Children's Charities Around the World Benefit From the SSI QUEST™ Awards, Recognizing Companies for Creating the Most Engaging Market Research Experiences

SHELTON, Conn., Nov. 11, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- Survey Sampling International today announced that it has made donations to children's charities around the world in honor of the first SSI QUEST™ (Questionnaire Experience Satisfaction Tool) Award winners. The SSI QUEST Awards, announced at the 2010 ESOMAR Congress in Athens, Greece, recognized three companies for creating the most engaging market research experiences – MarketVision Research, Inc. for the Americas, SinoMonitor Market Research for Asia-Pacific and Product Perceptions for Europe, as well as for top performance globally. As a reward for their excellence in survey design, project managers and programmers of winning projects were able to choose charities SSI would donate to in their names. Charities selected to benefit from the SSI QUEST donations are:

• Ronald McDonald House, chosen by Emilie Orians, winning project manager for MarketVision Research Inc.
• Make-a-Wish Foundation, chosen by James Reising and Stephen Cox, winning programmers for MarketVision Research Inc.
• Save the Children, chosen by Guoqiang Diao, winning project manager, and Haibo Ma, winning programmer, for SinoMonitor Market Research
• NSPCC for Preventing Cruelty to Children, chosen by Yvonne Taylor, winning project lead, and Sohil Mehta, winning programmer, for Product Perceptions

Winning project managers and programmers also received certificates of excellence for their innovation in survey creation. In addition, SSI presented winning companies with customized trophies, commemorating their commitment to advancing respondent satisfaction.

"We developed the SSI QUEST Awards to encourage the industry's continued creativity in crafting surveys that ensure every research participant has an excellent experience – one that is truly engaging, relevant, fun and respectful of participants' time," says Kees de Jong, CEO of SSI. "It is exciting to see that SSI QUEST not only is accomplishing this important objective but also realizing another critical achievement—supporting charities around the world that are helping children in crisis. We are proud to honor our winners by making donations in their names to the wonderful organizations they selected.

"The SSI QUEST program builds on SSI's strong legacy of charitable donations. Since 2001, we have donated close to $2 million to charities around the world, much of it on behalf of our research participants."

SSI QUEST Award winners are chosen through a combination of several objective factors. Research participants' self-reported satisfaction scores are key in determining the winning projects. Drop rates and median time to complete each survey also are considered in calculating the SSI QUEST winners. Each of these components is appropriately weighted within the QUEST formula to yield an accurate read on the effectiveness of the overall respondent experience.

To drive continued improvements in the research experience, SSI gives respondents a survey at the end of each project, assessing their satisfaction. Results are shared back with researchers, as a complimentary SSI service. To have their surveys scored, researchers can contact SSI at [email protected].

About Survey Sampling

International Survey Sampling International (www.surveysampling.com) is the premier global provider of sampling solutions for survey research. SSI reaches respondents in 72 countries via Internet, telephone and mobile/wireless. Client services include questionnaire design consultation, programming and hosting, and data processing. SSI serves more than 2,000 clients, including 48 of the top 50 research organizations. Founded in 1977, SSI has 17 offices in 15 countries.

SOURCE Survey Sampling International