Survey Hosting - Meaning?

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Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform. This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and Software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user clients of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware; proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed); database selection and configuration; and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations -- some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs? Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, percent tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support. If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full-service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to promptly respond to their questions, collect and remove incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes. If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle support and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP -- do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfection as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set. One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability (and availability) to program, administer, and monitor the survey. This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument; length of the survey instrument; number of survey participants; and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface. It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make certain that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise. Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention). In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform. Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent; while others will require the insertion of re-direction links. It is important to be certain that the hosted software correctly interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering. This can take many forms at different vendors. At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses. The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire. It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which model - ASP or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements. Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements. Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey. A properly administered survey can be a time-consuming process.

Marc I. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc, a full-service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines. Please visit Amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

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View the original article here

Survey Hosting - Meaning?

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Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform. This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and Software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user clients of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware; proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed); database selection and configuration; and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations -- some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs? Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, percent tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support. If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full-service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to promptly respond to their questions, collect and remove incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes. If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle support and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP -- do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfection as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set. One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability (and availability) to program, administer, and monitor the survey. This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument; length of the survey instrument; number of survey participants; and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface. It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make certain that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise. Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention). In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform. Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent; while others will require the insertion of re-direction links. It is important to be certain that the hosted software correctly interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering. This can take many forms at different vendors. At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses. The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire. It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which model - ASP or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements. Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements. Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey. A properly administered survey can be a time-consuming process.

Marc I. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc, a full-service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines. Please visit Amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

The planet hosting companies and the complete fusion of SoftLayer

The planet and SoftLayer, two giants in the world of Web services, hosting and dedicated server were merged. News from the merger, which was the subject of rumours and speculation months now has been confirmed in a (confidential) email sent by the world earlier this morning. In the email, the company says that the news will be made public "soon". But why wait for them, right?

The planet is now Softlayer

Hello

Is pleased to announce the merger of the world ® and SoftLayer ® completes! There will soon be public announcements on the merger, but I would like to speak with you directly on the opportunities and the capabilities it brings.

I'll call you in the coming days to answer any questions you may have - there has been much speculation and I want that hear you about exciting road ahead of me directly.

We highly value your business and trust and have worked hard to create a smooth transition.Your global accounts and services remain unchanged.reassure you, new SoftLayer is committed to world class support and personal service that you received by customer on the planet.

SoftLayer is already recognized for its automation and commitment to the development of products now, you will receive new capabilities with the increase of the valeur.Vous innovants.Mais have direct access and control your solutions thanks to our advanced customer portal and open with API.Cela allow you allows controlling, deploy and manage your entire request environment without the need for human interaction.

Our goal is to provide better experience in the business and we want that you directly.

The new SoftLayer offers:

-A range of products expanded with new products and services not available you forward.
-Automation-the-art customer portal and open API for direct access to more than 150 activities and back-end systems.
-Increased geographic diversity and to choose where the servers.
-High-speed and several POP, providing over 1,500 g connectivity and direct network connections for lower latency.
-Exclusive network weaves separate public, private networks and Data Center-to-Data Center architecture.
-Best Service Level Agreement with 100% availability and guaranteed 2 hours or less (failure or upgrade) hardware replacement.
-A greater value for your company, including more performance per dollar, a more developed partnerships with industry leaders and international presence.

Your existing account and the services are managed and consulted planet as they were before Orbit and the portal hosting managé.Mais from next week, you can also access client SoftLayer portal with your username for the planet and the password.

Until such time as this information is made public, please consider confidentielles.Je you will send a note this week some time for a practical test for you.

The SoftLayer and GI partners investment firm management team had acquired all the equity in SoftLayer August dernier.Partenaires IM also happens to possess a great issue of the planet, thus merging companies have since swirling rumors.

The planet submits that it is currently the largest privately-owned dedicated hosting provider with more than 20,000 customers worldwide, over party servers and 15.7 million websites in management .the ' company employees more than 500 people.

In fact, four of the five leadership team page journal SoftLayer managers worked previously by the planet, including CEO Lance Crosby.Très probably, Crosby will become CEO of the combined company.

Jointly, planet and SoftLayer has approximately 80,000 dedicated servers under the direction, which means that it would probably be out potential rivals Rackspace and 1 & 1.

It is a company that I intend to take Pit road sometime next year.

We're going to dig for more information on the financial aspect of the agreement merge - stay tuned.

