A survey is a method of gathering information from a number of individuals, known as a sample, in order to learn something about the larger population from which the sample is drawn.  Although surveys come in many forms, and serve a variety of purposes, they do share certain characteristics.  In order for the objectives of a survey to be met, the results must reliably project on the larger public, from which the sample is drawn.  A sample can be scientifically chosen so that each individual in a population has a known chance of selection.  This ensures that a sample is not selected haphazardly or uses only those eager to participate.  The sample size for a survey will depend on the degree of reliability necessary and how the results are to be used.  A properly selected sample should be able to reflect the various characteristics of a total population within a very small margin for error.  There are many surveys that study the total adult population but many others that focus on selected populations:  employees, academics, industry experts, computers users, or customers that use a particular product or service.

Some surveys focus on opinion and attitudes while others are more concerned with collecting factual information. Many surveys combine questions of both types.   A respondent could be asked what they heard or read about an issue, what they know about it, their opinion, how strongly they feel and why, interest in the issue, past experiences with it, and also certain demographic information which will help the survey analyst classify the responses (such as age, sex, marital status, occupation, and place of residence).  Questions can be open ended (“What does that make you think of?”) or closed (“Do you agree or disagree?”); they may ask the respondent to rate a product or a service on some kind of scale; they may ask for a ranking of various alternatives.  The questionnaire could be very brief – a few questions taking no longer than five minutes, or it could take a demanding hour or more of a respondent’s time.  A survey is usually rooted in situations where an individual or institution is confronted with an information need and no existing data will suffice. Once the information need has been identified and a determination made that existing data is inadequate, objectives are laid out for the investigation. These objectives should remain as specific, clear cut and unambiguous as possible.

Designing the questionnaire is a critical stage of the survey development process.  The questionnaire links the information need to the realized measurement.  Scaling techniques used for measurement can be comparative or non comparative.  If proper care and attention is not placed on clearly defining concepts and unambiguously phrasing questions, the resulting data is apt to contain serious biases.  Questions used in surveys must be refined to minimize interpretation problems and thus reduce measurement error.  If the respondent is unable to understand a question or fails to comprehend the question the way it was intended then the data is neither valid nor reliable.  A question must use language in a way that makes the intended observer’s meaning behind that question obvious.   In order to do this a survey must reflect an understanding of the population being sampled. For example, many people do not distinguish between robbery which requires the theft to be in the immediate presence of the victim and burglary which can involve breaking and entering without any confrontation.  The National Crime Survey, done by the Bureau of the Census, does not even mention the word “robbery” when it asks questions about robbery victimization.  Rather they ask several questions that use universally understood phrases, consistent with the operational definition of robbery, that when used together are able to capture the desired responses.

Keeping response errors and biases to a minimum factor heavily in designing a survey. How questions are interpreted by respondents must be carefully considered.  Also, you need to consider the length of the survey. If a questionnaire is too long than it can be burdensome to the respondent, inducing respondent fatigue that leads to response errors, refusals, incomplete questionnaires, and can contribute to higher non-response rates in subsequent surveys involving the same respondent.  Memory plays an important role when surveys deal with past events.  For most people the greater the demand a question places on memory, such as being asked to recall trivial details occurring on any given random date, the less accurate the responses and therefore the less reliable the survey data that is collected.  An appropriate choice of reference period should be made so that a respondent is not forced to report on events that happened too long ago.  Grouping similar questions together can reduce the cognitive burden a survey places on a respondent.  The validity of a survey can be put in jeopardy if questions are too sensitive, if they may prejudice the respondent, if they unduly invade a respondent’s privacy, and if the information that is sought is too difficult for a willing respondent to provide.

A web survey is one of five general ways research is typically conducted using surveys.  Surveys are also given using mail (the kind that requires postage), telephone, in-person interviews, and intercept surveys (respondents are “intercepted” as they pass through a heavily trafficked area).  The web survey most closely resembles the type of surveys which were traditionally mailed out.  Only this time you’re using email to send a link that takes you to an HTML form that is designed for completion and submission through the computer.   Information is collected quickly because as soon as your respondent has finished taking the survey, their responses are immediately submitted.  Web surveys can also be embedded on your web site using what is known as an Iframe.  An IFrame is an HTML element that makes it possible to embed an HTML document inside of another HTML document.   You can also create a Pop-Up survey on your web site so that when a site visitor visits a page the HTML form pops up from their web site.   If they have pop-up blockers enabled then this method will prevent them from taking your survey so you can also create a link to the survey which you can display on your web site.

