Hi everyone,
I would like to start a conversation with all of the market research professionals in the community regarding using LimeSurvey in our industry of market research.
Since I began using LimeSurvey extensively in 2009, a lot has changed in the software. There have been some major improvements over the last couple of years that have really made this software into something that is taken very seriously: the integration of quotas, the panel management features, or the very powerful Expression Manager are some notable examples. When I co-founded my company in 2009, we had really no startup capital. Other companies in our industry who were doing data collection were all using packaged software with hefty licensing fees to operate, but we didn’t have that ability. Using LimeSurvey, we were able to compete with those companies at a very minimal cost and with a very powerful set of feature in comparison. Yes, there were some things we couldn’t do, or at least thought we couldn’t do at first until we learned some “tricks”, but largely we could say we were competitive.
I believe that the market research industry is the single largest consumer of online survey data in the world. Each year, billions of dollars are put into budgets whose perhaps single largest component includes the collection, creation, and execution of online surveys. Online panel companies, the companies which have registered users opted-in to survey invitations, are some of the largest forces in the industry primarily because they can control the flow of online survey data, oftentimes with a worldwide reach.
As such, there is a huge opportunity for LimeSurvey to become a very credible competitor to all of the licensed survey software out there, which takes in hundreds of millions of dollars per year in licensing alone. It has already evolved to the extent that many market research companies are taking notice, although certainly it is not yet at a point where it can completely compete with a market leader like ConfirmIT. In fact, it may never displace a licensed giant like that as changing the mentality of upper management at a large company to using open-source software is not an easy task.
On the small-scale (meaning independent shop or small company), LimeSurvey is a very credible tool. I would say that it is at the point of being a competitor in the medium-size market research business now. In order for it to gain acceptance and use at this level, we as market researchers need to voice our opinions of the software and collaborate on its implementation to ensure that it continues to evolve in a way that is beneficial for our industry. I don’t mean to say that this will make it any less beneficial for other industries, but I contend that market research is the single largest user and driver of online survey software and has very specific requirements for how it is to be conducted.
The ways in which a market research company requires a survey to be designed and conducted are very rigorous and specific, and to most people outside the industry, these requirements may seem inane and unnecessary, however they serve very specific purposes. The elimination of survey bias is one of the most important issues for a market research company, and most companies allocate huge amounts of energy and money to that end. I have begun writing about this issue
here
and will be expanding this section in the near future. Besides the precise wording and phrasing of a question, there are many other considerations for market researchers when designing a survey, such as question order, question randomization that adheres to specific quotas, or the display of information in such a way that it does not influence the respondent’s opinion in any way; in most cases, this is easier said than done, and many market research companies stake their entire reputations on their ability to ensure that the data they collect is free of bias, so it is easy to see that the capabilities of their software will be paramount to their choice, where cost is a secondary consideration.
LimeSurvey has certainly come a long way, and I see it continuing to evolve in a good direction. In order to facilitate its growth, I believe that the market research community needs to come together more and collaborate on its usage: we should share our experiences, solutions, pains, and requirements in order for this software to gain wider and wider acceptance in our industry. This in turn would certainly drive more attention to the project, both in terms of donations and collaboration, and allow to evolve at an even faster pace.
I would like the invite the market researchers in the LimeSurvey community to identify themselves in this topic and share something about what they do and how they primarily use the software. If we can just begin with this simple introduction (and certainly I have seen several market researchers in our community), I think we can begin to establish a sub-community and help each other and the project to grow in a useful way. I can only see good things resulting from this.
Best regards,
Mark
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