1. What experience does your company have in providing online samples for market research?
Syno International has been working with online panels since the company was established in 2014. We use our own developed panel management platform, SynoPanel, to host own and client panels globally. We administrate panels in more than 40 countries. On top of surveying respondents via panels we also manage projects that collect responses from external panels and regularly conduct panel studies in more than 60 countries and in total more than 2000 projects per year.
2. Please describe and explain the type(s) of online sample sources from which you get respondents. Are these databases? Actively managed research panels? Direct marketing lists? Social networks? Web intercept (also known as river) samples?
Syno International and panel owners using SynoPanel use the following recruiting sources:
– Media publisher network ads
– Social media ads
– Search engine network ads
– Brand communities
– F2F recruiting
– CATI recruiting
– Affiliate traffic
– Email database with contact persmissions
Respondents are opted in to Panels via a double opt-in procedure. The panels are managed in accordance with the ISO guidelines and users can be re-contacted.
3. If you provide samples from more than one source: How are the different sample sources blended together to ensure validity? How can this be replicated over time to provide reliability? How do you deal with the possibility of duplication of respondents across sources?
Sampling algorithms make sure we avoid panel members that could be registered in different panels being used in one survey based on panelist identifiers and checking for same device. Regarding sample validity we use same sources in the same project over time and manage quotas between periods.
4. Are your sample source(s) used solely for market research? If not, what other purposes are they used for?
All panels in SynoPanel are used only for Market research activities, panelists sign up and opt in only for these activities during registration process.
5. How do you source groups that may be hard to reach on the internet?
Syno and Syno clients use various recruiting methods that allows us to reach complex audiences depending on panel country. Blending several panels to get bigger sample pools allows us to ensure better reach over all targets. On demand we also run ad-hoc recruitments opting in niche audiences to panels for projects.
6. If, on a particular project, you need to supplement your sample(s) with sample(s) from other providers, how do you select those partners? Is it your policy to notify a client in advance when using a third party provider?
If external sample vendors are required, we always inform the client about what panels will be used and use panels from companies that share our ethics and comply with ESOMAR/ICC code.
7.What steps do you take to achieve a representative sample of the target population?
We define sendouts and project quota complete targets by sociodemographic structure of general population in particular country. For each demographic group panelists are selected randomly.
8. Do you employ a survey router?
SynoPanel is by default not using any router on projects but is integrated with an external router provider and this can be turned on or off at project level.
9. If you use a router: Please describe the allocation process within your router. How do you decide which surveys might be considered for a respondent? On what priority basis are respondents allocated to surveys?
If activated the router will attempt to match the respondent to an open study by matching the stored profile of the respondent to available surveys. If there is a match, there are no qualifying questions asked. If there is a partial match, the panelist will be asked only the remaining qualifying questions. The panelist can opt-out at any time during the router experience. Survey allocation is randomized and all available studies or considered for selection.
10. If you use a router: What measures do you take to guard against, or mitigate, any bias arising from employing a router? How do you measure and report any bias?
If using the router this is set to only prioritize projects based on users matching the profile qualifications of the survey or not, so having same impact as screening in the survey.
11. If you use a router: Who in your company sets the parameters of the router? Is it a dedicated team or individual project managers?
If using a router the matching algorithms are set by a central team and across all projects. These are not edited project by project to minimize possible impact.
12. What profiling data is held on respondents? How is it done? How does this differ across sample sources? How is it kept up-to-date? If no relevant profiling data is held, how are low incidence projects dealt with?
Basic demographic questions are asked during registration, lists of questions vary by country and panel. Panelists get full profiler questionnaire when they login to their accounts, for some panels an external profiling survey is sent after registration with incentive for completion. Panelists are constantly reminded to update profiling data.
13.Please describe your survey invitation process. What is the proposition that people are offered to take part in individual surveys? What information about the project itself is given in the process? Apart from direct invitations to specific surveys (or to a router), what other means of invitation to surveys are respondents exposed to? You should note that not all invitations to participate take the form of emails.
Each panel uses a tailored invitation template besides invitation texts it usually contains survey length, incentive, survey, opt-out and unsubscribe links. Panelists receives invitations by email or can access available survey list in his panelist portal.
14. Please describe the incentives that respondents are offered for taking part in your surveys. How does this differ by sample source, by interview length, by respondent characteristics?
Each panel has an incentive table based on survey length. On demand (usually for complex surveys or to speed up fieldwork) it is possible to override incentive amount and raise rewards for participation.
15. What information about a project do you need in order to give an accurate estimate of feasibility using your own resources?
The more information we get, the more accurate estimation we can provide. Examples of information that helps with providing accurate feasibility and costing.
