The Toluna Pro Official Blog

For the past few days TolunaPro and QuickSurveys have been unstable due to unforeseen technical issues linked to an unforeseen increase in traffic. Our technical staff are working around the clock to resolve these issues and fully restore the system as soon as possible. Users whose QuickSurveys were affected by these problems are invited to email us at tqs-support@toluna.com and we will credit your account accordingly within 72 hours as recompense for any inconvenience.

We apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced and thank you for your patience and understanding.

The QuickSurveys Team

The Like button is a widget that you are likely to find on many websites in the near future; it is a great new way to share and recommend sites and content with your Facebook friends and the rest of the world, and we’ve added a Like button to all Toluna.com poll and topic pages:

When you click the Like button your Facebook friends will be notified in their news feed, and the “recent activity” section of your profile will be updated;  for more information on Facebook’s Like button please click here.

Member Voting Activity at an All Time High!

Toluna, the world’s leading online research panel and survey technology provider, announced a record number of votes were gathered on Toluna.com, the company’s member community website in January 2010.

Toluna.com was launched in North America in July 2009, and that provides a forum where over 4 million members globally to interact and poll each other on a broad range of topics in real-time.

“The ability for members to engage with one and other, and participate in a ‘community’ is unique, and the fact that we’ve gathered millions of votes in January proves that this is a successful means of engaging respondents,” said Frédéric-Charles Petit, CEO and Founder of Toluna.   “Furthermore, 30% of the voting that took place was done in North America, further proving that the concept of a panel ‘community’ has global appeal.”

Donation to be provided on behalf of respondent community members

Toluna, the world’s leading online research panel and survey technology provider, has pledged a donation to Haitian relief efforts on behalf of survey respondents.

On Monday, January 25, the company informed survey community members that for every survey response, Toluna will donate approximately $.20 until a total of $10,000 is reached.  All North American and European survey responses received count toward the goal.

Laurent Sabouret, Online Community and Panel Director says “We felt that it was important to provide help to the citizens of Haiti during this time, and know that many of our survey respondents were empathetic to the situation in Haiti as well.  Our thoughts are with our Toluna community members, Haiti citizens, and all who are affected by the devastating earthquakes.”

Respondent community members were also invited to participate in a Toluna QuickVotes™ to select the charity that will receive the donation.  The list of possible charities includes the following: The Red Cross, UNICEF, United Nations World Food Program, Doctors Without Borders, and Oxfam.  The final selection will be announced.

About the Program

Toluna will donate 20 cents for each survey response received from US and European respondents beginning Monday, January 25, through February 25, until we reach a total donation of up to $10,000.  Toluna will donate the funds to one charity selected by Toluna North America and Europe members in the Haiti earthquake poll that opens on January 25, 2010.

About Us

Toluna is the world’s leading independent online panel and survey technology provider to the global market research industry. The company provides online sample and survey technology solutions to the world’s leading market research agencies, media agencies and corporations, from its 17 offices in Europe, North America and Asia Pacific. In 2009, Toluna welcomed Greenfield Online and Ciao Surveys into the group – complementing its traditional strengths in Europe and increasing its online sample and delivery capacity in the US, Canada and Asia Pacific.

Unlike other panel providers, Toluna has developed a unique online community approach to the management of its panels. Through the use of web 2.0-based technology it has created the world’s first social voting community site toluna.com, focusing on maximizing panellist engagement to offer increased survey responsiveness and data reliability to its clients.

In addition Toluna is enabling organizations to generate valuable customer insight by creating, hosting and managing their own online communities  using its software as a service community management solution; PanelPortal . Toluna’s portfolio of research technology solutions also include QuickSurveys - an online self-service tool that enables you to ask 1-5 questions and receive 2,000 responses in a few hours, Interactive Voice Response, mobile survey capabilities and BrandSpector a new approach to measuring the efficiency and effectiveness of online advertising campaigns using Toluna’s online panel.

How many drivers admit to texting while driving?

A recent study conducted in the United States shows that texting while driving can have an even deadlier effect that talking while driving, and a survey conducted by Toluna shows that a surprisingly high percentage of drivers admit to texting while driving.