The web survey is a cost effective way of administering a survey that allows you to collect large amounts of information without having to pay for interviewers, paper supplies or postage, and does not require separate data entry for responses to be processed.  The rise in web based surveys is due in no small measure to the increasingly widespread availability of computers.   Particularly in organizational or professional settings, the ability to receive a questionnaire and complete it at home or in the office on a computer is very convenient for most people.  You can expect to wait at least a few weeks for a questionnaire that is mailed out to a respondent to be returned.  A web survey allows you to rapidly collect data in a timely manner.   Information can be collected and processed in just a few days.    It also allows respondents ample time to carefully consider response selection and to enter in text for open ended questions.  If factual information is required then the respondent has enough time to consult their records.

You can increase response rate to web surveys by sending respondents a pre-notification of the intent of the survey.   This lets your respondents know what the survey is about before they invest any of their time into taking it.  You can also send follow-up reminders to respondents that have not completed the survey. This can be used in a situation where a respondent must complete the survey within a given date range.  Web surveys assume a minimal level of computer literacy so keeping your surveys simple can also help your response rate.  The technical nature of online surveys make them ideal for specialized or well defined populations that have access to an email account and/or a computer.  Coverage bias may result when targeting populations where computers or internet access are not widespread.  Determining an appropriate type of survey to administer to your respondents must take the population that is being measured into consideration.

As we are developing the new versions of both Email Marketing and Help Desk we have put a great amount of detail into usability.  The term usability is often used to simply describe the user interface.  But, the term encompasses a much larger area of software development.

A specific case in our recent development is cron management.  A number of our applications require you to setup a cron job.  In some cases you may need to setup 3 or 4 cronjobs depending on the features you are using.This is something that can be a pain for our users.  Once you setup the application you should not have to do more work when you start using a feature or purchase an add-on.  Thus we are designing our new cron management feature.  Our new cron management feature serves 2 primary purposes:

1. Ability to have a single cron – yet have different timed events.  This means that while you will only have one cron that you have to setup, our software can choose to execute different actions at different time intervals.
2. Improve the process of expanding your application and upgrading.  With this new feature in place you will not need to manually add any crons or events if you wish to use extra features, new add-ons, etc..

Those 2 purposes are the primary objectives of this feature and a great example of improving usability.   This feature will debut in Email Marketing 5 and Help Desk 3.

Help Desk 3.0 development has begun….

We recently started work on Help Desk 3.0.  Version 3.0 will be a major update to the ActiveCampaign Help Desk Software package.

We will be incorporating hundreds of changes and additions including such things as:

• Rewriting the majority of the backend code
• Improving the speed and responsiveness of the entire application
• Leaving 99% of the source code unencoded
• CSS Based admin/public interfaces
• Escalation system
• SLA Management
• External Login Sources
• Much more….

While we have our development plans – we still want to know what you want to see in Help Desk 3.0.

Let us know what you want changed, what you wish was added, general feedback & comments, etc… Your feedback is greatly appreciated and will be taken into consideration for Help Desk 3.0.

Tell us what you want in the next version of SupportTrio!

The Mambo foundation is a volunteer, non-profit organization charged with the governance of the Mambo open source content management system.  Mambo is free software released under the GNU/General Public license and like all such projects, dealing with emails and organizational issues takes valuable time away from software development.   They use Help Desk to manage both time and resources more effectively.

Mambo developers must work in collaboration from many different locations which makes email key to their communication.   “Email is the key communication tool. The Mambo development team and the members of the Board of the Mambo Foundation are geographically distributed and work in a virtual, online environment.  All email that is not addressed to individuals is managed through the help desk.”  Directing email traffic through a central ticketing system allows multiple members to work together on the same issue if it is not specifically addressed to a particular individual.

Mambo foundation uses the knowledgebase in ActiveCampaign’s Help Desk Software to provide a central location for corporate documents that require routine turn over.  “For the management of Board affairs Help Desk has proven to be an ideal solution.  Previously, corporate documents were kept by officers of the Foundation and handed over to new officers following our annual elections of the Board. This meant that record keeping relied on the diligence of the individuals who handled those documents. Help Desk is used as a central repository and archive. By keeping all documents in the knowledgebase and keeping emails we now have accurate corporate records that are available to future Board members. This gives us confidence that we can not only meet our statutory obligations but also that institutional knowledge is retained for the future – two things that are extremely important and sometimes difficult to achieve in a volunteer environment.”     This improves efficiency and allows accountability that would otherwise be difficult to maintain.

