Polls, Quizzes, Surveys: What’s the Difference?

Polls

Polls are used to gather public opinion by asking specific questions to a random sample of people. Poll categories include election polls, opinion polls, exit polls, educational polls, health polls, product polls, and lifestyle polls. Polls can be created for business, social, and political purposes.

• Business polls are used to request information from customers or employees. Customers can provide feedback about a product or service and share their opinions on topics related to the industry, while employees get to say what’s on their mind in an open environment.
• Social polls are used to engage visitors and keep them on a website, thereby increasing audience participation. Aside from personal or business websites, online social polls can also be incorporated into Facebook and Twitter.
• Political polls are an invaluable tool for learning more about what voters think.

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Quizzes

Quizzes are assessments used to measure the respondents’ knowledge, skills, and/or abilities; while some are taken for fun. Categories range from IQ to educational. Quizzes can be conducted for business, social, and educational purposes.

• Business quizzes are used to evaluate and educate employees. Since a web-based business quiz can be sent directly to the staff’s computers, it provides a productive learning environment with minimal impact on daily schedules. It also encourages employee cooperation, which leads to a more unified work environment.
• Social quizzes are used to keep visitors interacting on a website. Some categories are political, love and dating, entertainment, celebrities, health, personality, and money.
• Educational quizzes help students and employees gain knowledge, as well as enhance their logic skills. Research has shown that students who take web quizzes do better in school than those who study the traditional, book-based way. Educational quiz categories include exam preparation, e-learning, spelling, math, business training, employee assessments, and technology.

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Surveys

Surveys are used to obtain information from a number of respondents. Companies utilize this data collection method to gather the feedback they need to make business decisions. Surveys can be carried out for business, social, and market research purposes.

• Business surveys help companies understand their customers better so that they can make necessary changes to accommodate them. Business surveys can be used by big and small organizations alike for sales and marketing, customer relations, advertising effectiveness measurement, media planning and analysis, technology tracking, and more.
• Social surveys are used to gather feedback via the web, as well as to increase traffic, encourage visitor interaction, and plan events.
• Market research surveys are conducted to identify a company’s market, create business models, and increase conversion. They are useful for search marketing, cross media measurement, scientific research, custom research, and video and distributed media measurement.