The case for using internet surveys instead of phone calls

At Mitchell Research, we do the vast majority of our recruiting jobs via internet surveys instead of hiring phone callers. Here's a story about why this approach is effective.

Let's say a cooking pan manufacturer wants to run a focus group. For the group, they want to find chefs in restaurants that serve at least 100 customers per night. The chefs need to use a specific brand of pan--All Clad.

Story #1: The client hires a call center


The cooking pan company hires a call center to find chefs. The call center employees work mostly at night. They call restaurants out of the yellow pages at nighttime, asking to speak to the chef on duty. They get a large number of hangups, since the kitchen is loud and the cooks are busy. When they do manage to get a chef on the line, many of the surveys go like this:

"On average, how many customers per night does your restaurant serve: Over 100, or less than 100?"

"Less than 100," answers the chef.

The caller consults her instruction sheet, says, "OK, you don't qualify for the study, but thanks anyway" and hangs up.

For chefs who get past the question about the 100 customers, the next question often goes like this:

The caller says "Do you use All-Clad pans in your kitchen?"

"No," the chef says.

"OK," says the caller, "Thanks for your time, but you don't qualify for the study."

With this approach, the callers find only 5 chefs to be part of the study, despite working on the project for weeks. The client asks what the trouble is. The callers say that the restaurants don't serve enough customers and they don't use All Clad pans.

"Do you have any ideas for how to get more participants?" says the client.

"We'll step up our calling efforts, and put double the callers on the project," says the call center.

Story #2: The client hires Mitchell Research


Mitchell Research designs an internet survey to find chefs. If respondents don't qualify for the study, they still fill out all the questions asked. For the important qualifying questions--the amount of restaurant customers, and the All-Clad pan requirement, here's how Mitchell Research writes the questions:

On average, how many customers does your restaurant serve on weeknights (Monday through Thursday)? Answers: Less than 25, 25-49, 50-74, 75-99, 100-149, 150-199, 200 or more.

On average, how many customers does your restaurant serve on weekend nights (Friday through Sunday)? Answers: Less than 25, 25-49, 50-74, 75-99, 100-149, 150-199, 200 or more.

What type of cookware do you use? (check all that apply): All-Clad, Le Creuset, Berndes, Calphalon, Cuisinart, other (please explain)

Since the survey is up on the internet, chefs can fill it out whenever they like. Some fill it out at 2 am after they get home from their late night shift, and some fill it out in the morning when they wake up. Within about 48 hours, there are enough responses to start scheduling participants.

There are 12 chefs who qualify in all respects--their restaurants serve 100 or more people on both weeknights and weekends, and they use All-Clad pans--and Mitchell Research schedules them. However, the client needs 20 chefs for the group. Mitchell Research gives the client this information: There are several chefs who work in restaurants where the weekend volume is over 100 customers, but the weekday volume is between 50 and 100 customers. There are also several chefs who work in restaurants with a very high volume (200 or more customers on both weekends and weeknights) but who don't use All-clad pans. They use Calphalon or Le Crueset pans. One chef says they use an "other" kind of pan and then writes in the comment field "I use Cuisinart now. I used to use All-Clad but have been very disappointed with it."

The client decides to include those chefs whose weekend volume is over 100, but whose weekday volume is less. The client also thinks it would be good to include a few of the high-volume chefs who use Calphalon or Le Crueset pans--now that they think about it, it would be interesting to hear from that segment as well. The client is especially interested in including the chef who says that he used to use All-Clad but was disappointed with it--the client feels it would be great to hear from this person.


Summary


This is a tricky recruit for both the call center and Mitchell Research, but the Mitchell Research approach gives the client a better outcome. The Mitchell Research approach is more flexible, faster, and gives the client a much more detailed picture of who the participants are. Even though the Mitchell Research recruit did not find 20 chefs as specified in the original criteria, the Mitchell Research survey data gives the client an opportunity to think about which criteria are the most important, and to adjust. In contrast, the call center approach leaves the client with no information about what went wrong, and no plan B.

Of course, there are times that an internet survey approach may not work. If, say, you are explicitly looking for a large group of people who don't use the internet very often, a call center approach might serve you better. However, Mitchell Research routinely finds participants with low to intermediate internet skills who fill out our surveys.