Survey coding is an invaluable tool for researchers aiming to analyze the open-ended responses in surveys. This method involves categorizing and labeling textual data from responses to questions that allow participants to express themselves freely, beyond the constraints of predefined choices.

In this post, we'll explore what survey coding is, why it's essential, and how it can transform unstructured open-ended responses into actionable, quantitative data. We'll walk you through the process of creating a comprehensive codebook, discuss the best practices for ensuring consistency and accuracy, and highlight some of the common challenges you might encounter along the way.

What Is Survey Coding?

Survey coding of open-ended responses involves organizing and categorizing textual data gathered from survey questions to make it easier to analyze. Here's a detailed breakdown of the process:

• Collection of Responses: In surveys, alongside multiple-choice questions, there are often open-ended questions where respondents can provide their answers in their own words.
• Initial Review: The responses are first reviewed to understand the range of answers provided and the different ways respondents interpret the question.
• Development of Codebook: A codebook is created which defines categories or themes that the responses can be sorted into. This involves identifying common themes, patterns, or recurring phrases within the responses.
• Coding the Responses: Each response is read and assigned one or more codes based on its content. This coding process can be done manually by researchers or with the aid of text analysis software which can help to automate some parts of the process.
• Refinement of Codes: As coding progresses, some codes might be split, combined, or refined to better capture the nuances of the responses. This is an iterative process that may require going back to previously coded responses and reassigning them under the new scheme.
• Analysis: Once coding is completed, the coded data can be analyzed quantitatively (e.g., calculating the frequency of each code) or qualitatively (e.g., examining the context around certain codes to understand deeper meanings).
• Reporting: The results are then compiled into a report, providing insights such as common themes, unusual opinions, or general sentiment about the surveyed topics.

Survey coding is essential for effectively using open-ended responses, as it transforms qualitative text into quantifiable data, allowing for a more structured analysis that can complement the statistical findings from closed-ended questions.

Benefits Of Quality Survey Coding

Survey coding, especially of open-ended responses, offers several important benefits that enhance the value of survey data for research, decision-making, and strategy development. Here are some key advantages:

1. Rich Insights: Open-ended responses can provide depth and context that closed-ended questions might miss. Coding these responses helps in extracting these nuanced insights systematically, allowing for a more comprehensive understanding of participants' opinions and experiences.
2. Quantifiable Data from Qualitative Responses: By categorizing qualitative responses into predefined codes, researchers can quantify this data. This quantification makes it easier to perform statistical analysis, such as identifying trends or comparing subgroups within the data.
3. Identification of Themes and Patterns: Coding helps in identifying common themes and patterns that may not be immediately apparent. This can be especially useful in exploratory research where the range of possible responses is not well known beforehand.
4. Enhanced Data Management: Coded data are easier to manage, store, and retrieve. Researchers can quickly access and analyze large volumes of data without needing to sift through each individual response repeatedly.
5. Improved Reliability and Consistency: A well-defined coding scheme ensures that data is processed consistently, reducing the variability introduced by different researchers’ interpretations. This enhances the reliability of the data, making the findings more robust.
6. Facilitates Comparison and Tracking Over Time: Coded data can be compared across different groups or tracked over time more easily than raw textual data. This is particularly useful for longitudinal studies or when comparing responses across different demographics.
7. Supports Mixed-Methods Research: Coding allows for the integration of qualitative data into predominantly quantitative studies, supporting mixed-methods approaches that can provide both breadth and depth in research findings.
8. Feedback for Future Surveys: Insights derived from coded responses can inform the development of future surveys, such as by helping to refine questions, adjust response options, or identify new areas of interest that require exploration.

Overall, survey coding is a powerful tool that transforms text data into highly-precise structured, actionable information, providing a deeper understanding of the research subject and enhancing the impact of the findings.

When Do You Use Survey Coding?

Survey coding is used in several specific situations during research and data analysis, particularly when dealing with qualitative data from surveys. Here are some common scenarios where survey coding is especially useful:

1. Analyzing Open-Ended Survey Responses: Whenever surveys include open-ended questions where respondents can write their answers freely, coding is used to organize these textual responses into quantifiable categories. This allows for systematic analysis alongside the quantitative data from closed-ended questions.
2. Exploratory Research: In early stages of research, where the aim is to understand broad themes and sentiments about a topic, coding helps identify and categorize these themes from survey responses. This is useful for shaping further research or developing hypotheses.
3. Market Research: Companies often use survey coding to analyze customer feedback on products, services, or experiences. Coding helps identify common complaints, suggestions, or praises, guiding business improvements and product development.
4. Academic Studies: Researchers in fields like sociology, psychology, and health often use survey coding to analyze data collected through questionnaires. It helps them understand patterns, relationships, and influences among variables based on participants’ textual responses.
5. Customer Satisfaction and Feedback Analysis: To gauge customer satisfaction and gather actionable feedback, businesses code responses from satisfaction surveys. This can inform customer service policies, product improvements, and overall business strategies.
6. Policy and Public Opinion Research: In policy-making and public opinion surveys, coding is used to categorize responses to open-ended questions about laws, regulations, or political issues. This helps in understanding public sentiment and informing policy decisions.
7. Longitudinal Studies: In studies that track changes over time, coding allows researchers to consistently categorize responses across different time points. This is crucial for accurately measuring how opinions, behaviors, or experiences change.
8. Content Analysis: Coding is used in content analysis where the content of text data—such as responses to an open question about media usage or preferences—is categorized into defined codes to analyze trends and patterns.
9. Qualitative Data Integration: In research, where both quantitative and qualitative data are collected, coding qualitative responses allows for integration with quantitative data, providing a richer, more comprehensive analysis.

In all these scenarios, survey coding is an effective solution for transforming unstructured comments into structured data that can be analyzed statistically.

Survey Coding Best Practices

Adhering to best practices in survey coding ensures that the data derived from open-ended responses is reliable, consistent, and useful for analysis. Here are some key best practices to follow when coding survey responses:

1. Develop a Comprehensive Codebook: Start by creating a detailed codebook that clearly defines each code, including descriptions and examples. This serves as a guideline for coders to apply the codes consistently. It should also include rules on how to handle ambiguous or unclear responses.
2. Train Coders Thoroughly: Ensure that all coders are thoroughly trained on the codebook and understand the objectives of the coding process. Regular training sessions can help maintain consistency, especially as the codebook might evolve over the course of a project.
3. Ensure Inter-Coder Reliability: Use multiple coders for the same set of responses initially to check for inter-coder reliability, which is the level of agreement among different coders. This helps identify any ambiguities in the codebook and ensures that the coding is reliable and consistent.
4. Use Pilot Testing: Before full-scale coding, conduct a pilot test with a sample of responses. This helps in refining the codebook by identifying new themes or issues that weren’t initially apparent. Adjust the codebook based on the findings.
5. Iterative Process: Be prepared to revisit and revise the codes as you process the responses. As you dive deeper into the data, new themes might emerge or existing codes might need refinement.
6. Maintain Coding Consistency: Regularly review the coding work to ensure consistency over time, especially for large projects or long-term studies. This might involve periodic retraining sessions or recalibrations of the coding rules.
7. Automate When Appropriate: Consider using software tools for coding if the volume of data is large. Many tools offer features like text parsing, pattern recognition, and preliminary coding suggestions, which can increase efficiency. However, human oversight is crucial to handle nuances and context that the software might miss.
8. Document All Processes: Keep detailed records of all coding decisions, changes to the codebook, and any issues encountered during the coding process. This documentation is vital for the credibility and replicability of the research.
9. Analyze Coded Data Critically: When analyzing the coded data, be critical of the codes themselves and the potential for bias or error. Analysis should consider not just the frequency of codes but also their context and the interrelations between different themes.
10. Ensure Ethical Standards: Respect the confidentiality and anonymity of survey respondents, especially when handling sensitive information. Ensure that all data handling and coding practices comply with ethical guidelines and legal requirements.

