Survey research: Definition, examples & methods

Author: Will Webster

Subject Matter Expert: Mark Hamilton

What is survey research?

Survey research is the process of collecting data from a specific group by asking them a series of questions. It’s a popular, versatile form of research that can uncover insights about everything from your products and services, to your brand and employee experience.

Survey research is primarily used as a quantitative research method, collecting measurable data at scale and providing you, your team or business with a goldmine of information. Surveys can also include qualitative elements – such as open-ended questions – to capture deeper context behind the numbers.

When done well, survey research can help you understand perceptions, measure behaviors and spot trends. But meaningful insights don’t appear by accident: good survey research depends on smart design, the right methodology and careful analysis.

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When to use survey research

Survey research is best used when you need structured insights from a defined audience. If you’re looking for statistically reliable data to guide strategic, product or experience decisions, it’s one of the most efficient and versatile tools available.

Depending on your objective, it can help you:

• Explore new ideas, needs or behaviors. Early in a product or experience design process, surveys can reveal what matters most to your audience, highlight unmet needs or surface new opportunities to pursue.
• Describe what’s happening within a market, customer segment or user journey. You might use surveys to track satisfaction over time, measure brand awareness, or understand how different audiences experience your product or service.
• Solve specific business problems with evidence. When performance drops or engagement declines, surveys can help identify the root causes, quantify the scope of the issue and point to where improvements are needed.

Why use survey research?

Efficient and scalable, there are many reasons why survey research is one of the most widely used methods in the insights world.

Whether you’re measuring customer satisfaction, validating product ideas or tracking brand awareness, conducting survey research offers a range of benefits. Today, it’s a go-to choice for researchers and experience professionals alike.

Let’s analyze some of the key benefits of using survey research:

Cost-effectiveness at scale

Compared to in-depth interviews or focus groups, surveys – especially online surveys – can reach thousands of people for a fraction of the cost. With the right tools, you can gather meaningful data without stretching your budget.

In fact, with the free Qualtrics online survey maker, collecting data doesn’t have to even touch your budget.

Easy to design and distribute

Modern survey tools streamline everything from question design to distribution and analysis. Whether you’re running a quick pulse survey or a longitudinal study, survey research is accessible even with limited resources.

Reach large, targeted samples

Surveys make it easy to collect data from large and diverse groups of survey respondents – whether you’re researching a niche audience or an entire population. This scale helps improve the reliability of your survey results and allows for detailed segmentation.

Fast turnaround and real-time analysis

With the right survey platforms and software, data collection and analysis can happen simultaneously. Responses come in fast, and built-in analytics dashboards let you spot trends and generate insights in real time.

Structured and flexible

Surveys are designed to collect structured data, making analysis straightforward. And they’re also flexible – you can mix open-ended and closed-ended questions to gather both qualitative and quantitative data.

Survey research methods

Calling these methods ‘survey research’ slightly underplays the complexity of this type of information gathering. From the expertise required to carry out each activity to the analysis of the data and its application, effective survey research demands careful planning and execution.

There are several ways to collect survey data – face-to-face interviews, telephone surveys, online surveys, panel surveys, and, in some cases, focus groups.

The method you choose will depend on who you’re surveying, your sample size, the type of data you’re collecting and your available budget.

Face-to-face interviews

Before online methods became widespread, face-to-face interviews were considered the gold standard – valued for their high response rates and data quality.

Skilled interviewers could probe deeper, clarify questions and keep respondents engaged. The downside? They’re time-consuming, expensive and hard to scale.

Telephone surveys

Typically combining a random dialing system and recording software, phone surveys were once a widely used research method – particularly for gauging public opinion and customer sentiment.

But response rates have been declining since the 1990s – and phone surveys come with lots of limitations. They can take a long time to complete depending on the response rate, and often require a lot of cold-calling to get the information you need. There’s also the risk of respondents not being completely honest, in favor of answering your questions quickly just to get off the phone.

Nonetheless, with the right survey design they can still be helpful when you need to reach a broad target population but lack the resources for in-person research.

Online surveys

Online surveys are now one of the most widely used survey methods – and for good reason.

They’re fast, cost-effective, scalable and highly accessible – essentially available to anyone for any research purpose. Evolving from the traditional paper survey, online surveys have made it significantly easier to gather data points from large and diverse populations, especially with a huge number of people now carrying a smartphone in their pocket.

With the right tools, you can create dynamic question types, reach people across multiple channels and analyze results instantly. But online surveys come with some risks.

Researchers using online surveys must keep in mind that plenty of people have issues accessing or using digital devices, such as those from poorer socio-economic backgrounds and elderly members of the population.

Failing to understand this could result in your data being more biased towards a certain group, potentially leading to accuracy issues when you’re looking for a representative population sample.

Panel surveys

Panel surveys use pre-recruited groups of respondents selected to match your target audience. Typically chosen by research companies, these panels make it easy to reach specific demographics and ensure balance across key variables like age, gender and income.

Panels are a great way to get your questions in front of the right audience. The downside is that some panel participants may only be responding in return for incentives – leading to rushed or disengaged answers that affect data quality. Avoiding this obstacle requires choosing a reputable panel provider and designing engaging, thoughtful surveys.

Focus groups

Focus groups are a qualitative method often used to support or inform survey design. While not surveys themselves, they’re commonly used for survey pretesting and designing, and can also be a great way to generate opinions and data points from a diverse range of people.

In a typical focus group, a trained moderator leads a small, diverse group in a guided discussion about a particular topic, such as your product, brand or service. Focus groups are excellent for understanding why people think a certain way, but they’re expensive and require a lot of time to conduct and analyze the data properly.

