Survey Reporting - 10 Tips

10 tips to get the most out of survey reporting

Giving a voice to online survey data is the final step in the online survey process. It all comes down to two major questions—did you get good enough results and can you easily share your insights? For many people, this is the most challenging part of collecting feedback. In this article, we’ll share 10 tips to help you get the most from your survey reports and improve the way you analyze surveys. We’ll also include some survey presentation tips, pie chart tips, and bar chart tips.

Survey analysis can mean different things to different people. If you’re a seasoned researcher, you may prefer to export your data into SPSS or SAS and work from there. For the majority, however, using the tools that come with a survey application such as survey graphs and charts, is the preferred route. Telling a story based on survey results can be fun—just follow the 10 tips below and you’re likely to learn something new from your survey.

1. Ensure your results tell a story. Ask yourself the following questions when reviewing your data before sharing your results in a formal report: What’s the key learning? The insight? What will you recommend? How do you tell the story?
   
   
2. Make sure you’ve interviewed the right people. A good sample (subset of a population) can be better than talking to everyone. Look at the profile of your target population and the profile of your respondents. If they’re similar - you’re ok - but if they’re not you have to look at the difference and question whether it’s going to skew the data. Also, you can view this sample size chart to make sure you’ve interviewed enough people to have confidence in your data.
   
   
3. Write to your audience. For example, a business audience appreciates clarity and simplicity over research lingo. 67% respondents chose Brand X in the forced comparison question while 30% chose Brand Y.
   
   
4. Use the tools provided to you. Zoomerang offers a wide range of survey analysis tools to help you understand your data. Zoomerang Pro offers you the ability to cross-tab, filter, and output data to a chart or spreadsheet. With a Premium subscription, you also get one-click statistics for each survey questions, comparison reporting and the ability to analyze open ends.
   
   
5. Charting tips. When building a graph of your survey results, choose the graph that best illustrates your results. A line graph is great for showing trends or specific data values, a pie graph is best for seeing how something is divided among different groups and a bar graph makes for easy comparisons. With Zoomerang, you can also build a point chart, donut chart or a stacked area chart.
   
   
6. Deliver bold recommendations. The clearer you are with what actions you are recommending, the more impactful your presentation will be. Summarize the data in a way that supports your recommended actions.
   
   
7. Make the report or presentation visual. Use Zoomerang survey graphs and charts to get your point across clearly. While it is important to have some written conclusions, an illustration usually speaks louder than words. Remember this when developing your PowerPoint.
   
   
8. Report on open ended questions. One reason to ask open ends is for the ‘why.’ Ask a closed-end question up front, hen follow with an open end to add texture to a quantitative question. What to do with them? Scan them all or use Zoomerang’s time saving tag cloud feature to group responses into quantifiable categories. Make sure to read at least a subset of them to get a feel of their tone as well.
   
   
9. Focus on what the data means. It is important to look at your survey report in the context of your current business situation and apply current knowledge to survey results. This will help you formulate the next steps for your business.
   
   
10. Have a purpose when you cross-tab. The part of the audience that is most important to you is the one you look at (cross-tab) across the entire survey. Ex) Food product: how many people thought it had too much strawberry taste AND that it was too red. Uses a cross-tab for the questions that you think are inter-related.

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