Have you considered changing the software you use? If so, have you looked at the 10 biggest problems with switching your software? You might be sure that you need to change the software you use but it’s easy to postpone the decision. Is that the right decision? This article looks at the problems with switching to another software solution. Although it is applied to the market research industry, most of the factors apply to any business sector.
My company is both of a user of several software packages and a vendor of software packages. Whilst I have worked in the marketing and market research sectors for many years, I think this 7 Step Software Evaluation Approach works in any market. Carrying out effective software evaluations is important so that good business decisions are made.
Market research software is in some ways no different from other software, but you are likely to need and understand detailed features for survey data collection, analysis and reporting. These detailed requirements mean that you will want to care about productivity, best practices and, often, learning the full scope of any software product.
Switching your main tabulation software platform from Quantum to MRDCL is not an easy decision, even when there may be 101 compelling reasons. There is likely to be a concern about moving projects, particularly large or complex ones.
If you type ‘survey software’ into Google, you will be presented several alternatives – for example, Qualtrics, QuestionPro, SmartSurvey, SoGoSurvey, SurveyGizmo, SurveyMonkey, SurveyPlanet and SurveySparrow.
I heard someone at a US conference in 2001 say that by 2010 there will be no more paper surveys; all surveys will be online. Predictions are dangerous, and the speaker was wrong, of course.
Online data collection has become the most common methodology for most market research surveys around the world. However, in some countries, for example, in Asia Pacific, where we operate extensively, data collection online still represents less than 50% of all fieldwork.
In my experience, I find that most people who buy research software spend most of their time considering the look and feel of the software and the features it contains…What is often given little or no consideration is how productive the staff using the software will be.
Market research software products have expanded over the last 25 years to cover online surveys, tabulations (crosstabs), reporting, online dashboards, CATI, CAPI, paper surveys, online communities, social listening, text analytics, automated reporting, automated coding, text processing and analysis, dashboards and, more recently, AI.
As a seller of software for market research, you might think it is difficult for me to be objective in offering advice to potential buyers about what matters most in that purchase decision (continued from Part 1).
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MRDC Software has been supplying software for market research since 1992. It is known around the world for its leading tabulation software, MRDCL, but has expanded its portfolio of products to have productivity-focused software for data collection, data analysis, reporting and dashboards.
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As leading suppliers of software in Asia Pacific, we have a team of sales, support and software developers at our offices in the Philippines. Please contact our sales executive in Manila for further help.
E: nikki.sunga@mrdcsoftware.com