>Introduction to Internet Surveys
>The internet represents the fastest growing and most exciting way to conduct survey research. If you’ve been online for more than a couple minutes, there is a 100% chance that you’ve either signed up to participate in an online survey or have at least been invited to take an online survey (blame those annoying pop-up surveys).
Internet surveys have grown exponentially compared to other modes of surveys because they offer distinct advantages: they are 1) quick and easy to create and implement, and 2) usually don’t cost a lot of money. The cost of an internet survey ranges from almost nothing (if you have the sample and program the survey yourself) to moderately expensive but still cheaper than a telephone, mail or in-person survey (if you have to buy sample and outsource the development of the online survey).
Internet surveys are especially good in situations where the respondents are known to you and have an interest in the subject, such as employee, membership, or customer surveys. They can be used for hard to find respondents as online sampling firms have established “panels” of respondents whose characteristics are in a database and have pre-emptively agreed to participate in surveys.
Of course, like all research approaches, Internet surveys have their weaknesses. Response rates to internet surveys are typically very low because they are usually very easy to ignore, which means that 1) you’ll need a lot of sample to complete even a small number of surveys, and 2) there is more chance that your survey results are not representative of the larger population you are targeting. In addition, there is the ‘professional survey taker’ phenomenon, where people sign up for many online surveys for the sole purpose of making money. Just check out their rules.
Internet surveys certainly have an important place in the market research toolbox (or is it a shed) – but be aware that they have some tradeoffs compared to other modes of data collection. In addition, online surveys have become much more pervasive in the past few years (how many websites now have surveys that popup when you log onto them?) meaning that they are becoming more of an annoyance as well as more likely to be ignored.