By following these best practices, you can maximize the accuracy and utility of the coding process, thereby enhancing the quality of data derived from open-ended survey responses.

Differences in Using Survey Coding vs Text Analysis To Analyze Open-End Survey Responses

Survey coding and text analytics are both methods used to process and analyze text data, but they have different focuses and methodologies. Understanding their distinctions can help in choosing the right approach for a given research need.

Survey Coding

Survey coding primarily deals with categorizing and tagging open-ended responses collected from surveys. It involves interpreting responses based on a predefined set of categories or themes that researchers develop to capture the essence of the text data.

Methodology:

• Manual or Semi-Automated: Coding can be done manually by researchers or semi-automatically using software that assists in categorizing responses.
• Developing a Codebook: Researchers create a codebook that defines each category or code. This includes descriptions of what type of response fits each category.
• Application: Codes are applied to each response to summarize and categorize the data, making it easier to analyze statistically.

Survey Coding Use Cases

It is commonly used in market research, social science research, customer feedback analysis, and anywhere qualitative data needs to be quantitatively analyzed.

Text Analytics

Text analytics involves a broader set of techniques designed to extract information and insights from text data. It uses algorithms and natural language processing (NLP) techniques to uncover patterns and insights within large volumes of text.

Methodology:

• Automated Tools: Text analytics is typically performed using software and algorithms that can process large datasets more efficiently.
• Techniques: This includes sentiment analysis, keyword extraction, topic modeling, and more. These techniques automatically identify and quantify various elements within the text without needing a predefined codebook.
• Natural Language Processing (NLP): Text analytics heavily relies on NLP to understand the grammar, structure, and even the sentiment of the text.

Text Analytics Use Cases

Text analytics is used in a wide array of applications like business intelligence, market analysis, customer service improvements, and sentiment analysis across various types of text sources like social media, customer reviews, and news articles.

Key Differences Between Survey Coding and Text Analytics

• Scope: Survey coding is more specific in scope, focusing on categorizing survey responses into predefined themes. Text analytics is broader, applying various computational techniques to extract insights from text responses.
• Automation: Survey coding can be manual or semi-automated, while text analytics is highly automated, leveraging complex algorithms and machine learning.
• Purpose: Coding is primarily about simplifying and structuring text for analysis, often in academic or formal research contexts. Text analytics is about discovering patterns and insights in text data, used across many industries for various business and research purposes.

In essence, while both methods aim to derive meaningful information from text, they do so in different ways and are suited to different types of analysis and data volumes.

FAQs

What is survey coding?

Survey coding is the process of categorizing and labeling open-ended responses collected from surveys. This process involves defining a set of codes, which are thematic or categorical labels, and applying them to the responses to organize the data into meaningful groups. This makes it easier to analyze qualitative data quantitatively.

Why is coding important in survey research?

Coding is essential in survey research because it transforms raw, open end comments into structured, analyzable form. This allows researchers to perform statistical analysis, identify trends, and draw significant conclusions from the data. Coding also ensures that data interpretation is systematic and consistent, improving the reliability of the research findings.

What are the differences between manual and automated coding?

Manual coding involves researchers applying codes to survey responses by hand, which can be time-consuming but allows for nuanced understanding. Automated coding uses software to apply predefined codes to text data. While faster and more consistent, it may not handle nuances as effectively as a human coder. The choice between manual and automated coding depends on the project's scale, complexity, and available resources.

Contact the Survey Coding Experts at Ascribe

Survey coding is an essential practice for transforming unstructured, open-ended responses into structured, actionable data. If you are seeking survey coding capabilities, Ascribe, with over 25 years of experience and having processed over 6 billion responses for the top global market research firms and corporations, offers cutting-edge open end analysis solutions. Ascribe Coder is the leading coding survey platform designed for high efficiency and precision, and CX Inspector is the premier text analytics solution equipped with advanced tools to decipher and illuminate the underlying sentiments and insights in textual data.

For a deeper dive into how Coder and CX Inspector can transform your data analysis process and significantly enhance your research outcomes, we invite you to contact us or schedule a demo using your own dataset.

What is an Engagement Survey?

Engagement survey, also known as an employee engagement survey is used to determine the level of employee engagement within an organization. Now, how exactly do we define the term “engagement”? Employee engagement refers to a person’s sense of connection to a company. They focus on how dedicated they are towards their work and whether or not they will stay with an organization on a long-term basis.Employees are the core of an organization. Therefore, it is important to understand how they feel about the organization’s work environment. Engagement survey is the best way to gauge the extent to which employees feel valued and respected at their workplace.Engagement surveys enable an organization to focus on specific issues being faced by the employees and transform the workplace. Employees who work in a pleasant environment are happier, which promotes customer satisfaction.

Why conduct an Engagement Survey?

An employer with a large workforce will not be able to have a one to one conversation with every employee. This is where organizations can rely on an engagement survey.

• Engagement surveys provide a platform to the employees to share their feedback revolving around the organization policies, work environment, management, etc. 
• It gives organizations an insight into the key issues they may not even be aware of. Organizations can use the results of engagement surveys to make well-informed decisions.
• Engagement surveys can be filled by employees anonymously. This enables them to express honest opinions.
• To assess if there have been any improvements, the responses to the same questions can be compared to past responses. Organizations can establish a baseline against which they can measure their progress year after year.
• Engagement surveys give organizations a sense of accountability. The organizations recognise that employees at all levels contribute to the success of an organization. 

What makes a good engagement survey question?

The ideal engagement survey questions focus on the following elements:

• Questions that give a better understanding of the employees’ emotions and attitude.
• How motivated the employees are to work within the company.
• Suggestions on ways to boost staff productivity.
• Questions that are clear, concise and use neutral wordings.
• Questions that will actually be able to draw actionable results.Engagement survey questions to ask

It is important to ask the right engagement survey questions that will provide impactful results. A few questions that could be a part of your survey are listed below:

Employee satisfaction

• How do you feel about your job?
• Are you satisfied with the salary and benefits given to you?
• Would you recommend our organization to a friend or relative?
• Are you happy with the work you've been given?
• Do you enjoy working with your team?
• Do you look forward to going to work?

Career goals

• Does the organization provide opportunities for growth?
• Does the organization inspire you to give your best?
• Is there an alignment between your goals and the company objectives?
• Do you have the tools to work efficiently?
• Does your manager and coworkers support your career goals?

Team Culture

• Do you and your coworkers share ideas and work in collaboration?
• Do you spend time thinking about ways to improve your team’s work process?
• Does your manager listen to your concerns with patience?
• Does your team encourage you to complete your tasks?
• Do you feel recognized by your team for your contribution in work?

