Working along side the Director of Innovation and Lead Engineer and the Research and Insights Team, my role was to design a series of survey ‘skins’ for various survey types that would be used in a public context. The objective was to make the surveys engaging and consistent between themes, while adhering to brand.
Overview
The challenge
In my role at Ekas Market Research I dealt with a lot of data, and this data came from respondents. Often, recruiting respondents can be a struggle. Getting prospective respondents to engage with the survey or screener, finish it, and answer truthfully is an ongoing challenge for any organisation utilising standard market research methods.
My objective was to increase respondent engagement and create a cohesive and scalable style guide for the company's survey suite and new market research technologies.
My objective was to increase respondent engagement and create a cohesive and scalable style guide for the company's survey suite and new market research technologies.
Problem statment
How might we make our surveys and screeners more engaging?
The process
Kick off + Discovery
I utilised a few different methods to help understand respondent and stakeholder painpoints.
- Stakeholder interviews
- Large scale quantitative survey (300 responses)
- Interviews (30 respondents)
- Qual and quant investigations into current respondent behaviours
Some things I discovered:
1. Respondent Engagement Challenges
2. Cognitive Load and Survey Fatigue
3. User Preferences and Behavior Patterns
4. Stakeholder Concerns and Needs
5. Technical and Accessibility Issues
Strategy
Drawing on feedback from staff and customers, I began conducting an analysis of market competitors and research articles on driving user engagement on digital platforms.
Throughout this research, and with the support of the business, gamification became a focus, exploring models used in online forms, market research, recreational gaming, and user interfaces.
The results were codified against gestalt, heuristic, cognitive bias, and UX design principles to create a succinct set of instructions to follow throughout subsequent design processes.
Throughout this research, and with the support of the business, gamification became a focus, exploring models used in online forms, market research, recreational gaming, and user interfaces.
The results were codified against gestalt, heuristic, cognitive bias, and UX design principles to create a succinct set of instructions to follow throughout subsequent design processes.
Ideation
With the director, developers, researchers, and analysts I ran workshops to quickly generate some ideas and get consensus on some constitutive elements for the surveys.
Wireframes were delivered for feedback from these stakeholders and altered to deliver viable and feasible low-fidelity mock-ups.
Together we agreed upon 3 survey types that would be prototyped, tested and developed for initial phases of the project.
Wireframes were delivered for feedback from these stakeholders and altered to deliver viable and feasible low-fidelity mock-ups.
Together we agreed upon 3 survey types that would be prototyped, tested and developed for initial phases of the project.
Prototyping and testing
Click to expand.
I worked together with our lead developer, researchers and analysts to produce functional, coded prototypes that would not only be used to test the interfaces, but also the usability of the data obtained from the surveys.
As a small, focused team, this approach enabled us to move at speed and iteratively work towards a functional system that would then be used as the final product.
As a small, focused team, this approach enabled us to move at speed and iteratively work towards a functional system that would then be used as the final product.
Unifying the style
Utilising insights gained from user testing, I defined a set of design principles and assets to apply to our first three survey types and guide the design of subsequent surveys.
The outcome
While I left the organisation before the new surveys were rolled out, the results from testing were very promising, indicating a 2.2 increase in customer engagement on a 5 point scale.
Alongside efficiency gained from the new data analysis systems, the above represents somewhere in the realm of a doubling of potential research capacity and revenue.
In addition, this project was initiated to be leveraged by a new type of patented hardware that would open up an entirely new revenue stream for the organisation. Initial estimates in the business plan for this were set at around $10 million in gross revenue within 5 years of functional hardware production.
Alongside efficiency gained from the new data analysis systems, the above represents somewhere in the realm of a doubling of potential research capacity and revenue.
In addition, this project was initiated to be leveraged by a new type of patented hardware that would open up an entirely new revenue stream for the organisation. Initial estimates in the business plan for this were set at around $10 million in gross revenue within 5 years of functional hardware production.