View the original article here

The planet hosting companies and the complete fusion of SoftLayer

The planet and SoftLayer, two giants in the world of Web services, hosting and dedicated server were merged. News from the merger, which was the subject of rumours and speculation months now has been confirmed in a (confidential) email sent by the world earlier this morning. In the email, the company says that the news will be made public "soon". But why wait for them, right?

The planet is now Softlayer

Hello

Is pleased to announce the merger of the world ® and SoftLayer ® completes! There will soon be public announcements on the merger, but I would like to speak with you directly on the opportunities and the capabilities it brings.

I'll call you in the coming days to answer any questions you may have - there has been much speculation and I want that hear you about exciting road ahead of me directly.

We highly value your business and trust and have worked hard to create a smooth transition.Your global accounts and services remain unchanged. reassure you, new SoftLayer is committed to world-class support and personal service that you received by customer on the planet.

SoftLayer is already recognized for its automation and commitment to the development of products innovants.Mais now, you will receive new capabilities with the increase of the valeur.Vous have direct access and control your solutions thanks to our advanced customer portal and open with API.Cela allow you allows controlling, deploy and manage your entire request, environment without the need for human interaction.

Our goal is to provide better experience in the business and we want that see you directly.

The new SoftLayer offers:

-A range of products expanded with new products and services not available you forward.
-Automation-the-art customer portal and open API for direct access to more than 150 activities and back-end systems.
-Increased geographic diversity and to choose where the servers.
-Network high-speed and several POP, providing over 1,500 g connectivity and direct connections for lower latency.
-Exclusive network weaves separate public, private networks and Data Center-to-Data Center architecture.
-Best Service Level Agreement with 100% availability and guaranteed 2 hours or less (failure or upgrade) hardware replacement.
-A greater value for your company, including more performance per dollar, a more developed partnerships with industry leaders and international presence.

Your existing account and the planet services are managed and consulted as they were before Orbit and the portal hosting managé.Mais from next week, you can also access SoftLayer client portal with your username for the planet and the password.

Until such time as this information is made public, please consider confidentielles.Je you will send a note this week some time for a practical test for you.

The SoftLayer and GI partners investment firm management team had acquired all the equity in SoftLayer August dernier.Partenaires IM also happens to possess a great issue of the planet, thus merging companies have since swirling rumors.

The planet submits that it is currently the largest privately-owned dedicated hosting provider with more than 20,000 customers worldwide, over 48,000 servers and 15.7 million websites in management .the ' company employs more than 500 people.

In fact, four of the five leadership team page of the SoftLayer managers worked previously by the planet, including CEO Lance Crosby.Très probably, Crosby will become CEO of the combined company.

Jointly, planet and SoftLayer has approximately 80,000 dedicated servers under the direction, which means that it would probably be out potential rivals Rackspace and 1 & 1.

It is a company that I intend to take Pit road sometime next year.

We're going to dig for more information on the financial aspect of the agreement merge - stay tuned.

View the original article here

Survey Hosting - Meaning?

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Error in deserializing body of reply message for operation 'Translate'. The maximum string content length quota (8192) has been exceeded while reading XML data. This quota may be increased by changing the MaxStringContentLength property on the XmlDictionaryReaderQuotas object used when creating the XML reader. Line 1, position 9533.

Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform. This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and Software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user clients of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware; proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed); database selection and configuration; and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations -- some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs? Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, percent tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support. If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full-service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to promptly respond to their questions, collect and remove incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes. If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle support and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP -- do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfection as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set. One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability (and availability) to program, administer, and monitor the survey. This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument; length of the survey instrument; number of survey participants; and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface. It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make certain that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise. Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention). In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform. Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent; while others will require the insertion of re-direction links. It is important to be certain that the hosted software correctly interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering. This can take many forms at different vendors. At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses. The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire. It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which model - ASP or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements. Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements. Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey. A properly administered survey can be a time-consuming process.

Marc I. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc, a full-service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines. Please visit Amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

Survey Hosting - Meaning?

Error in deserializing body of reply message for operation 'Translate'. The maximum string content length quota (8192) has been exceeded while reading XML data. This quota may be increased by changing the MaxStringContentLength property on the XmlDictionaryReaderQuotas object used when creating the XML reader. Line 1, position 8767.
Error in deserializing body of reply message for operation 'Translate'. The maximum string content length quota (8192) has been exceeded while reading XML data. This quota may be increased by changing the MaxStringContentLength property on the XmlDictionaryReaderQuotas object used when creating the XML reader. Line 1, position 9533.

Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform. This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and Software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user clients of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware; proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed); database selection and configuration; and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations -- some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs? Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, percent tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support. If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full-service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to promptly respond to their questions, collect and remove incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes. If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle support and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP -- do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfection as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set. One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability (and availability) to program, administer, and monitor the survey. This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument; length of the survey instrument; number of survey participants; and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface. It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make certain that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise. Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention). In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform. Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent; while others will require the insertion of re-direction links. It is important to be certain that the hosted software correctly interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering. This can take many forms at different vendors. At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses. The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire. It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which model - ASP or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements. Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements. Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey. A properly administered survey can be a time-consuming process.

Marc I. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc, a full-service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines. Please visit Amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

Survey Hosting - Meaning?

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Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform.This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user customers of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware.proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed);database selection and configuration.and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations - some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs?Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP.NET or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, Pierce tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support.If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; Although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to respond to their questions, collect and remove following incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes.If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle media and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP - do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfect as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set.One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability to program, administer, and monitor the survey (and availability). This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument. length of the survey instrument. number of survey participants.and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface.It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make sure that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise.Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention).In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform.Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent;while others will require the insertion of re-direction links.It is important to be certain that the software correctly hosted interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering.This can take many forms at different vendors.At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses.The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire.It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which ASP model - or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements.Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements.Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey.Properly administered survey can be a time consuming process.

Marc i. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc., a full service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines.Please visit amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

Survey Hosting - Meaning?

Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform. This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and Software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user clients of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware; proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed); database selection and configuration; and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations -- some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs? Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, percent tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support. If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full-service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to promptly respond to their questions, collect and remove incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes. If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle support and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP -- do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfection as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set. One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability (and availability) to program, administer, and monitor the survey. This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument; length of the survey instrument; number of survey participants; and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface. It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make certain that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise. Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention). In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform. Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent; while others will require the insertion of re-direction links. It is important to be certain that the hosted software correctly interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering. This can take many forms at different vendors. At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses. The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire. It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which model - ASP or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements. Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements. Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey. A properly administered survey can be a time-consuming process.

Marc I. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc, a full-service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines. Please visit Amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

View the original article here

View the original article here

View the original article here

Survey Hosting - Meaning?

Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform. This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and Software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user clients of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware; proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed); database selection and configuration; and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations -- some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs? Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, percent tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support. If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full-service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to promptly respond to their questions, collect and remove incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes. If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle support and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP -- do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfection as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set. One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability (and availability) to program, administer, and monitor the survey. This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument; length of the survey instrument; number of survey participants; and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface. It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make certain that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise. Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention). In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform. Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent; while others will require the insertion of re-direction links. It is important to be certain that the hosted software correctly interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering. This can take many forms at different vendors. At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses. The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire. It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which model - ASP or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements. Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements. Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey. A properly administered survey can be a time-consuming process.

Marc I. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc, a full-service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines. Please visit Amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

View the original article here

View the original article here

Survey Hosting - Meaning?

Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform. This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and Software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user clients of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware; proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed); database selection and configuration; and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations -- some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs? Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, percent tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support. If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full-service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to promptly respond to their questions, collect and remove incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes. If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle support and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP -- do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfection as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set. One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability (and availability) to program, administer, and monitor the survey. This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument; length of the survey instrument; number of survey participants; and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface. It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make certain that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise. Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention). In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform. Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent; while others will require the insertion of re-direction links. It is important to be certain that the hosted software correctly interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering. This can take many forms at different vendors. At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses. The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire. It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which model - ASP or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements. Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements. Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey. A properly administered survey can be a time-consuming process.

Marc I. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc, a full-service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines. Please visit Amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

View the original article here

Survey Hosting - Meaning?

Survey hosting can mean different things to different people. At one end of the spectrum it can refer to an ASP offering market research software where users can program and administer their own surveys. At the other end of the spectrum it can refer to a full-service survey solution where the survey company's professional staff programs and administers the survey on its own platform. This article describes differences in each approach and discusses some of the key considerations in the selection of a survey hosting vendor.