Psychological well being

• Are your team members able to openly discuss tough issues?
• Do you know whom to talk to if you are facing issues that are not under your manager’s control?
• Do you feel comfortable sharing your opinions in team meetings?
• Does the organization support a healthy work-life balance?
• Are you able to dedicate time to your family?

Effective communication

• Are you informed effectively about any refinement in policies and procedures?
• Do you feel there is a two-way communication with the organization?
• Does the management communicate all information with transparency?
• Do you feel managers and coworkers communicate information clearly?

Open-ended questions

• Are there any improvements to be made in the work culture?
• What policies or practices do we need to change?
• According to you, how can we improve employee engagement?
• Would you like to share anything about your experience at our organization?
• Is there anything more we should have asked about in this survey?

How to make the most of engagement surveys?

• Begin by determining why the survey is being conducted. Decide whether you are addressing specific concerns or seeking feedback on a recent policy change. This will enable the survey creator to ask the right questions in a clear and concise manner. 
• Engagement surveys can be paired with pulse surveys. Engagement surveys are usually conducted annually. However, these are not enough. In order to address the issues being faced by employees at a specific instant of time, pulse surveys can be conducted on a frequent basis.
• A mix of open and closed-ended questions should be included. 
• Conducting a survey is not enough. Organizations should be able to transform the results into actions. It's critical to recognise and acknowledge the employees' responses.

See Voxco survey software in action with a Free demo.Book a Free Demo

Final words

Employee engagement is complex, so an engagement survey should include a variety of factors. Use the engagement survey questions listed above to put together a survey that will bring you closer to your objectives.

When customers feel heard, they feel valued. This develops a sense of trust and loyalty towards the brand. By actively gathering feedback and acting upon it, you can demonstrate your commitment to improving and delivering a great experience at every interaction.

VoC strategy can help you nurture long-lasting relationships with customers and thrive in the competitive marketplace. In this article, we’ll look into several Voice of Customer examples and some common mistakes you should avoid maximizing the impact of the VoC program.

What is Voice of Customer ?

Voice of Customer, or VoC, is the process of gathering customer feedback in an attempt to identify any existing gaps between customer experience and customer expectations. The data gathered in VoC allows businesses to identify where customer grievances lie so that such gaps can be filled.

VoC programs are conducted differently in different organizations and there isn’t one correct way on how to conduct them. To reflect this, we’ve provided four examples to reflect how different organizations leverage their Voice of Customer program in a distinct way to reap the most benefits.

Examples of Voice of Customer

In order to better understand the concept of Voice of Customer, let’s take a look at a few examples of how different industries organizations in different industries leverage VoC to understand their customers and their expectations.

1. VoC in Subscription-First Ecommerce: Subbly

Subbly is a subscription-first e-commerce platform that successfully used VoC for product refinement. Subbly did so by creating an online page that is dedicated to gathering feedback from their customers. They often run surveys on pricing to understand how customers feel about their subscription plans. By constantly gathering data to hear their customers’ voices, Subbly is able to shape their product roadmap and decide which features to release.

2. VoC in Banking: Johannesburg Bank

The banking industry is a highly competitive space and banks must constantly change to keep up with customer expectations and rival banks. In this sector, it is very hard for organizations to keep their churn rate low due to competing organizations constantly introducing new and innovative ways to poach customers.

In order to remain competitive and reduce their customer churn rate, Johannesburg bank decided to use VoC and perform a comprehensive analysis on customer feedback across all their official channels, as well as social media. To do so, they used a hashtag-based campaign to gather feedback from customers regarding what they loved and hated about their bank. This campaign was able to generate two million pieces of feedback, which was sifted through to create custom categories that divided the feedback based on what bank service they were regarding (mobile banking, fees and charges, etc). Named Entity Recognition, or NER, was then used to conduct sentiment analysis by allocating sentiment scores to the different comments. These scores allowed the bank to identify which areas and issues needed their attention most.

3. VoC in Primary Healthcare: Nahdi Medical

Nahdi Medical is a major healthcare provider in Saudi Arabia. They leveraged a VoC program using survey documents and the feedback gathered from online forums. Once the data was gathered, sentiment analysis and text analytics were carried out to identify the different categories of feedback. After the feedback was clustered into different categories (by quality, convenience, price, etc), the result acquired was a highly detailed picture of Nahdi’s performance. This allowed Nahdi medical to identify gaps in CX and customer pain points so that these could be addressed effectively.

4. VoC in Insurance: Lawley

New York-based insurance firm Lawley used a Voice of Customer program by collecting customer feedback through NPS^® (Net Promoter Score^®) surveys. They used relationship NPS^® surveys to measure customers’ overall perception of their brand, which enabled them to benchmark their NPS^® score across different regions. By doing so, the organization was able to identify many different issues within the customer journey. They used this information to identify pain points and follow up with clients on their grievances before they could lose a large number of accounts. VoC helped Lawley improve customer service and prevent customer churn.

Voice of Customer: 6 mistakes to avoid

VoC strategy can be incredibly valuable for your business, but there are common mistakes that you should be aware of. We have listed down six such errors you should avoid to maximize the effectiveness of the Voice of Customer initiative.

1. Lacking clear objective:

Most often, brands don’t have a clear objective for their VoC program. A clear goal helps you guide the strategy effectively and efficiently, to align every step to the ultimate goal. Without a clear grasp of what you want to achieve by gathering customer feedback, you won’t be able to gather meaningful insights.

2. Not segmenting customers:

You might serve a broader audience, but ignoring customer segments can be a fatal mistake. You should leverage the feedback to segment customers based on preferences, needs, demographics, purchase behavior, etc. This will enable you to tailor surveys and feedback mechanisms to cater to specific segments. You can ensure that all the initiatives address the diverse needs of the customer base.

3. Relying on only a single feedback channel:

You should not over-rely on a single feedback channel to gather customer insights. This can limit your knowledge of customers and the overall population. Conduct focus groups to engage customers in discussions and gather their feedback via mobile offline surveys. Use phone survey software to conduct interviews. Leverage data from customer support interactions.

Make sure to use multiple channels to gather customer feedback and data to get a comprehensive understanding of the Voice of Customers.

4. Not closing the feedback loop:

This step involves communicating with the respondents how you plan to use their feedback and what actions to be taken. Brands often overlook this step. However, closing the feedback loop helps demonstrate your commitment to making meaningful changes.

It’s a best practice to share improvements, resolutions, and updates with the survey respondents and keep the communication transparent.

5. Not acting on the feedback:

You need to show customers how their feedback has made a difference. Customers put effort and dedicate their time to offer you their insights, not taking action based on those feedback will show them that you don’t care about their opinion. Ignoring taking action can lead to a loss of trust.

Use survey software that enables you to analyze data, uncover insights, and act on them in a timely manner.

6. Failing to involve employees:

You need to share the voice of customers across the entire workforce and not just among the leaders. Every employee can benefit from customer insights and optimize decision-making to drive customer-centric initiatives.

Not involving or engaging employees in your VoC program will hinder the organization’s ability to align internal and external business processes.

Avoid these mistakes to improve customer satisfaction and drive business growth using a robust VoC strategy. Listen, act, and engage your audience and boost loyalty.

Takeaways

VoC analysis can be leveraged by organizations in many different ways, using many different techniques, to understand customer sentiment. When conducted effectively, Voice of Customer analysis can provide organizations with actionable insights that can be used to meet customer expectations and effectively reduce churn.  

