Analytical
How to Make the Most of Survey Monkey Results
Before conducting a survey, one must always have an accurate description of his/her target audience: who they are, what their characteristics are, if they are male or female, how old they are, what they do for a living, how much money they make and so on.
One must also use (free) secondary research to find information about his/her products, competition etc.
The better job one does of writing the survey and planning the analysis, the easier the job of interpreting the survey will be for them.
The first few steps to take when interpreting your survey are:
- How many people completed the survey?
- How does that compare to the target group – the number of people on your email list, for example?
- What was the response rate? (To figure this out, take the number of people who completed the survey and divide that by the number of people who opened the survey invitation.)
- What was the average amount of time that people spent taking the survey (in other words, did people take it seriously or did they seem to fly through the questions)?
- Who responded-what does the breakdown look like, in terms of age, gender, type of business, etc? How well does it represent your target group (for example, your customer base or e-mail list)?
Next, look at the answers to your key questions or “outcomes” in the survey. For example, if your survey is a product creation survey, what % of the respondents said they’re very interested or somewhat interested in the product and what percentage said they’re not interested at all? Of those who are interested in the product, what kinds of things do they want to see in the product? How would they like the product delivered? What are they willing to pay for it?
Thirdly, see how those things “break” by demographic characteristics: Are men more interested in the product than women? Are newcomers more or less interested than people who’ve been in the business longer? This will start to give you a good sense of who’s most likely to buy the product and at whom you need to target it.
One must then ask himself/herself, what do the open-ended questions tell me? Your survey should rely mostly on closed-ended questions since they are easier for respondents to answer and easier for you to analyze. Open-ended questions are great for picking up on things that were not captured with closed-ended questions. Read through those comments, first looking for themes in the comments, then looking for how widespread those themes are, and finally summarizing what you’ve learned from these questions.
Finally, based on the results, create your “to do” list:
- If there is clear interest in the product that you’re creating, you should combine everything you can to draw your road map for creating that product – then, follow that map.
- You should have learned things about your target audience that you didn’t already know. Make a list of those things and note the things you want to further explore in future surveys.
- Note the things that don’t make sense to you. These are things you might want to explore on your blog or even in conversations with some of the survey respondents.
It’s always a good idea to look back at the comments that your respondents wrote about the survey. This should help you when you design your next survey.
These steps should aid you in analyzing results from SurveyMonkey.com.
For more information, click here.
Three Research Methods in the Classroom
In 1989 and 1990, an action research project was conducted to explore student reactions to multiple intelligences-based instructional models. The information was gathered in three ways: a daily journal was kept, a classroom climate survey was administered 18 times during the year, and a student assessment inventory of work at the 7 centers was administered nine times during the year.
The data was analyzed each week and observations were made. They were tested and verified. A hypothesis was formed and then tested again. This experimentation is much like the seven steps of the scientific method. It is factual and inexpensive to run.
Need to know more? Click here.
Sharing Survey Results
Bloggers often share survey questions, results and responses. Looking at other surveys is a great way to learn how to make your own.
Keep in mind, though, that not all surveys are created equal. For example, take a look at the survey and survey responses for this Athletes’ Acceleration survey about the United States’ performance in the Olympic track and field games.
At first glance the survey looks legitimate, but a closer look reveals that it is not an ideal survey to emulate. It biases the results by assuming that people believed that Team USA failed at the Olympic games and using inflammatory language.
The written responses reveal that the survey is flawed, and could be improved. So, before you use a survey as a model, make sure it is an appropriate example.
11/25/08 An Example of a Questionnaire
There is definitely a right and wrong way to create a questionnaire.
The following is a link to a good example of a questionnaire from Hemel Hempstead:
www.dacorum.gov.uk/pdf/Appendix%202.pdf