Survey Hosting and Software:

There is a limited number of survey and market research companies using their own research software to conduct surveys. End user clients of hosted survey solutions should note that the survey vendor might not be the actual developer of the software and/or could be hosting its surveys on another vendor's platform. Many survey companies license their survey software from a 3rd party vendor specializing in survey engine development and install the software on their own platform. Other companies license the use of hosted survey solutions on another vendor's platform to circumvent the need for software installation and ongoing hosting. In the case of licensed software, if the software developer does not provide a complete roadmap of the installation requirements, the survey software alone might not provide an adequate solution. Relevant factors can include: processing power of the hardware; proper selection and configuration of application servers (if needed); database selection and configuration; and the amount of bandwidth.

General Considerations:

In evaluating the best choice of vendor in the survey hosting space, here are five considerations -- some of which are more important than others depending on your specific requirements:

Do you prefer to program and administer the survey on your own (ASP model) or would you rather contract these functions with a full-service hosted survey provider?

Does your survey instrument require special features or custom programming?

If you are engaging in market research surveys, how easily does the software coordinate with sample providers i.e., does the software offer redirects and/or recording of PINs? Does the software offer quota stops? Does the software offer respondent filtering?

Does the software and its environment offer fast page views and an error-free survey experience for the volume of participants you are expecting?

Will you be able to provide technical support for survey participants?

Pick the software that matches your needs:

Regardless of whether you select an ASP or full-service solution, you need to identify the requirements needed for your survey projects and whether the software can meet those needs. For example, if you expect to use such features as skip logic programming, branching, piping, percent tables, etc., then you want to select a vendor that offers these features.

Similarly, if you expect to have a large volume of survey takers and/or use survey instruments which are long (such as 15 minutes or longer), make sure that the software has the capacity to handle this with fast page views and error-free data collection.

If you require custom programming of question types or programming logic to meet your survey needs, make sure that the vendor can provide a solution. For example, if the survey company is not the developer of the software and does not have a IT development staff, there might be limitations on the custom features it can offer. Before selecting a vendor, ask for a general cost estimate on the development and deployment of your custom survey solutions.

What about technical support?

Obviously, you will want the vendor to provide you with adequate technical support. If you select an ASP model, you may have questions on different stages of the user process. A full-service approach passes the responsibility of deployment and administration onto the vendor; although there is a cost for this service.

Just as important as your own technical support is the technical support provided to survey participants. There needs to be a process in place to promptly respond to their questions, collect and remove incorrect email addresses from the system, and manage unsubscribes. If you adopt an ASP approach that does not provide tech support for survey participants, be sure to designate several persons at your organization to handle support and make sure they are appropriately trained to answer technical questions.

Full-service versus ASP -- do you need professional services?

The field of survey data collection generally requires as close to perfection as possible in every step of the process to produce a reliable data set. One of the most important considerations in deciding whether an ASP approach to survey hosting will best meet your needs is your ability (and availability) to program, administer, and monitor the survey. This can depend on such factors as the complexity of the survey instrument; length of the survey instrument; number of survey participants; and time in the field. Your own (or staff member's) survey expertise is also important, as is the ease of use of the ASP interface. It is important to carefully examine the processes of each ASP vendor to make certain that you are comfortable choosing such a solution over full-service.

Special considerations in the case of market research surveys:

Programming and administration of market research surveys can require special expertise. Screening questions need to be properly programmed to terminate non-qualifying participants and quota stops may need to be used to prevent excess completes in particular cells (manual monitoring is possible but it can require constant attention). In addition, survey panel vendors providing survey sample may require interaction with their own platform. Some will accept recording of PINs for each respondent; while others will require the insertion of re-direction links. It is important to be certain that the hosted software correctly interfaces with the sample provider you will use.

Another relevant consideration for market research surveys is the ability of the survey hosting platform to provide respondent filtering. This can take many forms at different vendors. At a minimum, you will want to be able to remove survey data of respondents who provide incomplete, contradictory or straight-lined responses. The availability of respondent timers is also a nice feature because it allows you to identify and remove respondents who rushed through the questionnaire. It is also helpful if the platform allows you to record each respondent's PIN against his/her responses and use this information to re-sample those respondents, if needed.

In summary, when evaluating the concept of survey hosting, it is important to determine which model - ASP or full-service - will best meet your needs and fully price out each vendor based on your specific requirements. Start with your underlying software needs to determine which solutions meet all or most of your requirements. Consider your programming and administration requirements and decide if you or a member of your staff has the desire, time, and ability to self-administer the survey. A properly administered survey can be a time-consuming process.

Marc I. Tillman is a member of the professional services staff at Amplitude Research, Inc, a full-service online survey company headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, that builds its own survey engines. Please visit Amplitude's survey hosting page to learn more about its service offerings.

