Comments on: Poll on Surveys: Open Text Fields or Buttons?

By: ibagrak

ibagrak — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 22:22:46 +0000

Definitely buttons since they make for faster surveys. You can have radio buttons and then one which is an open text field for survey takers who are really eager to share their unique perspective. The downside is that the responses would be harder to analyze, but you would capture some relevant info that you would otherwise miss.

By: uberVU - social comments

uberVU - social comments — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 19:31:44 +0000

Social comments and analytics for this post…

This post was mentioned on Twitter by brantcooper: .@graydear yep, you captured the dilemma! Thanks for response. http://bit.ly/9JfJhN...

By: Cindy Alvarez

Cindy Alvarez — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 18:40:41 +0000

Generally, I think most respondents would prefer buttons/checkboxes – it’s faster, you don’t have to think or spellcheck.

Notable exception is when there is some specific thing that I really want to communicate that ISN’T in the button options. Adding a freeform textarea at the end is better than nothing, but not everyone remembers what they wanted to say without a ‘trigger’ in the form of a question.

Iterating your survey (show to a small % of users first to identify if there are any issues that might require ‘textarea questions’) is a big help.

In general that’s a good idea regardless – looking at a subset of responses helps you validate that you’re learning what you set out to learn or if you need to adjust the questions.

By: Lydia Sugarman

Lydia Sugarman — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 18:17:48 +0000

Ack! I meant to say/write that I overwhelmingly prefer buttons or checkboxes, although that wasn’t offered here as a choice. Just don’t make me have to really think and write something!

By: Lydia Sugarman

Lydia Sugarman — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 18:16:03 +0000

From the business owner perspective, I am usually willing to respond to surveys. It’s good karma to help other businesses, kind of the ‘golden rule’ rule.

As a respondent, I like getting the summarized results when offered to help me in my business. That is definitely an incentive to participate. I overwhelmingly prefer. If I’m confronted w/ text windows at the beginning of a survey, I always bail or if it’s one or two at the end, I’ll either give very perfunctory responses or leave them blank.

I’m willing to give a few minutes, but don’t take advantage of me!

By: brantcooper

brantcooper — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:56:51 +0000

Sure, no reason not to. But one can ask the same question using buttons or text fields. They will produce different results. Some people believe it’s faster and more accurate to use open text fields, while others argue that buttons are faster. What I’m asking here is what the survey respondent prefers.

By: brantcooper

brantcooper — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:53:06 +0000

Sorry, I find it frustrating, too. But it’s the spam, not abusive comments per se. Akismet is good, but doesn’t catch everything.

By: Michael Scepaniak

Michael Scepaniak — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 13:28:00 +0000

I don’t see any reason not to do both:

(button) option 1
(button) option 2
(button) option 3
(button) other (text field)

Mike….

By: Wimmo van Geldrop

Wimmo van Geldrop — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 10:13:06 +0000

Btw, i HATE moderations when leaving comments. I want my reply to show up on the website immediately. (Who in the world would leave abusive comment on a website and topic like this??)

By: Wimmo van Geldrop

Wimmo van Geldrop — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 10:11:48 +0000

If you would have thousands of replies and you have a straight yes/no answer, it’s better to work with buttons for your statistics. If you need response like ‘comment’ you obviously need a text field.