The web has given business many wonderful tools. Online survey tools are a great example - easy to create, low-cost to deliver to thousands of participants, automatically collated data.

But surveys are just another type of online engagement that require a successful intersection of business and user agendas.

The business agenda - collect usable data

Survey development starts with the business agenda. The data you collect has to enable the business decisions that you want to make.

We ask our clients what they want to do with the data - what decisions they want to make, what changes to designs, products or services.

Then we work back to the questions that can be asked within an acceptable user experience.

The user agenda - provide an engaging experience

A survey is a tool that can only be used intermittently - an opportunity that cannot be wasted. Customer engagement is the key.

• Engagement - we need to tip customers into completing the survey.
• Engagement - we need to ask questions that customers can answer without 'inventing' details.
• Engagement - we need to empower respondents if we want valid responses.

The implementation - what size? how? when?

With so many surveys of 5, 10, or 20 questions, it would be reasonable to believe that calculations to the base 5 are the secret to survey success.

Not so. A single question asked in the right context in an email, and informed by other subscriber click behaviour, can provide the insight you are seeking.

In surveys, as with everything, what you build is determined by the outcomes you want.

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