Web Hosting and Affiliate Marketing

Over the years as Internet growth has accelerated, this demand has also pushed the online business platform of web hosting to grow larger and even more larger trying to keep up with all the new web sites that are being created on a daily basis. It is hard to get an exact number but recent studies show that there is over one hundred million websites currently on the internet with thousands more going live every day. With more companies realizing that they must have an online presence just to compete nowadays and finding the many benefits this medium can provide, the demand for web hosting has never been higher and does not look like ever slowing down. So if you are in to studying trends from the point of an affiliate marketer, then this is definitely one that should be of great interest to you.

Also another major contributing factor when considering web hosting as an affiliate promotion is of course, the most important point of income. As has been proven time and again, back end products are a critical part of any successful internet marketing campaign. In other words, up-selling an already proven loyal customer base over and over by offering new or associated products in the field they have already proven to be interested in. So what could be even better than back end product sales and selling the same client maybe two or three or five times?

Recurring income my friend!

This is the best form of an income producing medium available online at any given moment, at any given time and beats everything else hands down. Not only do you as an affiliate marketer receive commission from that original sale, but you receive ongoing commission every month for the life of the continuing sale. Not only does this give you some great income opportunities but it also stabilizes your online business when it comes to income projections and just all round general stability. You no longer have to worry about how much you will make next month from your affiliate marketing ventures due to fluctuating performances or external influences. Once you have that loyal base of subscribers paying their hosting fees every month you can relax knowing you are guaranteed a certain amount of income to cover your expenses both off and online and you can build up on that base revenue from there.

That is an online marketers dream, to have a stable online presence bringing in guaranteed profits every month without fail. You could take that to the bank. Those 25+ billion web pages (2009 stats) will have to be hosted somewhere, so as an Internet marketer why not get a little bit of that recurring action.

So what to look for in a web host? If you Google web hosting there are 614 million results. Even with quotation marks which cuts it down heaps there are still over 85 million results! That is a heck of a lot of hosting providers to choose from considering you will be recommending and promoting which ever company you choose to go with and putting your hard fought name and reputation behind it.

Now the possibility of a quality web hosting company separating itself from the rest of the pack is not as uncommon as one might think. Three major points quickly come to mind when looking around for a quality web hosting company.

1. Up-time guarantee

2. Technical Support

3. Control Panel

You will notice that money, bandwidth and disk space do not really come into the scope of what makes a great web host as these points are very comparable nowadays from one host to the next. But the three previous points well they can make or break an internet website and so are extremely important.

Up-time simply means the time your website is up and available compared to down and not available. Now 99.9% is a very good up-time ratio and I would not settle for less with any of my sites. Why the down time? Simple the servers that contain all the websites are still mechanical objects that need upgrading, parts replacing and are also prone to breakdowns. There are also software upgrades that have to be carried out from time to time to keep the whole system running smoothly. Now if a hosting company is not properly prepared any one of these upgrades can cause down times where the websites situated on those servers might not be available to anyone on the internet. So do not settle for less in this area as you do not want disgruntled affiliates that you have introduced to this host sending nasty emails directed towards you.

Technical support may not affect the more experienced webmasters but a good free 24/7 tech support can be a godsend to the beginner trying to get their first website up and running properly. Especially the live chat support that some of the big boys in the industry offer. No sending and waiting for tech emails to return that your client may find hard to understand anyway due to all the geek talk. Then trying to blindly follow the directions emailed and getting lost and frustrated. When I need help with one of my websites I simply jump on live chat where I usually end up chatting to someone within 3 minutes who makes any changes that I am not able to do or talks me through the processes i need to carry out live. You cannot beat that for service.

The control panel. Well it might not sound like much but it can definitely make a great deal of difference to an up and coming webmaster. How easy is it to use? What kind of features does it have? C panel is one of the best control panels and you will find a lot of software developers ask their clients "do you have C panel"? As it tends to simplify the whole website process by leaps and bounds. You have features like Fantastico which can automatically install many pieces of software for you including WordPress the most used blogging platform on the web. Many other features are simplified in the C panel such as database creation, email setup and forwarding, domain additions, security, log files (stats on traffic) file management and much much more.

Web hosting is just one affiliate market you could try out and make some good and continuous income. Just remember that to be successful within your online endeavors also means that time, effort and patience is needed.

Read more Affiliate Marketing articles at http://www.impactyourwealth.com/blog/