You also run the risk of more dominant members of the group taking over the discussion and swaying the opinions of other people – potentially providing you with unreliable data.

Designing and conducting survey research in five steps

Effective survey design is crucial for collecting accurate, actionable data. A well-thought-out survey will go a long way to ensure that the insights you gather align with your research goals, answer your business questions and guide confident decision-making.

From setting objectives to analyzing the results, here’s how to get it right in five key steps:

1. Define your objectives and target audience

Start with a clear understanding of what you’re trying to learn and from whom.

Are you measuring customer satisfaction? Testing a product concept? Tracking brand perception? These goals should translate into specific research questions – the key things you need your survey to answer.

Once you’ve defined your objectives, identify your target audience – the specific group of people you need to hear from. This might be your existing customers, potential users, employees or a broader market segment.

From there, define your sample – the subset of your target audience who will actually take the survey. A representative sample size is critical for data reliability: too small and your survey results may lack statistical power; too broad and you risk collecting noisy or irrelevant data.

2. Choose the right survey method

It’s crucial that you match your method to your audience, goals and available resources. The right choice will boost your response rate, improve data quality and get you faster, more meaningful results.

• Online surveys are cost-effective, scalable, and ideal for reaching large audiences quickly.
• Telephone and face-to-face surveys allow for more personal interaction and follow-up, but require more time and budget.
• Panel surveys give you targeted access to pre-recruited respondents that match your criteria.
• Focus groups, while not surveys, are often used in the early stages to explore attitudes and refine survey design.

Remember that each method has trade-offs. Consider accessibility, reach, response quality and your timeline before deciding.

3. Design your survey questionnaire

This is where survey success is made or broken. A well-structured survey questionnaire includes the right question types, uses clear language and avoids bias.

Scroll down to the next section for our question design best practices.

4. Choose your software, test thoroughly and distribute

Research software is fundamental in today’s research world. With so many options available, you have to determine which best fits your needs – whether that’s advanced logic, multilingual support, real-time analytics, or more.

Before sending your survey out into the world, pre-test it with a small group and iterate if needed. This is an important step – helping you catch unclear wording, logic errors or formatting issues that could undermine your results.

When you’re ready, it’s time to launch. But don’t neglect the importance of choosing when to press go – and how often you send reminders.

5. Analyze results and turn them into action

Once your survey responses are in, it’s time to turn raw survey data into insight. Use survey analysis tools to identify trends, segment responses and run statistical analysis where needed.

Don’t just report the findings – interpret them and draw conclusions. Look for patterns that explain why something is happening, not just what’s happening. Connect the dots between data and action to help your organization make smarter, customer-informed decisions.

Best practices for designing survey questions

The quality of your survey insights depends on the quality of your questions. A poorly worded or confusing survey questionnaire can lead to unclear or misleading data points – no matter how advanced your analysis is.

Here are some best practices to help you design survey questions that generate accurate, meaningful responses:

Craft clear, direct questions

Use simple, specific language that’s easy for all respondents to understand – regardless of their familiarity with your brand or industry. That means avoiding jargon, double-barreled questions and vague phrasing.

You’ll often find that the more direct your question, the more reliable the answer.

Choose the right response scale

Your response options should match the kind of data you’re collecting:

• Nominal: Unordered categories like gender, region or product type.
• Ordinal: Ordered categories like satisfaction or agreement levels.
• Interval: Scales with equal intervals but no true zero, such as temperature ratings or Likert scales.
• Ratio: Numeric scales with a meaningful zero, like age, income or time spent.

Ensure your scale fits the question type and provides options that are mutually exclusive, exhaustive and clearly labelled.

Use balanced and consistent response options

Make sure your answer choices are mutually exclusive and cover the full range of possible responses.

If using scales, stick to one orientation throughout the survey to avoid distorting your results. And don’t forget to include neutral midpoints and options like “None of the above” or “Not applicable” where relevant.

Prioritize the key questions

Only ask what you need to know. Skip questions that aren’t essential or that ask for information you already have – this reduces survey fatigue and improves completion rates.

Use open-ended questions strategically

Open text boxes can reveal rich insight, but they also increase the cognitive load on respondents. Use them sparingly, ideally at the end of a section or survey, and only when you’re genuinely looking for qualitative data.

Want to go deeper? Explore the full guide from the Qualtrics XM Institute to get expert-backed advice, real-world examples and a complete checklist for writing survey questions.

Get reliable insights and drive action with Qualtrics survey software

According to Qualtrics XM Institute’s latest global study, while 76% of consumers rate their experiences highly, few go on to trust (73%), recommend (70%) or repurchase (69%).

For brands, well-designed research surveys are more important than ever – going beyond surface-level satisfaction to uncover what drives true loyalty and advocacy.

Used by more than 20,000 brands and supporting over 1.3 billion surveys a year, Qualtrics empowers everyone in your organization to convert data from both quantitative and qualitative research methods into actionable business decisions – and all from one platform.

Why Qualtrics for your survey research needs

Part of Qualtrics XM for Strategy & Research, our online survey software gives you everything you need to design, distribute and analyze surveys in one place.

With drag-and-drop simplicity and advanced capabilities like logic, branching, quotas and AI-driven quality checks, it removes the guesswork from survey design. You can launch faster, reach the right audience through any channel and get clean, reliable data that meets your research goals.

Whether you’re running a one-off customer study or an ongoing brand tracker, Qualtrics delivers scalable research without the complexity.