Want to read more? Click here for the full article and the Toluna survey results!

See you on the site,

The Toluna Team

Toluna is proud to introduce Toluna Pro, the new home of Toluna Quick Surveys!

Toluna Quick Surveys is a revolutionary self-service tool which enables you to conduct market research quickly, easily and very cost effectively.

TQS enables you to create your own surveys of up to 5 questions, select up to 2,000 nationally representative respondents, pay online using PayPal or your credit card, and view live survey results online.

Your Toluna Quick Survey will appear on targeted specific areas of Toluna.com- a global community site that provides a platform where members interact and create their own polls and opinion topics on a broad range of subjects:

Fast, affordable, hassle free, valuable customer insight when you need it!

Toluna Quick Surveys also allows you to add your company logo and images as well as video from YouTube, and you can invite people, e.g. your existing clients, to participate in your surveys.

Registration

In order to create your Toluna Pro account click the “Register” button on the upper right corner of the page.

Contact information

• For all support related issues, please use our contact form, or send an email to tqs-support@toluna.com.
• For further information about Toluna and Quick Surveys, please visit our corporate site.

Your survey data

The Quick Survey data consists of the following information:

• Quick Survey name:

The Quick Survey name will appear to Toluna members on the site and on the actual survey; try to use a descriptive name that will appeal to as many members as possible. The Quick Survey name can also be useful when managing your inventory of Quick Surveys.

• Category and sub category:

Select a category and sub-category for your Quick Survey; this is a mandatory step.

• Keywords / tags:

Tagging is optional but highly recommended. Effectively tagging your Quick Survey means that it will be easier to find, thus improving visibility and increasing the response rate.

• Number of participants:

The following options are available: 100, 300, 500, 800, 1000, 1500, and 2000 participants.

• Definition of Quick Survey participants:

A participant is a user who either completes the Quick Survey, or a user who answers at least one question but is screened out as a result of one of the Quick Survey’s filters. If a user starts the survey but navigates away before completion they are not considered a participant. All Toluna QuickSurveys participants are registered Toluna panelists over the age of 16.

• Target country:

There are currently 9 countries you can run your Quick Survey in:

• Europe: UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Russia
• North America: USA (English or Spanish) & Canada (English or French)

Important note: You will need to create separate accounts for access to the European countries and North American countries. European countries can only be targeted if your survey is created on one of the European Toluna Pro sites; the same applies to North American countries.

• Language:

Set your Quick Survey’s language.

Excluding participants

When you set up a new Quick Survey, you can choose to exclude panelists who participated in your previous surveys:

• On the Survey Data page, click “Edit excluded list”
• A list of all of your previous Quick Surveys will be displayed
• Select as many surveys from the list as necessary
• Click “Exclude selected surveys”
• The titles and numbers of the excluded surveys are now displayed on your Survey Data page

This feature can be very useful if you are repeating the same survey and want to make sure that panelists that participated in the past cannot participate again.

Importing a survey from text

To import a survey into the Quick Surveys wizard, click “Import survey from text” on the Survey Data page. Copy and paste your survey, then click “Import to wizard”; your survey has been imported into the TQS wizard.

Your imported survey needs to adhere to the following format:

Your survey title
//skip a line
(Multiple choice)(Randomize)Your first question
(Exclusive)Answer1
Answer2
//skip a line
(Multiple choice)Your second question
Answer1
(Exclusive)Answer2
Answer3
//etc….

Here is an example:

• Please note that by default all questions are single answer and the answer order is fixed- these settings can be modified after you import your survey.
• After you import your survey’s text you will need to complete the survey data before you can save and activate your survey.

