WHAT IS IT?
With the emergence of ‘Smartphones’ and their huge popularity, mobile phones are fast becoming a popular channel for gathering data. Designed to collect small amounts of data quickly, Mobile Phone Surveys are a particularly exciting new service that HC has launched this month.
Mobile Phone Surveys are particularly well suited to administration of ’microsurveys’ (a survey with only a small number of questions) and are a quick and cost effective way for managers to gain employee feedback.
The usability of Mobile Phone Surveys can be superior to more traditional methods and is far more convenient. Preliminary research also suggests that respondents enjoy the process more when done over mobile phone.
Mobile surveys work best when they contain only one or two items. For this reason they should normally only be used under particular circumstances (just like pulse surveys). However, when used in the right context, studies have shown that such short surveys can actuallybesuperior to longer multiple-item questionnaires (Wainos et al., 1997).
HOW DO WE DO IT?
Mobile-based surveys are almost identical to online surveys, yet they are more compact and simpler. A weblink is sent directly to employees via SMS. Recipients then simply choose an answer from predefined options, and submit their response. Of course this only works for employees that have web-enabled phones.
HC can tailor every aspect of the survey (font size, spacing, layout) to ensure that it is compatible with most smart phones.
WHEN TO USE MOBILE-BASED SURVEYS
The primary benefit of administering a mobilebased survey are:
- Gauge quick feedback about specific announcements or events
- Assess how your staff are coping with a large scale change
- Decision Support: assess satisfaction with new initiatives or strategies
- Pilot questions before conducting a larger scale online survey
- Reach employees who are often on the road, in a fast and convenient way
- Combine with data from other sources, to gain more comprehensive feedback
THINGS TO THINK ABOUT…
- Mobile surveys will work best on ‘Smart phones’ (such as iPhones and Blackberrys) and will need to be enabled to use the internet
- Traditional phones will have technical issues such as the browser size and their ‘scroll-down’ capacity
- Mobile surveys are not designed to replace online surveys, or hard-copy questionnaires, and should only be used in the appropriate situations. However, when used properly, these surveys can be an incredibly powerful tool.