– Total sample size
– Country/-ies
– Target group demographic (age, gender, regions) and non-demographic definitions and quotas
– Estimated survey length
– Estimated survey incidence rate from all population or from targeted group
– Time in field
– Re-participation rates
– Other parameters that can affect feasibility
16. Do you measure respondent satisfaction? Is this information made available to clients?
Not directly, we analyze drop out rates, panelist willingness to participate in future surveys. Panelists can anytime provide feedback by email or contact form that we pass to our clients.
17. What information do you provide to debrief your client after the project has finished?
Typically we provide number of completes, actual incidence, conversion rate, quota-fulls, length of the survey
18. Who is responsible for data quality checks? If it is you, do you have in place procedures to reduce or eliminate undesired within survey behaviours, such as (a) random responding, (b) Illogical or inconsistent responding, (c) overuse of item non- response (e.g. “Don’t Know”) or (d) speeding (too rapid survey completion)? Please describe these procedures.
If we run full service surveys, Syno International is taking care of data checks and cleaning, if we run only sampling, cleaning is on client’s side. Internal data quality checks includes fraudulent user blacklist, quality questions in a survey, time in survey time analysis, flatliner, arrow and other answer pattern analysis for matrix questions, answer logic consistency. Also bad quality open end question answers flags users as fraudulent.
19. How often can the same individual be contacted to take part in a survey within a specified period whether they respond to the contact or not? How does this vary across your sample sources?
Quarantine (min. time interval between invitations) is set on panel level, mostly it is 3 days. For specific surveys this can be overridden (daily trackers, sample re-use, wave exclussion)
20. How often can the same individual take part in a survey within a specified period? How does this vary across your sample sources? How do you manage this within categories and/or time periods?
There is no cross project time limitation for users to take part in multiple surveys that they have qualified and been invited to during a given time frame.
21. Do you maintain individual level data such as recent participation history, date of entry, source, etc., on your survey respondents? Are you able to supply your client with a project analysis of such individual level data?
Individual data is stored in our databases and can be available upon request.
22. Do you have a confirmation of respondent identity procedure? Do you have procedures to detect fraudulent respondents?
Please describe these procedures as they are implemented at sample source registration and/or at the point of entry to a survey or router. If you offer B2B samples what are the procedures there, if any?
We compare panelist survey answers with profiling data and if it’s not matching we flag user as suspicious. In some panels phone number is mandatory and duplicates are not allowed. Also other fraudulent activities are registered (bad quality answers, speeding, flatliners and other patterns, control questions wrong answers) and used identify fraudulent panelists.
23. Please describe the ‘opt-in for market research’ processes for all your online sample sources.
When user voluntarily fill registration form, he receives an confirmation email and after clicking confirmation link becomes active panel member (double opt-in process).
24.Please provide a link to your Privacy Policy. How is your Privacy Policy provided to your respondents?
Syno default privacy policy can be found at www.synoint.com/privacy-policy/
During registration process panelist needs to agree with our privacy policy it is also easy to reach from their accounts. Some client panels have own custom privacy policies and these can then be found on the panel sites and in the panelist portals.
25. Please describe the measures you take to ensure data protection and data security.
Information security includes three main aspects:
confidentiality of information – protection of information against unauthorized disclosure;
integrity of the information – protection of information from unauthorized or accidental change;
availability of information – ensuring that information is available whenever it is needed.
In order to ensure the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information processed by the Syno, Syno is in the process of creating an information security management system.
Syno intends to open the information security management system in the second part of 2021 and start certifying according to ISO 27001 (LST ISO/IEC 27001:2013) by the end of 2022.
26. What practices do you follow to decide whether online research should be used to present commercially sensitive client data or materials to survey respondents?
Specific panelist groups can be excluded during sampling process or eliminated during interview. Quality team also informs client if surveys have any issues, if there any risks caused by survey content.
27. Are you certified to any specific quality system? If so, which one(s)?
We have no certification for a specific quality system.
28. Do you conduct online surveys with children and young people? If so, do you adhere to the standards that ESOMAR provides? What other rules or standards, for example COPPA in the United States, do you comply with?
Minimum panelist age is defined according to ESOMAR guidelines and each country legislation that varies from 14 to 16 years of age. Younger respondents can be reached through panelists that state they have children in required age range to be interviewed with parent consent.
Syno International has been working with online panels since the company was established in 2014. We use our own developed panel management platform, SynoPanel, to host own and client panels globally. We administrate panels in more than 40 countries. On top of surveying respondents via panels we also manage projects that collect responses from external panels and regularly conduct panel studies in more than 60 countries and in total more than 2000 projects per year.
Syno International and panel owners using SynoPanel use the folllowing recruiting sources:
– Media publisher network ads
– Social media ads
– Search engine network ads
– Brand communities
– F2F recruiting
– CATI recruiting
– Affiliate traffic
– Email database with contact persmissions
Respondents are opted in to Panels via a double opt-in procedure. The panels are managed in accordance with the ISO guidelines and users are recontactable.
