In today’s interconnected world, businesses navigate a difficult and ever changing landscape, the global marketplace. Understanding international customer preferences, emerging trends, and potential challenges is not optional and brands must be aware of these issues at all times; this crucial knowledge serves as the foundation of effective global market intelligence. More specifically, strategic surveys have become a useful tool, offering businesses a direct line to the voices of international customers.
While other market research methods hold value as well, surveys provide distinct advantages. Firstly, they enable the direct collection of data from target audiences across geographical boundaries. Online surveys facilitate cost-effective and rapid data acquisition, a critical advantage in the global landscape. Time is money, as they say, and surveys ensure your company can gather insights efficiently. Furthermore, the inherent scalability of surveys allows businesses to reach a diverse range of international customers, providing a comprehensive understanding of the global market. Once formed, companies can translate and transpose surveys in almost no time at all.
Despite all the benefits, navigating the complexities of global surveys still requires a nuanced approach. Language barriers are an immediate pitfall, and minor misspelling and mistranslations can deflate the results of any data gathering measure. To ensure accurate interpretation and avoid cultural misunderstandings, meticulous cultural adaptation of survey questions are key. Nuances in humor, for instance, can be easily lost in translation, potentially skewing results. Similarly, question formats and response scales may need to be adjusted to accommodate cultural variations in expressing opinions. High context cultures may, for example, have difficulty accurately portraying their feelings through a written survey because there may be non-verbal cues belying the true response they wish to give. Maybe then it would be better to conduct your research through an in person or virtual interview. One size does not fit all, and successful global surveys require careful cultural insights.
Several online survey methods are particularly well-suited for international intelligence gathering. Localized website surveys are the most common and cost-effective, strategically placed on regional versions of your website. This would allow you to directly reach international customers in their preferred language. Multilingual email surveys offer another efficient way to reach a broad global audience. By segmenting your email list by geographic location, you can tailor survey content and language to resonate with specific markets, but again you may run into issues with cultural barriers rather than language ones. Finally, with the ubiquity of mobile devices, in-app surveys present a valuable avenue for gathering feedback from international users. Similar to website surveys, in-app surveys can be localized and targeted to specific user bases within different regions.
But say you don’t want faces on your survey. Crafting the best culturally sensitive survey questions is critical. While open-ended questions offer richer insights, they may be less effective in certain cultures where directness is discouraged, think again back to high context cultures like Japan where outward politeness is favored. A pilot test in select markets can help refine survey instruments and ensure their effectiveness across diverse global audiences. Such a pilot test may also be available already, so check on that before working on your own survey. After all, you’re likely not the first one to survey folks in another country, so look out for how other companies are doing, and learn from their examples, and even their mistakes.
All in all, strategically designed online surveys can be a powerful tool for gathering global market intelligence. By acknowledging cultural nuances, employing appropriate survey methods, and implementing an analytics-driven approach with the data collected, businesses can unlock a wealth of knowledge about international markets. Ultimately, this intelligence empowers them to make informed decisions and achieve success in the global marketplace.
Citation:
6 best survey examples from real brands