There are a couple of handy rules to remember when it comes to International studies that can help the project run more smoothly and produce better results.

The biggest recommendation I would make is that you start with the English language version of your survey and do not develop any foreign language versions until the English one is fully completed and signed off, (completed in terms of creating the online implementation and any associated communications). Use the English survey as your master version once finalised and as the basis for translation and creation of any foreign language variants.

What should be avoided is starting with four or five draft questionnaires in say English, French, German, Spanish and Italian and setting them all up online in parallel. Rarely, if ever, is a first draft of an online survey used as the final version. When the inevitable change and refinement request are made by the client or team you are working for it is much better to only have to make changes in one place rather than five times over. With these studies comes the complication that any refinements have to be translated and this takes time and potentially money to do. Things can get complicated quite easily especially when lots of different people are making change requests as often happens with international studies due to the nature of the companies that commission them.

If you are offering a prize draw as an incentive you should make sure that you do so in accordance with the laws of the country you are operating in. These vary and you will need to make sure that you have the appropriate legal wordings translated and available for survey respondents to read.

If you are sourcing external sample then you may be able to use a single sample provider for all the countries being researched. The advantage is that it keeps both the commercial and technical side of things simple. The disadvantage is that it can be expensive as often panel companies have to buy in sample for countries not in their portfolio or with weak coverage and mark it up accordingly. The alternative is to use different local sample providers in each of the countries. This can be cheaper and often the service and quality is good because they are focused on only their own market.

If possible, ORS aim to get the English language survey completed first and then use our translation partners to produce the foreign language questionnaires based on the online version. Our software systems produce special outputs for translators to make this easier and ensure accuracy. If sourcing sample for clients we usually obtain quotes from one or more of the large multi-national sample companies along with a selection of locally sourced alternatives.

ORS has conducted surveys in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portugese, Swedish, Danish, Greek, Thai and Chinese.