“Volunteer, free software projects tend to have a reasonably high turnover in personnel. People work when they can, in their spare time, and often find it hard to commit their time in advance. By having a central document repository and by handling all email through the ticketing system it does not matter who is around and when. People can come into new roles and read what has happened previously and people can take leave for a few months while knowing that others can step in and take over handling of the enquiries.

“In the past, individuals took responsibility for one or more email accounts. There was no way the rest of the team could be certain that emails were being responded to in a timely manner and no way the team or Board could be certain it was receiving all information. By collecting all emails within the help desk the groups collectively have access to each email and the responses. This has made us more accountable and has improved our responsiveness to enquiries.

“Prior to installing Help Desk we also had issues due to the distributed, virtual team environment we work in. Team and Board members are located all over the world and not everyone has reliable internet connections. Some countries have high fees for bandwidth. This resulted in some Board members being reluctant to take on responsibility for handling email enquiries due to costs – especially as a lot of the email is spam. By using the helpdesk nobody needs to worry about the costs because email goes into the ticket system and is not downloaded to individual’s computers. If someone’s internet connection is down for awhile this is not a problem – responding is a collective responsibility and no longer a burden put on individuals.

“The Mambo Foundation has used SupportTrio for nine months now. The improvements in our responsiveness and productivity have been significant. Best of all, we now have more time to devote to developing the software.”

SupportTrio provides a central framework to allow Mambo Foundation address the challenge of working in an environment that requires the collaboration of volunteers working in different locations.  It also provides a means for maintaining efficiency and accountability in an environment that necessitates a high turnover rate.

Click here for more information about ActiveCampaign Help Desk Software.

Having previously been a programmer myself, I can attest to very real and maddening phenomenon that affects nearly everyone in this line of work: the urge to rewrite. It comes on hard and fast, usually immediately after finishing a piece of software. Sometimes it even comes on smack in the middle of your efforts.

The reason is simple: as you go through the process of writing the code, you gain new perspectives on the shortcomings of your original approach to the problem. It’s the same thing that happens when we look back on the events of our past and think “if I only knew then what I know now…” In a way, the better the software that you’ve written turned out, the better your perspective becomes, and therefore the more pernicious the urge to rewrite it becomes.

A great example of this is our own Knowledge Management software. It’s a great piece of software that’s very highly regarded in the industry, and an awful lot of people tell us how much they enjoy using it. We could very easily add on to the existing code base, adding new features and improving existing ones, and release a new version and make a ton of money. But it wouldn’t be as good as we know that we could make it. Because now we’ve been working with the product for years, supporting it, using it on our own site; we know too much about it now; we know what its potential is.

So what are we doing now? Rewriting the whole damn thing from scratch. And it’s going to be great. It’ll be a lot faster, more flexible, and have lots of little touches that would’ve been too difficult to work into the old framework.

Of course, like anything, there has to be balance. You can’t rewrite a product every day or even every year and still remain profitable. At some point you have to recognize that no matter how much potential you see, only a certain amount of that potential is realizable in the immediate future. No matter how good a piece of web software becomes, there will always be room for improvement. The better a piece of software gets, in fact, the more strongly it advocates for the shifting of its own paradigm. You’re always climbing into view of the next incredible set of previously unthinkable goals.

The art of software development is in recognizing when you’ve found a nice plateau, and then allowing yourself to rest there for a while. That way you have room for some horizontal growth–feature enhancements, optimizations–and this give you and your clients time to enjoy all the hard work and creativity that’s gone into the software’s current iteration.

We are currently looking for highly motivated & talented PHP / MySQL software programmers to join our team.

Our work includes: Working in collaboration with other developers to meet our product cycle updates. Introducing new features into existing software and improving the code base and techniques currently being used. Taking part in new product development. From planning to development to deployment. Re-writing older “legacy” code that is out of date. Taking on challenging new ideas and methods required for upcoming products. Integrating web and desktop applications. Assisting in direct software support on existing software products.

This is a full-time position. We offer competitive salary along with extreme scalability based on skill set and motivation. Benefits include: 100% Company Paid Medical & Dental Insurance, Retirement Options With Company Matching, Paid Holidays, Vacation Time, Flexible Working Hours, Casual Work Atmosphere.

To apply, email employment@activecampaign.com with your cover letter, resume, and salary history.