Sampling algorithms make sure we avoid panel members that could be registrered in different panels being used in one survey based on panelist identifiers and checking for same device. Regarding sample validity we use same sources in the same project over time and manage quotas between periods
All panels in SynoPanel are used only for Market reasearch activities, panelists sign up and opt in only for these activities during registration process.
Syno and Syno clients use various recruiting methods that allows us to reach complex audiences depending on panel country. Blending several panels to get bigger sample pools allows us to ensure better reach over all targets. On demand we also run ad-hoc recruitments opting in niche audiences to panels for projects.
If external sample vendors are required we always inform the client about what panels will be used and use panels from companies that share our ethics and comply with ESOMAR/ICC code.
We define sendouts and project quota complete targets by sociodemgraphic structure of general population in particular country. For each demographic group panelists are selected randomly
SynoPanel is by default not using any router on projects but is integrated with an external router provider and this can be turned on or off at project level.
If activated the router will attempt to match the respondent to an open study by matching the stored profile of the respondent to available surveys. If there is a match, there are no qualifying questions asked. If there is a partial match, the panellist will be asked only the remaining qualifying questions. The panellist can opt-out at any time during the router experience. Survey allocation is randomized and all available studies or considered for selection.
If using the router this is set to only prioritise projects based on users matching the profile qualifications of the survey or not, so having same impact as screening in the survey.
If using a router the matching algoritms are set by a central team and across all projects. These are not edited project by project to minimise possible impact.
Basic demographic questions are asked during registration, lists of questions vary by country and panel. Panelists get full profiler questionnaire when they login to their accounts, for some panels an external profiling survey is sent after registration with incentive for completion. Panelists are constantly reminded to update profiling data.
Each panel uses a tailored invitation template, besides invitation texts it usually contains survey length, incentive, survey, opt-out and unsubscribe links. Panelists receives invitations by email or can access available survey list in his panelist portal.
Each panel has an incentive table based on survey length. On demand (usually for complex surveys or to speed up fieldwork) it is possible to override incentive amount and raise rewards for participation.
The more information we get, the more accurate estimation we can provide. Examples of information that helps with providing accurate feasbility and costing.
Total sample size
Country/-ies
Target group demographic (age, gender, regions) and non-demographic definitions and quotas
Estimated survey length
Estimated survey incidence rate from all population or from targeted group
Time in field
Re-participation rates
Other parameters that can affect feasibility
Not directly, we analyze drop out rates, panelist willingness to participate in future surveys. Panelists can anytime provide feedback by email or contact form that we pass to our clients.
Typically we provide number of completes, actual incidence, conversion rate, quota-fulls, length of the survey
If we run full service surveys Syno International is taking care of data checks and cleaning, if we run only sampling, cleaning is on client’s side. Internal data quality checks includes fraudulent user blacklist, quality questions in a survey, time in survey time analysis, flatliner, arrow and other answer pattern analysis for matrix questions, answer logic consistency. Also bad quality open end question answers flags users as fraudulent.
Quarantine (min. time interval between invitations) is set on panel level, mostly it is 3 days. For speciffic surveys this can be overriden (daily trackers, sample re-use, wave exclussion)
There is no cross project time limitation for users to take part in multiple surveys that they have qualified and been invited to during a given time frame
Individual data is stored in our databases and can be available upon request.
We compare panelist survey answers with profiling data and if it’s not matching we flag user as suspicious. In some panels phone number is mandatory and duplicates are not allowed. Also other fraudulent activities are registered (bad quality answers, speeding, flatliners and other patterns, control questions wrong answers) and used identify fraudulent panelists.
When user voluntarily fill registration form, he receives an confirmation email and after clicking confirmation link becomes active panel member (double opt-in process).
Syno default privacy policy can be found at www.synoint.com/privacy-policy/
During registration process panelist needs to agree with our privacy policy it is also easy to reach from their accounts. Some client panels have own custom privacy policies and these can then be found on the panel sites and in the panelist portals.
Information security includes three main aspects:
confidentiality of information – protection of information against unauthorized disclosure;
integrity of the information – protection of information from unauthorized or accidental change;
availability of information – ensuring that information is available whenever it is needed.
In order to ensure the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information processed by the Syno, Syno is in the process of creating an information security management system.
Syno intends to open the information security management system in the second part of 2021 and start certifying according to ISO 27001 (LST ISO/IEC 27001:2013) by the end of 2022.
Specific panelist groups can be excluded during sampling process or eliminated during interiew. Quality team also informs client if surveys have any issues, if there any risks caused by survey content.
We have no certification for a specific quality system
Minimum panelist age is defined according to ESOMAR guidlines and each country legislation that varies from 14 to 16 years of age. Younger respondents can be reached through panelists that state they have children in required age range to be interviewed with parent consent.
