One of the most critical issues in the research process is the initial development of the questionnaire. By this I mean choice of and structure of questions being asked as opposed to any actual online implementation.

Like most things in life you can either write your questionnaire yourself or bring in specialists to do it for you. If you are not a researcher then our advice is:

• Non Business-critical studies. For example, studies such as seminar evaluation or PR type surveys where a management team aren’t making important business decisions based on the results.

  In these cases its usually acceptable for a non-researcher to develop the wording and initial drafts of the questionnaire. We would advise that this is reviewed and refined by a market researcher before publication. This will ensure that factors such as wording, progression, consistency of scales and overall value from your questionnaire are optimised.

  ORS provides such a questionnaire review as part of the ORS Standard Survey Package.

• Business-critical studies. Here we are talking about studies whose results will be used by a management team to help make important decisions regarding future tactical and strategic business plans. Examples might include market intelligence or customer satisfaction studies.

  We advise employing fully trained researchers with knowledge of your industry to develop your questionnaire from the ground up. They will start by understanding your business and your objectives for the research and then developing a research plan to suit. If you do not have a research team in-house then the Market Research Society website is a good place to draw a list of suitable agencies from.

  If you do have an in-house research team then the advantage is that they will already know the business and obviously costs will be lower. Conversely, if you use a research agency then it will add cost but they will not be constrained by current company thinking, policy and politics and it can add a badge of independence to the research thus encouraging higher levels of participation and authority to the final findings.

However good the later implementation of your online survey is, having the right questionnaire is key to a successful research project.