The folks at Vovici have an interesting series of whitepapers on the use of surveys - and how to use them to build customer community. I found 'Survey Rating Scale Best Practices' particularly useful.
Beware of survey fatigue in your customers
Please read the paper in full if this subject is interesting to you and your relationship marketing efforts, but here is a short summary of their published recommendations;
- Use 5 point scales when rating against one attribute in a 'unipolar' scale - for example, from 'Not at all satisfied' to 'Completely satisfied'
- Use 7 points scales when rating against polar opposites in a 'bipolar' scale - for example 'Extremely likely to recommend against' through 'Extremely likely to recommend'
- Use fully labeled scales with no numeric ratings shown. These are preferred by respondents and have higher reliability and predictive validity than numeric scales
- Exclude 'Don't know' and 'No opinion' as a choice
- Use unipolar scales instead of bipolar scales wherever possible - they are shorter and less confusing
- List rating scales with the most negative item first - to prevent results inflation from order-effects
- Use common scales where possible rather than write your own
- Respondents need different things than analysis - you can map scales to a 0-10 scale for reporting
- Stick with common scales across your organisation so you can compare results
An example scale for a 5 point numeric - to illustrate a unipolar scale;
- Not at all satisfied
- Slightly satisfied
- Moderately satisfied
- Very satisfied
- Completely satisfied
And finally a 7 point example of a bipolar scale;
- Absolutely inappropriate
- Inappropriate
- Slightly inappropriate
- Neutral
- Slightly appropriate
- Appropriate
- Absolutely appropriate
There is a science and good experience in this process and customer relationships are too important to mess with unprepared. We recommend you do some reading before asking.
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