Adding questions to your TQS

• Click “Question”
• Enter your question: questions are limited to 1,000 characters; try to keep your questions’ wording short and concise.
• Enter the answers to your question; to add another answer simply click “Add another answer”. Questions are limited to 20 answers, and each answer is limited to 200 characters. Try to limit your answers to a maximum of 7 for questions with multiple choice answers.
• In order to add an additional question, click “Question”. Each additional question will be added to your control panel for easy access; you can reorder the questions by using the arrows that appear in the control panel.
• Randomize answer order: selecting this option will display the answers in a different order to each participant.
• Multiple choice: this option allows participants to select more than one possible answer.
• Exclusive answers: selecting this option for one of the answers in a multiple choice question means that if a participant selects this answer, all of the other answer selections will be nullified.

Question options

Moving and deleting questions

If you’ve created several question and/or content pages and would like to change their order or position, simply click the yellow arrows displayed on each item in your survey control panel. To delete a question or a content page click the red ‘X’ displayed on your control panel questions and content pages.

Setting a filter

A filter is a tool that enables you to do one of the following:

1. Screen out a participant if a certain response is given (positive or negative response)
2. Redirect a participant to another question within the QuickSurvey based on the responses they provide (moving forward only)

• To set a filter, click “Edit filter”
• Click “Add rule”, the filter graphic interface will appear; select the relevant answer and desired action.
• A filter can be set to act if a participant selects or does not select any of your question’s answers.

Notes:

• If participants terminate the QuickSurvey after a filter screens them out, they are still counted in the total number of survey participants.
• Filters can only be set once you’ve created more than one question.
• The maximum number of filters per question is 5.

Adding content pages to your TQS

Content pages are optional, but are highly recommended; content pages can contain simple HTML, images and Flash objects.

Common uses for content pages are start pages, in which you can introduce the participant to your survey, and end pages, which can be used to thank participants. You can also insert additional content pages between questions; the total number of questions and content pages cannot exceed five.

Adding videos and images

• Click the ‘add a video’ or ‘add a picture’ link located under the space allocated for your question and answers.
• A new window will appear, displaying relevant search results from YouTube or Google Images.
• Browse the search results using the arrows; when you find the video or picture you want to use, click it.
• A preview of your selected attachment is now displayed; if you are pleased with your choice, click ‘Save’ to close the search window and continue the QuickSurvey creation process.
• If you’d like to remove the attachment, click the red ‘X’ that now appears next to the ‘attach’ buttons.

Note: Pictures can be uploaded from your computer, or from any location on the web; videos can only be attached from YouTube.

Adding a YouTube video without searching

In addition to searching for videos, you can also add a specific YouTube video to your QuickSurvey:

• Copy the video’s URL (the video’s webpage address, which you can copy from your browser)
• Click ‘add a video’
• Paste the video’s URL into the search window
• Click ‘Go’
• A preview of your video is now visible; click ‘Save’ and you’re done.

Adding a picture from the web / uploading from your computer

In addition to searching for pictures on Google, you can also add pictures from any web page, or directly from your computer:

• Copy the picture’s URL (the web address of the picture you wish to attach, which you can copy from your browser)
• Click ‘add a picture’
• Paste the picture’s URL into the search window

Note: Make sure you are linking directly to the picture you want to attach and not to a page which contains the picture.

• Click ‘Go’
• A preview of your picture is now visible; click ‘Save’ and you’re done.
• To add a picture from your computer, simply click the “Go” button located to the right of “Upload an image”; browse your computer for the relevant file, then click “Save”.

Important: When you upload a picture from your computer or when you attach an image from the web, you are certifying that you have the right to use said image and that you are not in violation of our terms & conditions.

Uploaded picture restrictions: All attached images, whether uploaded from disk or from the web, must be smaller than 1MB; the total size of pictures uploaded from disk cannot exceed 6MB.

Video / image attachment tips

Modify the search query for better results: when you search for a video or a picture, you may receive a limited number of results, or irrelevant results. This is likely to happen if you have written an elaborate question or answer, since the search query uses all of the text you have entered. In order to improve on search results you can modify the search query within the search window; there is no limit to the number of searches you can run. Feel free to use search queries that are not part of your question’s text if you feel this will improve the results.

Saving your Quick Survey

Click “Save” on the bottom right corner of your control panel; your QuickSurvey has been saved, but has not yet been activated. A QuickSurvey can only be activated once payment has been received.