Forget paper and the Web, if you need a survey just pick up the phone!
ORC International and Local Government users benefit from more effective phone-based research methods of conducting surveys
Belfast, 28th July, 2014 – ORC International, a leading market research firm whose customers rank among some of the biggest private and public sector names in UK and globally, has turned to mobile and voice customer service specialist, SpeechStorm, (http://www.speechstorm.com/), for its Interactive Voice Response (IVR) phone-based solution to help it conduct employee engagement research surveys and dispense with less effective and more costly paper and web-based methods.

Conducting surveys is a challenge for any company attempting to gather statistically credible information on important matters from segments of the population relevant to their cause. Traditional paper-based and web-based methods have become inefficient in being able to deliver statistically relevant results from a target audience. As a result, many organisations which need credible survey results on which to base important business decisions, are turning to phone-based solutions that are fast, effective and engaging, and make the difference between someone taking part in a survey, or not.

ORC International conducts a large amount of research on behalf of its clients using innovative, integrated solutions, and its employee division, which is using the SpeechStorm solution, helps customers address strategic, employee-related issues through such surveys.

Alun Byles, Head of Operations (UK) at ORC, said, “We use SpeechStorm to reach employees that are harder to get in contact with. For a leading utility company we use it for employees who don’t really have a base, or if they do have one, are rarely there, e.g. meter readers. IVR is the only method we use to reach these employees and we always get a good response rate. For last year’s survey we received feedback from around 2,000 employees.

“The software is easy to use and we’ve found SpeechStorm to be really responsive to any enquiries we have. They go the extra mile to help us out.”

SpeechStorm is also helping public sector organisations with surveys. It has, for example, helped the UK Government’s Department of Finance & Personnel (DFP), in Northern Ireland, which had previously relied on paper-based surveys that incurred substantial postal and processing costs, move to phone-based solutions. The DFP has been using SpeechStorm to provide an automated IVR solution for conducting its important Quarterly Employment Survey (QES) survey, to gather short-term employment estimates for the Northern Ireland economy from businesses across the region.

Oliver Lennon, SpeechStorm CEO, said, “Many traditional methods of conducting surveys fail to engage the customer, appear long and tortuous and result in few participants and statistically poor data. Our phone-based approach, however, really helps encourage target segments to take part, and we’re delighted ORC International is getting a good response rate using our IVR solution.

“In Northern Ireland, our solution has helped the DFP improve overall response rate to its QES, making results that much more valid and timely. The department said that over 90% of respondents to the survey indicated they preferred this method of data capture to previous paper and web-based survey methods. So, if you need an effective survey conducted, why not just pick up the phone!”