It is a strategy that offers a direct channel for customers to express their opinions and for you to listen to their unfiltered experiences. By leveraging survey software and data analysis tools, you can gather and analyze vast amounts of customer feedback to align your offerings with customer preferences and deliver a great experience.

FAQs on Voice of Customer

What is the voice of the customer?

The VoC process or Voice of the Customer refers to the strategy of gathering customers’ feedback and opinion regarding a product, service, or brand. The strategy involves actively listening to what customers are saying and using the insight to take effective initiatives that improve customer satisfaction.

What are examples of VoC products?

Some examples of VoC products or methods are:

• Surveys
• Interviews
• Focus groups
• Customer feedback
• Customer journey mapping

What are the 4 types of customers?

The four types of customers you may come across in the business are:

• Loyal customers – Those who choose your brand consistently.
• Price-sensitive customers – The customers who make purchase decisions based on the price.
• Impulsive customers – Buyers who make spontaneous purchases.
• Nedd-based customers – Consumers who purchase depending on their needs or problems they want to address.

What are the 4 main customer needs?

The four main customer needs generally include the following:

• Functional need – Buyers need products/services that resolve a problem or meet a specific function.
• Emotional need – Consumers seek products that evoke positive emotions.
• Social need – They desire services and products that help them fit in and meet social expectations.
• Personalization need – Customers want their experience to cater to their unique needs and preferences.

What is the purpose of VoC?

The purpose of the Voice of Customers program is to listen, understand and meet customer expectations. The strategy enables you to make informed decisions and prioritize improvements based on customer feedback. This allows you to develop customer-centric strategies that boost customer satisfaction, drive loyalty, and gain competitive advantage.

What is a Voice of Customer interview?

A Voice of Customer interview refers to a one-on-one conversation between a company rep. And a customer. The aim is to gather detailed insights about the customers’ experience with the brand and its offerings.

The interview provides and opportunity to dig deep into the concerned topics, understand customers motivations and pain points that can help you share your business strategies.

What is the voice of customer analysis?

Voice of customer refers to the feedback your customer gives with regard to your brand, product, and services. Whereas its capturing and analysis are known as the voice of customer analysis.

As we know, brands are used to getting feedback from customers through various channels and methods like surveys, interviews, social media, etc. The real struggle starts when you have to make sense out of it. This is called analysis of the voice of customers, and it is a market research technique that gives brands an understanding of their customer’s needs and wants.

Voice of customer analysis will capture customers’ expectations, opinions, and preferences. Brands will work on these factors, analyze them and find insights to work upon which will give them a competitive advantage in the market.

Shape your brand with the customer’s voice.

Voxco helps you gather customer insights to help you get started in improving your brand awareness.

Why is it important to analyze the voice of customers?

• Voice of customer analysis will boost your marketing efficiency.
• It allows you to consider every customer’s feedback and analyze it for improvements.
• Voice of customer analysis gives you an idea about what causes the customers to stay or leave your brand.
• It helps you by understanding customers’ purchase decisions and choices.
• Voice of customer analysis will draw a picture for you about who are the most profitable customers and how you can gain new target customers to buy your products.

How to perform the voice of customer analysis?

You, as a brand, will have an abundance of data to deal with after gathering customer feedback. How your analysis turns out highly depends on the voice of customer tools you use to make insights out of the gathered data.

We will see in this section how to perform the voice of customer analysis on your voice of the customer:

Start with a question

This is the very first step. You might have a goal or a purpose before starting your Voice of Customer program. So even before you start your analysis, be firm and clear about your question. WHY are you analyzing your data for?

The analysis question can look something like this:

• To understand what the customers like more.
• To understand what the customers hate.
• To understand the new trends in the market.
• To get areas where the products and services can be improved.

Apart from this, you need to be sure about HOW you will gather your data, WHICH analysis tools you will use, and WHAT TYPES of analysis you will perform.

Gather your data

The second and pretty obvious step is to gather your data. It starts by selecting your sample customer or targets customer to feature as your voice of customers.

Make use of methods like surveys, interviews, focus groups, social media, etc., to have your data through customer feedback. Make sure to frame your surveys and questionnaires which are totally focused on your goal or survey topic and question. And then comes the voice of customer analysis.

Sentiment analysis

Here comes the analysis of data. The capabilities of AI mostly do this job. The AI basically identifies the sentiments in the feedback depending on whether it is positive feedback, negative feedback, or neutral. Further on this analysis, you can divide your path of progress into two major categories:

• Increase what people like.
• Improve what people hate.

Well, it does sound easy to label feedback as positive, negative, and neutral. But this is when you are doing it manually, which is, of course, not possible. Remember you are using an AI tool to measure these factors. So the system has been able to understand sarcasm, indirect criticisms, and twisted comments.

But once you start to analyze the data according to your use case, the system will get used to the analysis plan and work better towards the goal.

Natural language processing

Natural language processing, or NLP, is an essential way of processing your natural language. Voice of customer analysis needs the analyzing system to read through all the data and be able to make sense of the information. It will draw out the trends, preferences, topics, and issues by analyzing the words.

Plotting of words with their hidden trends and issues looks something like this:

This method gives you one label to represent a huge amount of data. Automated segmentation is the best way to cut your time-consuming analysis process.

Data correlation

Raw data makes no sense. You will have a lot of random data from customers, meaning god knows what. In every data analysis process, the raw data is useful only when the information is drawn from them. The same goes for the voice of customer analysis.

Let’s say you have your brand’s NPS score on the social media reviews of your product, only then will you have an idea of what conversations are influencing your NPS.

In case you are concerned about negative reviews, you can analyze the product reviews under shopping websites and social media to address those issues.

Draw conclusions

After you have labeled and segregated your data, it is time to make information out of it that will actually help you get to certain conclusions and insights to work on.

In this phase, you will have a clear understanding of how relevant your data, information, and conclusions are with respect to your targeted voice of customer goals.

Initiate improvements

Apparently, just getting to conclusions isn’t enough, right? The way you act upon the analysis and make improvements in your branding weighs a lot on the customers’ perception of you. Customers know they have given their feedback, and now they will wait for the corresponding changes in the brand.

As a brand, it is your responsibility to prove to your customers that you consider their opinions valuable and are willing to improve for them. This is the act that contributes most to the voice of customer analysis. For instance, if customers voiced their concern about finding it difficult to reach your support team via phone, consider adding a dedicated customer support business phone number to your website and social media profiles.

FAQs

What is the voice of customer analysis?

Voice Of Customer analysis refers to the process of extracting actionable insights into customers’ perspectives toward a brand, product, or service. It helps organizations to make decisions that are aligned with their customer’s expectations and ultimately helps improve customer satisfaction.

How to analyze the voice of customers?

Analyzing the voice of customers is an ongoing process and involves understanding and interpreting customer feedback, opinions, and preferences to gain insights into their needs and expectations.

Here are the key steps that go into analyzing the voice of customers:

1. Gather customer feedback
2. Categorize and organize feedback
3. Use sentiment analysis
4. Identify key issues and trends
5. Quantify the feedback
6. Prioritize improvement areas
7. Create customer personas
8. Share insights across the organization
9. Take action and monitor progress

What is customer analysis?

