Introduction
To develop a high-quality survey that is tailored to the country, follow these four steps:
- Step #1: Develop an offline Core Questionnaire in the survey’s primary language.
- Step #2: Translate the Core Questionnaire into other languages.
- Step #3: For voice surveys, create audio recordings in all languages.
- Step #4: Load the content (SMS text, Voice audio files) in the online tool.
This guideline is for Step #4: Loading the content in the tool.
Do load the primary language in the questionnaire first.
We recommend that you load the entire questionnaire into the tool using the primary language first, including the question type, response options, and skips. Once you have entered the information for the primary language, the same variables will be available for the other languages you’ve selected. You will need to fill in the text for the SMS or IVR messages in each language and check the response options, but you will not have to re-create the variables. This will ease the transfer process for the other languages.
Do select the languages needed for the questionnaire.
If the questionnaire will be multilingual, use the add language feature on the side to select the additional languages. Once you begin to type in a language, a dropbox selector will appear with options.
Do list multiple response options for SMS where applicable.
The Ask tool can accept multiple responses for SMS. For example, consider a question about gender, where the responses are 1 (Male) and 2 (Female). For voice, the respondent must press “1” and “2.” However, SMS has more flexibility. You can specify different options that the tool will accept. In the example below, if someone types “Male” or “M”, the tool will automatically code those values as “1.”
Do determine if and where flags will be used in survey.
Flags are used to set disposition codes at various points in the survey. There are four different flags available: refused, ineligible, partial and complete. Flags should be input at predetermined locations in the survey. If you want respondents to be marked as “partial completes” once they reach a certain point in the survey, the partial flag would need to be added at that point.
Do not use text-to-speech for non-English languages.
Remember that text-to-speech is only functional for English. For non-English languages, audio files need to be uploaded for voice questionnaires.
Do not load questionnaire text into tool until finalized.
The Master Questionnaire Spreadsheet will undergo many different revisions during the translation and audio review process. Make sure to keep meticulous notes of the different versions of each question on the same document and only upload the text into the tool when finalized.