e-substance over style |
The conventional wisdom is that surveys on the internet should be carried out using
forms on the world-wide-web, which allow sophisticated formatting, input validation
and drop-down boxes for pre-defined options. E-mail, with its limited character set
and inflexible formatting is seen as user-unfriendly.
However, the most recent McCannics e-survey finds that almost nine out of ten businesses taking part prefer an e-mail questionnaire to the alternative of a web-based form. One respondent said that they would not continue with the survey if it was conducted by web-form only. The main reason given is that the e-mail questionnaire can be completed off-line and sent with other e-mails, rather than respondents having to spend time filling in a form while connected to the internet.
As most respondents to the e-survey have been completing questionnaires by e-mail
for almost two years there is bound to be an element of self-selection involved -
anyone who much preferred web-based forms would probably have stopped responding by now.
However, the survey has established that most participants can clearly see the
advantages in the e-mail methodology. When the 4 out of 48 respondents who said that
they would prefer a web-form were contacted again it was found that none of them felt
strongly about the issue. One said,
There is clearly a place for web-based forms - for instance for one-off surveys of
visitors to a web-site or when the questionnaire needs to be interactive. If and when
a new and more flexible standard format for e-mail messages becomes established across
all mail readers, then it may be possible to combine the advantages of both approaches.
Until then, however, for regular surveys the disadvantages of 'vanilla' text with no
formatting in an e-mail questionnaire seem to be outweighed by the convenience to the
respondent of being able to respond to the questionnaire off-line at their leisure,
along with their other regular e-mails. The e-survey methodology was summarised by
one respondent:
In the McCannics e-survey, we make a determined effort to gather valuable information while keeping questionnaires as short as possible. We realise that people do not want to spend a long time filling in questionnaires - especially as the survey is carried out every month (more frequently than most other regular surveys). We also realise that a questionnaire which would seem of reasonable length on paper can seem to be intimidatingly long as a plain-text e-mail.
We feel that we have now established that this methodology can work very well but, as the respondent above noted, we need more companies to take part if the survey is to show its full potential. With a larger sample size, the regular questions which we ask on sales and prices would be tremendously useful indicators of the state of the economy. McCannics personnel have a considerable track record in business statistics - including helping to establish the DTI's methodology for counting the numbers of businesses in the economy. A larger sample size, as well as simply reducing the confidence interval of our results, would allow us to weight the results by business size and sector - to make them more representative of the business popuulation as a whole - and to produce chain-linked series to reduce the variation caused by changing sample composition.
Because our survey is carried out by e-mail, it can be scaled up very easily. We do not need to pay postage charges and we can process most responses automatically (this is why we ask for answers to be put inside square brackets, which can be recognised by our custom-written processing software). As internet access for business is becoming the norm rather than the exception, there is no reason why the survey could not expand to cover tens or even hundreds of thousands of businesses and become the most reliable indicator of the state of the UK economy. Businesses taking part would then know that the information which they provide was directly used by government and the Bank of England when making the economic decisions which affect all businesses. Respondents also have the opportunity to set the agenda by suggesting special questions for the survey to address.
McCannics is currently talking to a number of organisations and hopes to be able to announce shortly the first measures to recruit new volunteers to the survey. Any other organisations which could help to encourage more businesses to take part should contact McCannics. Individual businesses which wish to take part should just send a blank e-mail to volunteer@mccannics.demon.co.uk - we will do the rest!
If you already take part in the survey, please encourage other businesses to take join - how about adding a line to your e-mail signature, like this?
UK businesses - get a voice: join the e-survey. Just send
a blank e-mail to:
volunteer@mccannics.demon.co.uk
More information at:
http://www.mccannics.demon.co.uk/
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The internet-connected firms taking part in this survey report only a small improvement
in sales over the past year. Almost 46% say that sales are in the past month
(May 1999) compared with a year before (May 1998), while 35% say that sales were down.
This gives a balance of +10% - an improvement on the -2% in the
previous survey, but otherwise the lowest on record (see chart, right).
Inflationary pressures remain subdued, with a balance of +19% reporting that their selling prices in May 1999 were higher than in May 1998, exactly the same as in the last survey. One-third had increased their prices over the year, while 15% cut them. |
"Was your sales turnover
in the month just ended higher, about the
same, or lower than in the same month last year?"
Note: Chart shows percentage balances (percentage saying higher minus percentage saying lower). Earlier surveys include late responses and so may differ from figures published elsewhere.
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The twenty-third survey questionnaire was sent out on 13th June 1999 and by 30th June responses had been received from 48 businesses across the UK.
The e-survey has been operating on a pilot scale for almost two years and is now ready to show its full potential. Organisations which would like to collaborate should contact McCannics. Individual UK-based businesses which would like to take part in the survey should send a blank e-mail to volunteer@mccannics.demon.co.uk.
All individual replies will be kept strictly confidential. Only anonymised results will be published, and your e-mail address will not be passed on to any third party.
E-mail us with comments, queries or suggestions for future topical questions at: esurvey@mccannics.co.uk
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