Customer analysis refers to the process of gathering and analyzing data and information about customers to gain insights into their characteristics, behaviors, preferences, and needs. It involves studying customer demographics, purchasing patterns, interactions, and other relevant data points to understand and segment the customer base.

How to do a customer analysis?

Customer analysis is done by gathering customer data (mostly with the help of online surveys), analyzing customer data, and then generating actionable insights from that data. It is a process of understanding customer characteristics, behaviors, preferences, and needs.

Among the traditional methods of research, telephone surveys have been a popular tool for decades. With the widespread availability of telephones across the population (landlines and cell phones), administering a survey by telephone has been increasingly common. It offers an efficient and cost-effective way to gather data from a wide population on a wider range of topics.

In this article, we will explore the advantages and disadvantages of telephone surveys and will also go over the different sources of error in this method of data collection.

What are Telephone Surveys?

Telephone surveys are a method of data collection wherein interviewers contact respondents via telephone to conduct an interview by asking the respondents a list of predetermined questions.

CATI surveys are a popular method of data collection as they are considered to be reliable and valid and allow for data to be gathered more quickly than via face-to-face surveys.

Advantages of Telephone Surveys

Phone surveys are designed to systematically gather data from a sample population using a standardized questionnaire. Researchers use it when they need to gather public opinion on a topic and maintain control over the data quality.

One of the great advantages of phone surveys is the flexibility they offer. For instance, by using a free virtual number, researchers can easily conduct surveys across different regions without worrying about geographic limitations. This cost-effective approach allows for broader data collection while still maintaining control over quality.

While it is one of the most ideal data collection tools, you should consider the following benefits before deciding whether or not telephone surveys are what you need.

The following are a few advantages of using the telephone survey mode:

Highly Accessible:

One of the advantages of administering a survey by telephone is that telephones are highly accessible. In today’s age, everyone either owns a landline or a mobile.

While telephone surveys may not be as popular as they used to be with the emergence of online surveys, many people still consider the telephone to be more practical. Not all your respondents are well-versed in technology or have internet coverage; for them telephone survey is a more viable option to take a survey.

Quality Control:

Telephone surveying allows for quality control over the entire data collection process, including sampling, respondent selection, survey administration, and data entry.

CATI surveys are consistent from one respondent to another. The interviewers use a standardized questionnaire to promote accuracy in response. Moreover, CATI software enables you to monitor live interviews and record the calls so you can monitor them later to identify any mistakes committed by any interviewer.

For example, say a survey organization conducted telephone interviews, and the interviewer went off-script and tried to ask personal questions to the respondent. The organization can monitor the ongoing call and intervene to salvage the situation.

Cost-Efficiency:

Another major advantage of telephone surveys is that they are extremely cost-effective when compared to face-to-face interviews.

Telephone survey software is a one-stop shop to create surveys and gather and analyze data. Additionally, agile software enables you to scale the software based on your research needs.

Using CATI software, you require less time to administer a survey by telephone, which makes it an attractive choice for organizations with limited budgets.

Fast Data Collection:

The speed with which data can be gathered and processed using telephone surveys is much faster than when compared to face-to-face interviews.

The emergence of the CATI system helps faster data collection, processing, and management. It makes the processing, organizing, and storing of survey data much easier for the interviewers. It automates tasks such as dialing a number, saving data, and filling in additional details, which saves the interviewer’s time and speeds up data collection.

Disadvantages of Telephone Surveys

While telephone surveys can offer many advantages, there are certain limitations you should consider when determining the best method of data collection.

The following are a few disadvantages of using the telephone survey mode:

Limitations on Length and Complexity of Interview:

Even when executed well and correctly, telephone surveys generally place a limitation on the complexity and length of an interview, as the average respondent will find it tiresome to be kept on the telephone for longer than 20 minutes.

Coverage Errors:

Telephone surveys tend to have a significant risk of coverage error, which would result in a defective frame and biased estimates when using survey data. This bias occurs when you gather survey data from individuals with access to telephones. As a result, the survey data will not represent the entire population. This can lead to inaccurate results.

Potential Geographical Ineligibility:

Due to number portability, researchers can no longer be certain of where a respondent is when contacted by telephone. Implementing number porting allows businesses to keep their phone numbers, ensuring continuity and trust. Without explicit geographic screening, there could be serious errors of commission which would result in geographically ineligible respondents being interviewed.

Lower Response Rate:

Other than non-response and coverage bias, technological advancement has led to lower response rates in telephone surveys. The use of caller ID and call-blocking technologies makes it difficult for interviewers to reach potential respondents.

3 Types of Total Survey Error (TSE) in Telephone Surveys

In survey sampling, total survey error refers to all forms of survey error. There are three main types of survey errors, including nonresponse error, noncoverage bias, and measurement bias.

01. Nonresponse

Nonresponse error occurs in telephone surveys when people who were a part of the sample frame but weren’t interviewed differ significantly as a group in a non-negligible way from those who were a part of the sample frame and were interviewed. Nonresponse in telephone surveys generally occurs due to:

• Failure to contact sampled respondents.
• Certain sampled participants refused to participate in the interview.
• There’s a language barrier making it difficult to interview certain respondents.

02. Noncoverage

Noncoverage bias is a result of the magnitude of the difference between the sampling frame and the larger population it is supposed to represent. The extent to which the population covered by the sample differs from the population not covered by the sample will be the extent of coverage bias present in the survey. Noncoverage in telephone surveys can occur due to:

• Certain households have no telephone numbers and only cell phone numbers instead.
• Certain households have multiple lines.

03. Measurement

Measurement bias occurs when the data collected by interviewers during telephone surveys inaccurately measures the attitudes, behaviors, and demographics of interest. These inaccuracies can take the form of bias and variance and are generally errors associated with:

• The questionnaire.
• The interviewer.
• The respondent.

Tephone Surveys

In telephone surveys, the response rate refers to the number of interviews completed out of all the telephone numbers dialled. This metric can be a revealing indicator of the quality of telephone surveys.

Response rates are generally influenced by;

• The survey topic
• The reputation of the organization conducting or sponsoring the survey
• The length of the questionnaire
• The calibre of the interviewers
• The length of the field period
• The rules for callback
• The use of contingent and noncontingent incentives

When should you use telephone surveys?

We have mentioned two use cases when telephone surveys are a useful research tool.

1. Target audience is available and willing to participate:

One of the primary advantages of telephone surveys is that it is widely accessible, which allows you to reach a diverse and large audience. However, it is true under the assumption that your target audience has access to the telephone and is willing to answer your survey questions.

When administering a survey by telephone, it’s important to consider the time and the availability of the target audience. Most people are not home during working hours. Those who are at home are either retired, unemployed, homemaker, or people on vacation/sick leave. Therefore, it is equally important that your respondents are willing to participate in the survey.

If your target market is not reachable by telephone, or if they are unwilling to participate, telephone surveys may not be the best option.

2. Your telephone survey questionnaire is very short:

Telephone surveys are the best data collection tools when you need to gather basic data such as customer satisfaction or brand loyalty. Whichever survey method you decide on, it's important to remember that you are asking participants to take time out of their day.

If your questionnaire is lengthy, the respondents will get impatient and not pay attention to your questions. So, telephone surveys are better when you gather data faster. It's important to keep the questionnaire brief and to the point.

How to Conduct Telephone Surveys?

