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anonymity

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7:40
August 3, 2008


gbswales(free version)

Member

posts 4

I recently posted a survey saying that it was anonymous – however one of the participants decided to take a look at surveygizmo himself and found, as I now have, that the IP address and location other information is automatically included.  the location i guess will be the ISP location but if someone has a fixed IP address then this presumably makes them traceable somehow.  Unless there is some way of preventing this I cannot put that something is anonymous – I guess I will have to change the wording to “no personal information is requested”  – however this might discourage some people from answering if the responses are in any way sensitive

gbswales – free member

3:00
August 4, 2008


cheri

Admin

posts 846

Hello, gbswales.

You can make your survey entirely anonymous in SurveyGizmo by deactivating all IP address tracking.

To do this, go to Edit Survey => Advanced Options.

On that page, check the box that's labeled '”Anonymous Responses” and save your setup. 

It's done!


–Cheri

7:19
August 4, 2008


gbswales(free version)

Member

posts 4

Guess I should have made it clear I was using the free version – I cant see that choice  in advanced options so I guess it must be one of the paid for extra's. Cry

Not gonna pay for something I do very occasionally for a bit of fun Tongue out

Thanks anyway for your reply

gbswales – free member

9:13
August 4, 2008


Mario

Admin

Boulder, CO

posts 994

Yeah, any of the paid levels would have that. Glad you are having fun with surveygizmo!

Mario Lurig
Sales Engineer – SurveyGizmo
How was my customer service? Provide feedback!

2:02
August 5, 2008


gbswales(free version)

Member

posts 4

Pity – it's getting harder and harder to find good full featured software that is free to play with – I think that offering software free can actually have beneficial returns for a company.

Let me suggest a model for this – you allow users to sign up for a full free account with all the frills (except the option of removing the surveygizmo logos) The free account would allow the user to create and publish say 1 survey and 3 polls each month.  The restriction need only be on the publishing so that users could experiment building their next survey.  A compulsory final page would carry a prominent advert link for surveygizmo along with a reminder that the free version is for private use only. 

So I create an effective and very professional looking survey that impresses the people i send it it to- if I manage to get say 500 people to take my survey that is 500 potential customers that would see both your advert and the quality of your service.

As an added benefit you could set it up so that each time a click through on the advert brought in paying business for you the owner of the free survey would get credited with an extra survey over their monthly allowance – which might encourage some people to actively promote it for you.

Anyway I hope someone from the company reads this and I would be interested to hear your thoughts

gbswales – free member

2:20
August 5, 2008


Derek Scruggs

Admin

posts 36

Thanks for your feedback. We've considered doing something like this. But the problem with allowing people full access for free is that, while it's possible that more people may use it and promote it, it's also extremely likely that they'll have a lot more support questions. SurveyGizmo is a very deep product in terms of capabilities, and that inevitably leads to more support requests. That costs us real money, and we're not some VC-backed company with millions in the bank.

In addition to features, the most common positive feedback we get from customers is that the quality of our support is very high. If we open the gates to everyone, support will inevitably suffer as we try to spread ourselves across more (mostly non-paying) customers. That's too big a risk, and it's unfair to our paying customers.

Did this answer help? Let us know!
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5:50
August 5, 2008


gbswales(free version)

Member

posts 4

Cry its a shame because your reports are the best I have seen – I guess for more complex stuff I will have to back to  http://www.esurveypro.com who do offer filtering etc albeit with advertising on the page – the adverts dont bother me but their interface is nowhere near as good as yours.

Just to pick up on a couple of your points – I doubt if allowing more features would significantly increase the number of people using the free service – especially if the volume restrictions stayed in place – also you could make it clear that the only support was from users in forums and self help guides – we are all pretty used to this with open source software thesedays

anyway thanks for engaging with me on this issue – I will just hope for a change of mind someday when you are successful and large enough to offer it.

BTW do like the math feature on the bulletin board -so much better than the usual hard to read letters is the bulletin board yours or a publicly available – if its yours you should market that as well LOL

cheers

Clive

gbswales – free member

9:57
September 25, 2008


Rhonda

Guest

Just wondering if the IP address tracking is turned off to keep surveys anonymous, does this also mean that people trying to repeat a survey cannot be detected using the IP option

7:45
September 25, 2008


cheri

Admin

posts 846

Hi, Rhonda.

Yes, that's true. If you want an anonymous survey, you cannot use the vote protection by IP option. You can use the vote protection by cookie instead.

I hope this works for  you.

–Cheri

2:45
December 26, 2008


biojuris

Member

posts 3

cheri said:

Hi, Rhonda.

Yes, that's true. If you want an anonymous survey, you cannot use the vote protection by IP option. You can use the vote protection by cookie instead.

I hope this works for  you.

–Cheri


With the Personal subscription, is it possible for respondents to turn the anonymous off or on by themselves, so they can determine whether thay want it to be anonymous or not.

or is this solved, by making the survey anonymous, and then allowing them to insert contact information – which therefore makes the survey “identified” rather than “anonymous”.


8:44
December 26, 2008


cheri

Admin

posts 846

Hi,

You can activate anonymous surveys at Edit Survey => Advanced Options. This means you will not know anything about the respondent (including IP address).

If you choose to give your respondents the option to fill in contact information, that is up to you as the survey creator.

There is no option that allows respondents to turn the anonymous feature on and off. You do that as the survey creator.

I hope this helps.

–Cheri

9:22
December 27, 2008


biojuris

Member

posts 3

cheri said:

Hi,

You can activate anonymous surveys at Edit Survey => Advanced Options. This means you will not know anything about the respondent (including IP address).

If you choose to give your respondents the option to fill in contact information, that is up to you as the survey creator.

There is no option that allows respondents to turn the anonymous feature on and off. You do that as the survey creator.

I hope this helps.

–Cheri


Thanks Cheri.

If the respondent fills in the contact information, does this mean that I will be able to associate the respondent's answers with his/her contact information.  In other words, when the respondent fills in the contact information, does this mean the survey is no longer anonymous?

Richard


8:25
December 29, 2008


cheri

Admin

posts 846

Hi, Richard,

If you have a question in  your survey where respondents fill in their contact information, then that will be part of each individual response. If you don't ask them for their contact information, you will not have any way of knowing it.

I hope this helps,

Cheri

2:38
January 1, 2009


biojuris

Member

posts 3

cheri said:

Hi, Richard,

If you have a question in  your survey where respondents fill in their contact information, then that will be part of each individual response. If you don't ask them for their contact information, you will not have any way of knowing it.

I hope this helps,

Cheri


Yes, Thanks very much!

6:49
March 21, 2009


Pac Shady

Guest

Is there any chance of having IP tracking turned off by default for free accounts? It would make more sense than the current system, it's kind of like getting information for free, and having the option to pay to be blind.


It's also dangerous, as what's to stop hackers or what not from making a free account, and having access to every IP address used to fill out any surverys they create? At least if it costs money, there is less chance of this happening since payment details are required and paying might deter many of these sort of people.


It would also come in handy for me, as I'm planning to use this site for a research survey, and I don't want people to be unwittingly handing me over their personal information like this.


Keep IP tracking for Pro and above packages, but make it anonymous by default for free and personal packages.



The Forums are now closed, because much of the older info is out of date.

Check out our Knowledge Base, ask a support question: Support.SurveyGizmo.com or ask a sales question with our Sales Contact Form.