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Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

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Re: Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

#21

Post by DanBC »

This seems like a really neat idea. I'd be happy to do a short (20 second) survey to get access to content. I'd much prefer to do a short survey than watch some of the pointless stupid annoying ads that Youtube is giving me at the moment. And there's little chance of me taking year subs for all the sites I read maybe once a week.

Survata should be aware that any longer than that, or poor content hidden behind the survey-wall, means that I'm likely to just click random options on the survey. But I'm sure they are.

Good Luck to them!

Really, someone 'just' needs to fix micropayments.

Re: Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

#22

Post by awenger »

Ataraxy wrote: post #4

This has been done to death in the incentive based affiliate marketing world for some years now. The quality of data that will be generated from these surveys is going to be extremely poor and I would be interested in seeing how they're able to sustain advertisers (market researchers).

We agree that maintaining data quality is the biggest challenge and really the crux of this business. We have initial filters that look for incorrect answers to "checker" questions (e.g. What browser are you using? In which time zone do you live?), an outlier response speed (too slow or too fast), etc. And we're working on a more sophisticated system to really address this.

Data quality with initial partners has been good. We'll be working hard to keep it that way.

Re: Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

#23

Post by masterzora »

colmvp wrote: post #12
MetalMASK wrote: post #9

No. You probably don't need a degree in experimental psychology to understand that forced recruitment gives you invalid/biased/low quality data. These surveys are annoying to the users; more importantly, the data provided has little if at all value to the organization behind the survey. No matter how well you design your survey. I don't even want to start on how bad/biased some surveys are designed. The only way the…

"You probably don't need a degree in experimental psychology to understand that forced recruitment gives you invalid/biased/low quality data." Interesting point. Anecdotally, I am less honest with my selections if I'm taking a survey specifically to get a reward (i.e. contest, Kongregate points, access to a site), as I usually just want to get it done with as fast as possible. However, if it has tangible results (i.e…

Even the honesty of your answers is not the only issue. One of the big ones is that the set of people opting in to a survey is already demonstrating a characteristic different from the set of all people of interest unless the people of interest are for some reason "the set of people opting in to a survey". This alone is enough to muddy or even invalidate the output data.

Re: Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

#24

Post by memset »

The neat use-case I see coming out of this is enhancing an onboarding process.

I work for a company which sells wine online, and a large number of people have strong preferences about the types of wines they like (red, white, chardonnay, half-cases, etc.)

It's useful to give people a survey - combined with an explanation of how the site works - as they are signing up. Even more useful is to use their answers to show the new customer a wine which is suited to their tastes. (If you like high-end reds, it wouldn't make sense to show you a half-case of inexpensive white wine to convince you to make you first purchase.)

And if our marketing department can manage their survey, marketing copy, and graphic design without having to ask developers every time they want a change (or if they can save me the time of writing a customizable interface) then all the better.

Onboarding. That's where it's at, yo.

The idea of surveys as a paywall mechanism (eg, New York Times paywall with a survey) is, at first glance, pretty unappealing, because paywalls are de-facto abhorrent. But we'll see; I may not mind filling out a 4-question questionnaire in order to read an article that would otherwise be blocked. Especially if I know that after filling it out once, I will never ever have to fill the survey out again.

And let's not forget about the adult industry! Instead of captchas... well, why not get some interesting marketing analytics out of the deal?

Interested to see how this evolves!

Re: Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

#26

Post by rabidsnail »

colmvp wrote: post #12
MetalMASK wrote: post #9

No. You probably don't need a degree in experimental psychology to understand that forced recruitment gives you invalid/biased/low quality data. These surveys are annoying to the users; more importantly, the data provided has little if at all value to the organization behind the survey. No matter how well you design your survey. I don't even want to start on how bad/biased some surveys are designed. The only way the…

"You probably don't need a degree in experimental psychology to understand that forced recruitment gives you invalid/biased/low quality data." Interesting point. Anecdotally, I am less honest with my selections if I'm taking a survey specifically to get a reward (i.e. contest, Kongregate points, access to a site), as I usually just want to get it done with as fast as possible. However, if it has tangible results (i.e…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-selection

Re: Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

#27

Post by awenger »

dm8 wrote: post #7

Interesting idea. Google is already doing this ( http://www.google.com/insights/consumersurveys/home ) and they have solid relationship with big publishers. Question to founders - 1. How are you different from Google? 2. As a UX person, I'm not sure what sort of data I will get from these surveys. Is there anyway you can maintain the quality of responses? I assume in most of the cases users will give dummy data for t…

Thanks for the interest. Google Consumer Surveys does have a similar model to ours. There a few things that differentiate us now:

1. Our minimum spend is only $10 vs. $100 for Google; lower minimum brings in a group of people who want to get a "quick read" on an issue (e.g. ask 100 people an opinion on a new logo design or tagline)

2. Starting soon, we'll be offering advanced behavioral targeting. For example, you could select a target audience of active young mothers, Honda car owners, or online shoppers.

3. We're allowing multi-question surveys (up to 4 questions). Each respondent answers all questions in your survey, which enables cross-tabulation of responses (e.g. looking at how respondents who answered "Yes" to question 1 respond to question 3). Google is currently focused on 1-2 questions at a time.

In the coming months, we hope to differentiate ourselves in other areas, in particular data quality.

Re: Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

#28

Post by awenger »

kunle wrote: post #18
jedc wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And I think the solid relationships with big publishers is the big part that's hard to replicate. That said, you could probably more easily approach smaller (more local?) publishers that are more willing to experiment to get traction. Is that what you're planning on doing?

Would also say, there are tons of blogs out there with dedicated readerships in niche, but high value demographics (to advertisers). This is perfect for them.

Have you wiretapped our office?

While we hope to work with big publishers too, niche blogs are an awesome place to start. As you say, they provide a self aggregated group of individuals with a common interest. They're perfect for polling.

Re: Survata (YC S12) replaces paywalls with "surveywalls"

#30

Post by awenger »

DanBC wrote: post #21

This seems like a really neat idea. I'd be happy to do a short (20 second) survey to get access to content. I'd much prefer to do a short survey than watch some of the pointless stupid annoying ads that Youtube is giving me at the moment. And there's little chance of me taking year subs for all the sites I read maybe once a week. Survata should be aware that any longer than that, or poor content hidden behind the sur…

Thanks for the support, Dan.
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