Designing and conducting effective phone surveys in today’s landscape requires careful planning. Here are some tips for administering a survey by telephone.

1. Determine the purpose of the survey:

A telephone survey requires time and resources. That’s why it is important to develop a clear research objective and determine the type of data you want to collect.

Gather around the different departments and understand the type of information they want to obtain from the survey. This will help you structure your questionnaire and determine the sample size.

2. Create a list of contact:

When conducting customer research, it's best to create a list of customers you want to reach out to. Most companies urge their customers to share their phone numbers for a product or service.

You can either use the contacts of your existing customers or purchase a list from a telephone company. If you want to conduct market research, you can combine the two lists to expand your target market.

3. Design a questionnaire:

Now that you have determined the research objective and the target audience build a questionnaire for the research goal. Start by writing all the questions you want to ask and narrow them down to the most important ones.

Leverage skip and branching functionality throughout the script to ensure that you gather data from the right person on the right question. It is important that you test your survey before you begin your campaign. This will help you to identify any discrepancies and make necessary adjustments before you start your survey.

4. Use random sampling:

An effective way to ensure that the survey data reflects the population is by dialing the numbers in random order. Using the method of random sampling will ensure that the result is reliable.

You can achieve this by using a list of contacts that have been randomly generated.

By following these practices, you can ensure that the telephone surveys are effective and generate insightful data.

Conclusion

Telephone surveys offer several advantages, such as the ability to reach an audience quickly and efficiently. In this blog, we have shared the advantages, disadvantages, and best practices of administering a survey by telephone. Phone surveys are a common data collection tool for many organizations, however, to determine whether it suits your research purpose or not, we suggest you read our blog.

FAQs on Telephone Surveys

What are telephone surveys?

Telephone surveys are a method of data collection wherein interviewers contact respondents via telephone to conduct an interview by asking the respondent a list of different questions from a questionnaire.

What are the advantages of telephone surveys?

Some advantages of telephone surveys are that they are a fast and cost-effective method of data collection and can allow for high-quality control.

What are the disadvantages of telephone surveys?

Some disadvantages of telephone surveys are that it sets limitations on how lengthy and complex the interview can be. There is also the risk of coverage errors and respondents being geographically ineligible to participate in the survey.

Leverage CATI software to conduct automated telephone surveys. The software automated the dialing process and also administers the questionnaire. The interviewers can follow the script on their monitor to ask respondents a set of questions and record answers into the CATI system.

How to ensure the validity of telephone surveys?

Here are three ways to ensure the validity and reliability of the data you gather using phone surveys:

1. Use random sampling to ensure the sample represents the population.
2. Pilot-test your survey to identify and eliminate any issues.
3. Train interviewers to ask questions neutrally.

What are some ethical considerations you need to follow in telephone surveys?

Here is a list of ethical considerations one should follow while conducting telephone surveys:

1. Obtain consent from respondents to save personal data.
2. Protect the confidentiality of the respondents.
3. Avoid leading questions.
4. Provide respondents with information about the purpose of the survey and how you will use their feedback

What is a public opinion poll?

An unbiased public opinion poll refers to a type of survey or inquiry that is designed to measure the public’s opinions or views regarding a certain topic or a series of topics. The information collected through opinion polls can reflect certain attributes of a large population, allowing inferences to be drawn from them. Opinion polls often involve the use of a sample that is drawn to be reflective of the larger population. This allows the inferences made from responses to be generalised to the entire population. People who conduct and analyse opinion polls are generally referred to as pollsters.

How to conduct an opinion poll?

Setting up a sample

Before conducting a public opinion poll, you must first select and set up a sample. There are many different ways to set up a sample but we will specifically focus on the controlled sample method and area sampling method as they are the most commonly used methods by polling organizations.

• Controlled Sample

In this method, the sample is set in a controlled manner to ensure that the sample is reflective of the target population. To do so, a variety of units that comprise the entire population are included within the sample. This is done by setting up the sample with an equal percentage of units from different demographic segments (males and females, different age groups, communities, and economic classes) so that the sample is representative of the different groups.

• Area Sample

In this method, a cross-section or miniature sample is set up based on the cross-section of the area rather than of people. This sample is set by ensuring that the sum of the areas can represent an accurate miniature model of the population so that their opinions can be generalised to the wider population.This method of setting up a sample is more commonly used by researchers and pollsters relative to the controlled sample method as the information required to set up an area sample can be easily acquired through census reports and other accessible sources.

Phrasing the questions

Once you’ve set up your sample, you must phrase the questions that will be included in your poll. These are some general tips you can follow to phrase questions well so as to yield great results from your poll:

1. Avoid Loaded Questions: Ensure that all the questions are neutral as loaded or leading questions will jeopardize the authenticity of poll results. 
2. Avoid Double-Barreled Questions: Avoid including questions that touch upon more than one issue. 
3. Keep the Questions Clear and Concise: By keeping the questions clear and concise, you can ensure that they are not misinterpreted. 
4. Avoid using Jargon or Complicated Terms: Complicated questions fail to connect with the audience and are likely to yield meaningless or untrue responses. Use simple terms that will be easily understood by the audience. 
5. Test the Poll: It’s a good idea to test the poll before sending it out to the general public. Use any feedback collected to make changes. 

Questions to Ask in an Opinion Poll

The type of questions asked in public opinion polls will differ depending on the topic in focus. However, there are a few different types of questions commonly used in opinion polls:

1. Closed Questions: These questions often take the “yes” or “no” format. Such questions are generally used when the public already has an opinion on the issue in question. 
2. Open-Ended Questions: These questions provide a space to type in or write responses and therefore they allow respondents to freely express their views. Such questions are used when researchers want to identify the different views of the public that exist on a specific issue. 

Multiple Choice Questions: MCQs provide respondents with a predetermined menu of responses, or a checklist, from which an answer can be selected. Such questions are generally used when public opinion on a certain issue falls under just a few different categories.

Advantages of Public Opinion Polls

The following are a few key advantages of using public opinion polls as a method of data collection:

1. Have a Wide Reach: Opinion polls are often conducted online. This provides researchers with an extremely large reach as most of the population has access to the internet.
2. Fast and Accurate: When conducted using online poll software, opinion polls are fast and accurate. Units of the sample can easily and quickly respond to the poll and the researchers can obtain responses in real-time.

Serves as a Component to Democracy: Opinion polls reflect and reinforce the importance of the opinions of the wider population. It provides the common man with an opportunity to express their opinions and make them count.

Types of Public Opinion Polls

The following are some of the different types of polls used to measure public opinion:

• Tracking Polls: Surveys that are conducted repeatedly using the same sample group to identify and measure changes in opinion and views over time.
• Mass Survey: Polls that are conducted by interviewing a large subgroup of the population. 

• Focus Groups: A group interview that comprises a small number of demographically similar participants for an in-depth group discussion. The researcher brings up a topic or idea to gauge the reactions and opinions on it. The focus group is meant to be representative of the larger population so that their opinions can be generalised to those of the larger population.

• Opinion Polls: Polls that are conducted by sampling a small subgroup of the population to predict public opinions or attitudes on the issue.

• Benchmark Polls: Refers to the polls that are taken in a campaign, often right before a candidate announces their bid for office. They provide the campaign with a base for comparison, so candidates can discern any changes in their likelihood to win. 

