Controversial findings : “Devices Used To Access Surveys Are Changing Rapidly – Are You Prepared?”

EasyInsites, an online research agency specialising in custom panels and online fieldwork, and Cint, a technology company providing solutions for gaining high-quality market insight, presented controversial findings today at the CASRO Technology Conference in New York City.

Their study found that survey-taking experiences on devices such as smartphones and tablets are often not positive, contrary to popular belief that our industry’s surveys work properly across devices.

Visit us at: www.EasyInsites.com

Looking across a wide variety of custom and access panels, anywhere from 7% to 20% or more of panelists are attempting to join panels and take surveys with either their smartphone or tablet devices instead of using a regular computer or laptop. If their experience is a negative one and as a result these consumers choose not to join and participate, then a substantial slice of the population is being excluded from our industry’s panels and surveys.

EasyInsites and Cint conducted research across several key markets in the world including the US, UK, France, Sweden and Australia. While some differences exist between markets, there was a general consistent pattern with the following key findings:

1. • Smartphone and tablet use is large enough to matter and is growing, and varies greatly by panel (from 7% to 20% or more)
2. • More survey problems are reported by those who are trying to take surveys on their smartphone and tablet devices, as compared with regular computers and laptops (54% and 45% vs. 20%)
3. • Smartphone and tablet users tend to belong to fewer panels and as a result take fewer surveys (71% of computer users belong to more than 1 panel vs. 58% of smartphone users and 52% of tablet users)
4. • Despite potential problems experienced on smartphones and tablets when taking surveys, a large proportion of users of these devices still prefer using these devices for survey taking (72% of those who took our survey on a tablet, stated they prefer using tablets to take surveys, and 45% for smartphones)
5. • Those who prefer these newer devices tend to be different types of consumers, for example tablet users tend to shop for better quality products whilst those who prefer their computer tend not to purchase expensive brands. Therefore, it is important to enable all device users to take easily take surveys, in order to reach these different consumer types.
6. • Taking surveys on smartphones increases the length of time the survey takes to complete. Yet as an industry, we provide the same incentive, based on average estimated length of interview regardless of device used (for a short survey of 5 minutes, smartphone participation made the length of interview increase by 1 minute or 20% vs. taking it on a computer)
7. • Survey designs can successfully accommodate these newer devices by simply considering what the experience will be like for the respondent by device, automatically detecting the device being used to access the survey, and providing the correct version with adjusted question types and formatting to make the experience optimal for each device

These research findings are extremely important as our industry battles the challenges associated with panel attrition, declining response rates, generating representative results, and collecting high quality and consistent data.

A copy of this research can be obtained from either EasyInsites or Cint and is entitled “Devices Used To Access Surveys Are Changing Rapidly – Are You Prepared?”

For more information regarding this media release, please contact:

Charles M. Pearson, Managing Director

charles@easyinsites.com

Direct: +44(0) 1483 549 418

Visit us at: www.EasyInsites.com