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Quantitative surveys

What is it?

A quantitative survey seeks to ‘quantify’ something from a numerical or statistical point of view. It may be used to quantify the size of a market or market share, or it may be used to quantify opinion.

Quantitative surveys are characterised by their structure. They pose specific closed questions and then provide a selection of answers that the respondent must choose from. The respondent is not allowed to elaborate but instead must select the answer that is correct or most correct for them.

The standardised approach and structured answers make quantitative surveys easier to complete and interpret. If you need to classify features, count them, and then construct a statistical model to explain what you observed then you probably need to collect quantitative data collected automatically via operations, or through a well-designed survey.

Why does it matter?

It matters because quantitative survey data allows you to build up a clearer picture of how a random sample of a target population or audience behaves or what they think about a particular topic. The findings can then be projected out to the whole target audience to generalise opinion and measure the incidence of various views or opinions within the survey. This type of analysis can also be helpful in finding out more about particular sub-groups to understand more about what they want, like or dislike about your offering.

Plus if you initiate quantitative surveys on a regular basis to the same group of people then you can monitor changes to behaviour or opinion over time. This is especially useful if you maintain at least some of the same questions so you can make accurate comparisons.

How can I use it in practice?

Quantitative surveys and questionnaires are ideal if you want to quantify something whether that is opinion or the potential size of a market. They are especially useful in helping to:

  • Establish whether or not there is a market for your products and services.
  • Establish whether your audience is aware of your product or service.
  • Estimate how many people are interested in buying your product or service and the likely size of your market.
  • What type of people are your best customers.
  • Establish your customer’s buying habits.
  • Figure out the changing needs of your target market.

Quantitative surveys are very flexible and they can be particularly useful for measuring strength of feeling regarding a particular area of interest such as customer satisfaction or how much a customer loves a product or service. It can also allow you to measure how that opinion changes over time, which can help to get back on track quicker.

They can, however, be quite easy to fudge – simply by skewing the recipient group. Plus, because of their flexibility, quantitative surveys are widely used which means respondents can be quite jaded about filling them in. You may need to provide an incentive to get enough people to participate to ensure it’s worthwhile.

How do I get started?

You need to know what questions you are seeking answers to and design the survey around those strategically important questions.

There are some guidelines to remember when creating your survey:

  • Surveys of any kind to any stakeholder group can induce eye-rolling and apathy so make sure you explain the purpose and potential benefit of the survey. If recipients understand why they are being asked to complete the survey and what difference the results might make to their lives then they are more inclined to engage with the questions, answer accurately and provide useful information.
  • Use clear, simple language. That means no overly complex ‘business-speak’ or jargon.
  • Ask one question at a time. Don’t roll questions together. For example, don’t ask recipients ‘How attractive and easy to use is product X’? They are two different questions.
  • Make it as short and easy to complete as possible. Only ask questions that you genuinely need the answers to.
  • Have your survey professional designed so that it looks attractive and includes plenty of white space.

Once you have designed your survey consider distributing it online. Most quantitative surveys are conducted online via web-based surveys such as Survey Monkey to aid in the collection and analysis of results. They can also be conducted over the phone, by post or face to face but this tends to be more expensive because the results must then also be input into an analytics tool.

Possible data sources

The data comes directly from specially created quantitative surveys which can be sent to specific target groups such as your customers, your employees, suppliers, investors, etc.

These surveys can be administered face to face via interview or over the phone. Or they can be sent out through the post or conducted using online web-based or mobile tools.

How difficult or costly is it to collect?

This will depend on how big the survey is and how it’s conducted. Obviously it will be more expensive if you decide to hire researchers to ask questions face to face or print and post a questionnaire with telephone follow-up. In postal survey’s all the responses will also still need to be input into a program for analysis so this is usually an additional labour cost.

In most cases the most cost-effective and quickest approach to quantitative surveys is via an online web-based tool that distributes the survey and inputs responses directly into a program that will then analyse the results, or collate the data ready for export into a program that can analyse the data.

Practical example

A travel agent may want to know more about their customers so they can target their marketing initiatives to the right areas at the right time. They may create a customer survey which may ask a number of pertinent questions such as ‘How many times have you flown overseas in the last 6 months?’ The answers may be:

Never

1–2

2–5

6–10

More than 10

This structured approach allows the travel agent to analyse a large amount of data and convert that into useful statistics that can then be extrapolated to a wider population and help guide decision making and marketing activities.

Tips and traps

Define the target market of your survey very clearly so you know who you are seeking opinion from and why. Once you understand this then select the best contact method for that audience not for you. Unless it’s easy and convenient for your target audience to complete the survey they won’t bother, so remove as many obstacles as possible.

Don’t make the survey too long. Only ask questions that you really need to know the answer to and seek to make completing the survey as quick and easy as possible for the recipient.

Further reading and references

To find out more about conducting quantitative surveys see for example:

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