• Entrance Polls: A poll that is taken before voters cast their vote at the polling station.

• Exit Polls: A poll that is taken after voters have cast their vote at the polling station.

FAQs on Public Opinion Polls

What is a public opinion poll?

A public opinion poll is a survey or inquiry that is designed to collect information on the public’s views or opinions regarding a certain topic.

Can the media influence public opinion?

The media can, and often does, largely influence public opinion. We consume media on a daily basis and our views and opinions on different issues are partly influenced by the media we consume on these topics.

What is another word for public opinion?

Public opinion is also sometimes referred to as political opinion.

What are opinion leaders?

An opinion leader is an individual or organization that is an expert on a certain issue or topic, and exerts a significant amount of influence within their industry or network.

You can't just develop a new product without understanding the need or interest for it in the market. So how do begin with such research? Which research should you even conduct?

This brings us to the topic of exploratory research. Exploratory research helps us gain an understanding of a topic, defines the variables of the problem, and establishes a basis for a more specific research question.

Read the article to learn what exploratory research is, its characteristics, & the methods used to perform it.

What is Exploratory Research?

Exploratory research investigates problems that are not clearly defined. It is conducted to gain insight into the existing problem, however, exploratory research does not provide a conclusive answer to these problems.

A researcher starts with an idea that is general in nature and uses this as a means to recognize issues that can become the focus of future research. An important feature of exploratory research is that the researcher should keep an open mind and be willing to change the direction of their research as they collect more and more insightful data.

Exploratory research uses the grounded theory approach, also known as interpretive research. It aims to answer questions such as: “What is happening?” “Why is this happening?” “How is this happening?”

For example, if a researcher wants to know how the target audience of their app perceives a particular filter, they can first find out which section uses their app. Then proceeding to find out which filters are most used, why they are used, and decide whether adding an additional filter similar to the existing ones will be a good idea.

What are the Characteristics of Exploratory Research?

Now that we have defined exploratory research, it is important to be familiar with its attributes. Exploratory research has several features that researchers need to learn to understand when to use it.

The following are the characteristics of exploratory research:

1. They are not structured in nature.

2. Exploratory research design is interactive, open-ended, and usually accessible within the budget of the organization.

3. It helps researchers uncover answers to questions such as: what is the problem being studied? What is the need for this study? What topics should be included in the study?

4. It is time-consuming and thus requires patience and persistence on the part of the researcher.

5. Exploratory research is broad, flexible, and adaptive in nature.

6. The researcher needs to go through all the information and data collected through the research.

7. Exploratory research needs to have an important cost or value; if not, it is ineffective.

8. The researcher should have some theories that will help in supporting the findings uncovered during the exploratory research.

9. Exploratory research generally produces qualitative data.

10. In some instances, where the study sample is large, and data is collected through surveys and experimentation, explorative research can be quantitative.

Now, that we have cataloged the characteristics, the question is how to go about collecting the data for your exploratory research. The following section explains the two methods you can use to conduct your research.

What are the Types of Exploratory Research?

Carrying out research on something that one has limited information about sounds and feels difficult. However, several methodologies can help you decide the best research design, how to collect data, and the variables to study.

There are two main methods of conducting exploratory research - primary research and secondary research. Under these two broad types, various methods can be used depending on the nature of your study.

The data can be of quantitative or qualitative nature. Let’s look at each of the research methods in detail.

1. Primary Research Methods

In the primary research, the information is collected directly from the respondents. This data can be collected from a group of people or just an individual.  It is usually done to explore a problem that needs in-depth analysis.

A) Surveys:

Surveys or polls can gather large amounts of data, usually from a predetermined group of respondents. They are one of the most popular quantitative research methods. Surveys or polls are used in exploratory research to explore the opinions, trends, or beliefs of the target population.

Surveys can now be conducted online and thus be made more accessible, thanks to technology! Nowadays, organizations have started offering shorter surveys and rewards to the respondents who fill them to increase the response rates and gain more insights. Short surveys can be sent to respondents through text messages right after they make a purchase and are asked to fill it for a coupon/discount in return, so organizations can understand their views on the product under study.

Voxco lets you conduct omnichannel surveys to gather insightful market research data anywhere, anytime.

B) Focus Groups:

Another widely used methodology in exploratory research is focus groups. In this method, a group of respondents is chosen and asked to express their opinions on the topic of interest. One important consideration when making a focus group is choosing people with a common background and similar experiences to get unified and consistent data.

An example of a focus group would be when a researcher wants to explore what qualities consumers value when buying a laptop. This could be the display quality, battery life, brand value, or color. The researcher can make a focus group of people who buy laptops regularly and understand the dynamics a consumer considers when buying electronic devices.

C) Observation:

Observational research can be quantitative or qualitative. It involves observing an individual and making inferences from their reactions to certain variables.

This research does not require direct interaction with the participants. For instance, a researcher can simply record the observations of how people react at the launch of a new product.

D) Interviews:

Surveys provide huge amounts of information in a relatively short period of time, but an interview with one person can provide in-depth information that can otherwise be overlooked in surveys. Interviews are a methodology for collecting data for qualitative research.

You can conduct the interview face-to-face or even on the telephone. For example, an interview with an employee about their job satisfaction can offer valuable insights that would otherwise go unnoticed in the closed-ended questions asked in a survey.

2. Secondary Research Methods:

In secondary research, information is gathered from primary research that has been published before. For instance, gathering information from case studies, newspapers, online blogs or websites, or government sources.

A) Online Resources:

The quickest way to find information on any topic is through the internet. A huge amount of data is available on the internet that you can download and use whenever you need it. One important factor to consider when acquiring data online is to check the authenticity of the sources provided by the websites.

For example, a researcher can find out the number of people using a preferred brand of clothing through a poll conducted by an independent website online.

B) Literature review:

Reviewing the existing literature on a particular topic from online sources, libraries or commercial databases is the most inexpensive method of collecting data. The information in these sources can help a researcher discover a hypothesis that they can test.

Here, sources can include information provided by newspapers, research journals, books, government documents, annual report published by organizations, etc. However, the authenticity of the sources needs to be considered and examined.

Government sources can provide authentic data but may require you to pay a nominal price to acquire it. Research agencies also produce data that you can acquire at a nominal cost, and this data tends to be quantitative in nature.  

C) Case studies:

Another way researchers can gather information for their exploratory research design is by carefully analyzing the cases that have been through a similar problem the researcher wishes to study. These cases are important and critical in the business world, especially.

The researcher should be cautious in reviewing and analyzing a case that is similar to the variables of concern in the present study. This methodology is commonly used in the health sector, social sciences, and business organizations.

For example; let’s assume that a researcher is interested in understanding how to effectively solve the problems of turnover in organizations. While exploring, he came across an organization that had high rates of turnover and was able to solve the problem by the end of the year. The researcher can study this case in detail and come up with methods that increase the chances of success for this organization.

[Related read: Primary Vs. Secondary Research]

What are the Steps to Conduct Exploratory Research?

Let’s explore the practical aspect of how you can conduct exploratory research from design to data analysis. Follow the steps as per your research requirements to uncover insights and validate your research question.

1. Identifying the problem area -

The very first step is for the researcher to identify the area of research and the problem can be addressed by finding out ways to solve it.

