FAQs for Step 24: Clarify Primary Research Questions
Q: How reliable are survey results?
Q: Is it really fair to ask people their age and income? People are getting really sensitive about privacy of information. Won’t this alienate potential customers?
Q: Is there a less transparent way of getting market research information?
Q: How reliable are survey results?
Survey results can be quite reliable. The following is copied from Survey Software Success eBook published by Jeffrey Henning for Vovici, a publication we highly recommend you take time to download and read. Your surveys will be sharper as a result. Mr. Henning also publishes the Voice of Vovici Blog and you can subscribe and download the free eBook at http://blog.vovici.com/blog/bid/18188/Survey-Software-Success-Free-EBook
The table shows the number of survey responses needed for 95% Confidence with ±5% Margin of Error.
| Population Size | Responses Needed |
|---|---|
| 10 | 10 |
| 100 | 80 |
| 200 | 132 |
| 300 | 169 |
| 400 | 197 |
| 500 | 218 |
| 600 | 235 |
| 700 | 249 |
| 800 | 260 |
| 900 | 270 |
| 1,000 | 278 |
| 2,000 | 323 |
| 5,000 | 357 |
| 10,000 | 370 |
| 20,000 | 377 |
| 100,000 | 383 |
| 1,000,000 | 384 |
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Q: Is it really fair to ask people their age and income? People are getting really sensitive about privacy of information. Won’t this alienate potential customers?
It’s a fact that a certain number of people will not cooperate or complete your survey. It’s certainly fair to ask the question, but important to do so in manner that is not offensive or too specific. The common practice is to rank participant’s ages by the age bracket or group. So, while it might be offensive and too detailed to ask for the exact age, it will be more appropriate to ask if the person to place their age in a category. For example, the following question is used to gather the age group in the surveys at http://www.riskbuster.com/tools/surveys/
Check your age group:
10-18 ________ 19-29 ________ 30 & over ________
Q: Is there a less transparent way of getting market research information?
Many people are sensitive about the overall matter of collecting personal information, we think it’s safe to say that almost everybody hates the transparent methods. That said, the market research RoadMap steps 11 to 30 are peppered with links to great secondary market research sources. The advantage of using secondary market research is that you are piggybacking on the efforts of agencies that invest considerable amounts to gather and organize market intelligence.
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