The SwiftTraction Beta got another new report today along the same lines as yesterday’s addition. This one displays a comparison of the times that each of your users has spent performing a particular action, and compares that time to any estimates you’ve alloted for the Action.

While our test data isn’t extremely comprehensive at the moment, this screenshot can give you a bit of an idea of what you’re working with. Each Project can have any number of Actions, and you can set a projected amount of time for each of the individual Actions. The time estimate for the whole project is just the sum of all of the actions within the project.

There been some discussion around here about how to the clarity of these labels in SwiftTraction. To break it down:

1. A Projectis a set of Actions & Activities
2. An Action is a general type of action you can take
3. An Activity is a specific instance of an Action

For those of you interested in SwiftTraction as a time management tool: how do these concepts and labels work for you? What do you like or dislike about them, and how would you like to see them evolve over the course of SwiftTraction’s development? Some of us have been thinking that “Action” & “Activity” should be switched, so that an “Activity” is the category of task and an “Action” is a single instance of performing it.

We’re thinking seriously about how to structure the workflow of SwiftTraction right now, centering mainly on the development of wizards for setting up users and user groups, as well as projects. We’d like to hear about your ideal workflow for setting up and managing your projects. So, if you haven’t already, grab a copy of the beta and let us know what you like and what you don’t in terms of workflow and usability.

The SwiftTraction beta just got a new report that displays the relationship between your set time estimates for each project and the actual time spent on the projects so far. This is a good thing for two reasons.

First, and perhaps somewhat obviously, having constant access to your running totals and visual representations of your progress just makes it easier to think about the project. Having this information at the ready gives you room to conceptualize how you’re going to allocate your resources and direct your team to finish the project on time before you end up in the crisis situation of being over-time and over-budget.

Secondly, most projects end up costing more and taking longer than we at first anticipate. There just isn’t any way to accurately estimate the amount of time a project is going to take us, short of the specific expertise that a project manager can develop over a period of years working in the same environment. This is not only because it takes that long to understand the intricacies of the problems your teams are solving–and it does–but also because it takes time to understand the dynamics of the team itself: the attitudes and patterns of decision-making, the types of emergencies that come up, even the impact that vacations and holidays are likely to have on completion times.

SwiftTraction is quickly arriving at a point where it will be able to decrease this organizational learning curve by giving direct, immediate feedback on project time estimates versus actual completion times. This report is a first major piece of that development.

Currently all of our products have a base requirement of PHP 4.3+ and MySQL 3.23+

You may have noticed recently that PHP.net declared that they will no longer be supporting PHP 4 as of December 31st 2007. Also there has been a widely publicized project called GoPHP5. The idea behind GoPHP5 is to get as many applications to back the PHP5 only development status.

While we do agree that it is time for hosts to make a final switch to PHP5 we will not stop supporting PHP 4.3+ anytime soon. We strive to ensure our product line works from PHP 4.3 to the latest version of PHP5. And we will ensure compatibility with PHP6 when it is closer to release.

Keeping that in mind we are currently testing increasing the MySQL version requirement to MySQL 4.1+ for TrioLive, SupportTrio, and SwiftTraction. We have found the vast majority of our client base to be utilizing MySQL 4.1 or above for some time now.

We won’t be rushing any of these changes out. If you should have any feedback during this time just let us know!

Do you have a passion for web applications and an intense knowledge of PHP/MySQL?

Thrive in an atmosphere that appreciates an accomplished base of talent and skill sets. We recruit team-oriented individuals who exhibit strong creativity and sound technical proficiency. If you have the professional demeanor necessary to put in a lot of time and energy; you will appreciate our laid back and casual work environment. Our downtown Chicago location is a convenient “El” ride from many of the train lines in Chicago.

Excellent communication skills are expected, along with an honest, self-motivated, and a strong desire to expand and capitalize on your existing skill set. We offer competitive salary along with extreme scalability based on skill set and motivation.

Programmer Position

• Working in collaboration with other developers to meet our product cycle updates.
• Introducing new features into existing software and improving the code base and techniques currently being used.
• Taking part in new product development. From planning to development to deployment.
• Re-writing older “legacy” code.
• Taking on challenging new ideas and methods required for upcoming products.
• Integrating web and desktop applications.
• Assisting in direct software support on existing software products.
• Using advanced JavaScript/Ajax techniques alongside your strong php/mysql skills.

Please submit resume, portfolio of code/design examples, and salary history to employment@activecampaign.com