2. Creating a hypothesis -

If the researcher is aiming to solve a problem for which there are no prior studies or the problem has not been resolved efficiently in previous research, then the researcher creates his/her own problem statement. This problem statement, also called a hypothesis, will be based on the questions that the researcher came up with while identifying the area of concern.

3. Determining data collection methods -

While planning your research design, it is important to select the proper data collection methods. In this blog, we have explored the various methods of data collection so you can determine which method aligns with your objective.

Consider the nature of your research goal and identify the source of data you want to explore. Determine the data collection tools you need, which may include an online survey tool or a phone survey tool.

4. Choosing sampling method -

In order to ensure your research findings represent the target population, you need to choose the appropriate sampling method or leverage a market research panel. This step will help you gather data from the audience who have knowledge or experience about the subject, thus allowing you to gather relevant and accurate insights.

5. Analyzing data and identifying patterns -

Leverage a survey software that enables you to store and analyze data seamlessly. Conduct quantitative data analysis, text, and sentiment analysis to identify patterns, reveal trends, and discover key findings. By utilizing a robust tool, you can unveil meaningful insights to guide your future research.

6. Advancing future research -  

Once the data for the current problem has been obtained, the researcher will continue the study through a descriptive investigation. Generally, qualitative methods are used for a detailed study of the data to find out if the information gathered through exploratory research is true or not.

When to Use Exploratory Research?

Exploratory research design helps you investigate a subject that is vague, new, or poorly understood. Often referred to as grounded theory research, the insights help strategies the foundation of future research.  

1. Define a vague topic:

This research design is an ideal choice when you have a poorly defined research problem. The exploratory method helps you gain clarity on the subject before you dive deeper.

2. Explore unexplored topics:

The research method helps brands delve into emerging or new markets with limited prior data. It helps identify variables, trends, and characteristics.

3. Conduct market research:

Brands can utilize exploratory research to gauge market trends, customer preferences, behaviors, and needs. You can use the feedback to guide your marketing strategies and product/service developments.

4. Study diverse population:

The research method is valuable in gathering knowledge on diverse cultural groups. It can help you understand the nuances of different cultures, behaviors, needs, and more.

Advantages of Exploratory Research

Exploratory research provides the researcher an opportunity to keep an open mind and explore the variables affecting their area of interest. Some of the advantages of exploratory research are:

• It allows researchers to be flexible and change their stance on the problem being studied as the research progresses.
• It is cost-effective.
• It lays a foundation and structure for future research.
• It can help researchers find out the causes of the problem being studied, which can be elaborated on in future studies.
• It allows you to adapt the method of data collection as required by the research.

Now that we have listed the benefits, we can’t forget the limitations. It is important to learn about both before you jump into the research mode.

Limitation of Exploratory Research

Exploratory research is not without its limitations.

• The research findings are usually inconclusive.
• Some of the data collected can be biased or subjective as it is mostly qualitative in nature.
• Since exploratory research has a smaller sample size, there is hesitancy in generalizing the findings to the whole population.
• If data is collected through secondary sources, there is a chance that the data will be old or outdated.

Wrapping up;

Exploratory research helps you form the foundation of your research project. It lays down the groundwork for a research question you can explore in the future. Exploratory research design is best used when you need insights into a problem or phenomenon before you begin to conduct further research.

Field research is an approach to qualitative data collection that involves observing the behaviour of individuals, groups, or organizations in their natural settings. Although there are many different social research methods categorized under field research, it generally always begins in a specific setting relevant to the social context of the study.

The objective of field research is to observe and analyse the behaviour of a subject in their natural setting. Field research is often tough to analyse because when studying variables in their natural environment, there may be many extraneous variables that could have an effect on the relationship being studied. This, in combination with the relatively small sample sizes used in field research, makes it hard to establish a cause-and-effect relationship. For this reason, most data collected in field research is used to establish correlation rather than a causation.

Why Conduct Field Research?

There are many different reasons to employ the use of field research, the most pivotal being that it allows researchers to access different types of information that may not be easily accessible to outsiders, and that may not be obtained through other methods of research.

Additionally, it is a very useful method of investigation when trying to fill an information void relating to the research problem being investigated as it provides pivotal data on the social contexts being studied. Field research can help obtain data that cannot be observed through other methods of research and can provide an empirical basis to test a research question or hypothesis, opening new frontiers of knowledge. Using field service management software makes the process easier and more organized, helping researchers work more efficiently.

What are the Methods used to Conduct Field Research?

There are 5 common methods of field research, and they are:

• Qualitative Interviews

Qualitative interviews generally involve gathering information through one-on-one interviews that have open-ended and conversational communication. In open-ended questions, researchers pose questions without providing answer options, allowing respondents to present their answers in their own words. This method can be used to collect extensive data as it allows researchers to gain a perspective on “what” people think, as well as “why” they think so.

• Direct Observation

In direct observation, researchers employ the observational method to study subjects in their natural environment without influencing the outcome of the study. This method is very useful in studies where contextual data is highly relevant to the outcome of the study. However, although this method provides a high degree of ecological validity, it also has a very low degree of experimental control resulting in low internal validity.

• Participant Observation‍

In this method of field research, the researcher not only observes the subjects being studied but also immerses themself in the subject’s environment and actively engages in the same activities. Researchers will often take on the very role they are trying to study so that the research participants don’t feel like they’re being studied and are therefore less likely to modify their behaviour in front of the researcher.

• Ethnography

Ethnographic research is conducted using direct observation to research participants in their natural environment. It is used when trying to understand the social dynamics and interactions of participants within a specific social or cultural context. It provides an in-depth insight into participants’ actions and views and how these relate to their social context.

• Case Study

Case study research comprises an in-depth investigation of a specific phenomenon within a real-life setting. This method is also sometimes referred to as a “naturalistic” design in contrast to the “experimental” design of scientific experiments. There are three main types of case study research; intrinsic, instrumental, and collective.

Advantages of Field Research

• High External Validity: Data collected through field research often has high external validity as subjects are studied in their natural settings making the results of the study more generalizable to the real-world.
• Comprehensive Data: Field research allows for the collection of detailed, accurate, and comprehensive data due to the proximity researchers have to subjects.
• Provides Social Context: Field research emphasizes the role and relevance of social context, allowing researchers to uncover social facts that participants may themselves have been unaware of. Therefore, It can be used to collect data that may not be obtainable through other methods of data collection such as interviews and questionnaires.

Disadvantages of Field Research

• Time Consuming: Field research is extremely time-consuming and can sometimes take years to conduct. This is significantly more time consuming than other methods of data collection such as interviews or questionnaires.

• Expensive: Field research is extremely expensive as it involves many different costs such as travel costs, field station fees, wages for field assistants, research equipment purchases, and more.

• High Risk of Researcher Bias: As researchers immerse themselves into the environment being studied, it becomes increasingly difficult for them to distance themselves from the study, creating a high risk of researcher bias.

FAQs on Field Research

What is Field Research?

Field research is a qualitative method of data collection that involves observing the behaviour of subjects in their natural settings.

What are some methods of field research?

There are five distinct methods of field research:

• Direct Observation
• Particapant Observation
• Case Study
• Ethnography
• Qualitative Interviews

What are the advantages of using field research?

Some advantages of field research are that the data collected using this method is comprehensive and has high external validity. Field research also provides a strong social context to the variables being studied.