Polling Point’s Poor User Experience

By On July 24, 2005 · 9 Comments

I’m not usually the kind of person that stops to fill out online surveys. Most of the time, I find myself hassled by the unethical way most survey sites offer free drawings in exchange for the right to spam me and sell my email address to the highest bidder. On occasion, though, I break my own rules and do complete surveys. In this case, I got exactly what I expected… something to write about. This survey, which was conducted by PollingPoint.com, was a simple, straightforward survey. It consisted of three pages of questions about entertainment, politics, religion, etc. It was easy, and it took me two minutes. Once the survey was complete, Polling Point asked for my contact information so that they could send me more poll invitations. Here’s the screen:

 pollingpoint1.jpg

On the surface, this page is pretty straightforward. However, I have a couple of problems with it. Keep in mind that I try to approach every screen I see like a casual browser, not the developer and frequent web user that I am: 1. What do the asterisks (*) next to the name and email fields mean? I suppose they could mean that those three fields are required, but they aren’t; I can navigate away from this page without filling out anything. But even if they were required, the only web convention for denoting required fields they seem follow is the presence of the asterisk. What they didn’t do was make the asterisk red, place it before the field and place a note at the top of the page communicating as much. But since none of the information on this page is required, I can only assume that the asterisks mean that I should fill out those three fields if I’m going to fill out anything. This is probably not the best way to communicate that information. Even still, since there is nothing on the page to map the asterisks to their purpose, I’m only making an assumption and I could be totally off. 2. I need to be reassured that you’re not going to pimp out my information before I fill out the form. This is nit-picky, I know, but it makes a difference in conversion. Most people are going to miss that note because it’s jammed between the form and the navigation buttons. In addition, the first sentence can be emphasized a bit more. That’s the reassurance the user wants to hear. But alas, I am not interested in receiving invitations to complete surveys, and since nothing appears to be required, I click the “Next Page” button. Here is the result:

pollingpoint2.jpg

Two thoughts on this page: 1. Never, ever keep a user from navigating away from a page with NO required information. To a casual user, no good can come of this and only confusion will result. “Why am I seeing the same page again, and with lots of red text?” they will ask as close their browser. I should never see red on a page where nothing is wrong and nothing is required. A better solution would be to allow me an opportunity to change my mind and return to this form on a future page.

2. “You may continue to skip entry of this information.” That’s exactly what I was trying to do, isn’t it? So what do I do now? If I click “Next Page” again, will it give me the same message or let me go? This message, which is unclear and grammatically incorrect, isn’t really helping me and I don’t even know exactly what to do until I click “Next Page” again and it actually works. This is not a difficult fix, but changing the text to read “Click ‘Next Page’ to skip entry of this information” can make a big difference. After clearing the land mines, I am presented with the last form, which, aside from trying to get me to enter a drawing for an iPod mini, actually employs a good method for increasing conversion: pollingpoint3.jpg The box to the right, which gives me an opportunity to go back and complete the last form, is the right way to go about this process. Unfortunately, I’ve already gotten a bad taste from being unable to leave the form behind and I won’t be changing my mind this time. The point of bringing up PollingPoint.com is to illustrate that there is more to a satisfying user experience than slick and simple interfaces. PollingPoint had those, to be sure. But a user will quickly forget about the look of something if they’re having trouble completing a task.

I think it’s time I get back to the “Design for Context” series now, so I’ll return in my next post with “Ideas vs. Implementation” as promised.

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  • Me

    I have had polling point ask me personal
    medical questions, on several occations.

    the questiar starts off with politics, then asks if i have been “diagnosed with any of the following problems”

    ya , iv got a problem..its with u asking the question.

  • Cristi

    I recently discovered PollingPoint via a link beneath a very specific political question on a website, which led to my completing a lengthy political opinion poll, which I finally discovered did NOT include the specific question. Nevertheless, as I’m always happy to share my opinions, I permitted them to invite me to participate in future polls. I just got my first email invitation today, only to discover that it was primarily a marketing survey – not what I expected at all! It was salted with a few political questions here and there, but I think they were merely “window dressing” to encourage participation, only to be discarded. (Fool me once, …”)

  • Cristi

    I recently discovered PollingPoint via a link beneath a very specific political question on a website, which led to my completing a lengthy political opinion poll, which I finally discovered did NOT include the specific question. Nevertheless, as I’m always happy to share my opinions, I permitted them to invite me to participate in future polls. I just got my first email invitation today, only to discover that it was primarily a marketing survey – not what I expected at all! It was salted with a few political questions here and there, but I think they were merely “window dressing” to encourage participation, only to be discarded. (Fool me once, …”)

  • R. Lloyd Nelson

    I, too, recently discovered PollingPoint, but unlike Cristi I expect to see marketing surveys as well as political surveys. PollingPoint solicited me and I signed up hoping to earn a bit of spare cash now and then. After my first survey I received a credit of 1,000 points plus a 2,000 point sign-up bonus. Only then did I find that the only cash award available was $100 for a whopping 100,000 points. (I have no interest in T shirts or webcams for 20K or 30K) I’ve been doing surveys for a dozen or so dependable companies since 2000, but along the way I learned to avoid others. One red flag for me is the payout limit higher than $20. More than once I’ve found myself 90% of the way to a high payout, only to have the surveys stop coming…forever. Brandon Satrom’s analysis of PollingPoint’s website just adds to my concern…are they amateurishly clumsy or deliberately deceptive? BBB shows a very sparse complaint record, so perhaps they are innocently in need of renovating their website and payout structure. I’ll wait and see. In the meantime, I think I’ll explore more of userexperience.com.

  • James Hanson

    Recently you took a PollingPoint poll about your views on public affairs. Thank you for helping us out!

    PollingPoint would like to invite you to participate in a follow-up study sponsored by Stanford University and PBS’s By the People about citizenship and democracy. During this study, we will provide briefing materials for you to read about these topics. At the end of October, PollingPoint will send you a follow-up survey so policy makers can learn what you think about these important issues.

    All you need to do to participate is to simply visit the link below, which will then show you how to access the reading materials. Materials will be posted a total of four times over the next few weeks. The first set of readings is already available for you to read. We will send you a reminder email each time new materials are posted, but you may visit the website as often as you like.

    Please visit the following link to participate: http://isurvey.pollingpoint.com/a/vnSCcPqNJGhZft

    We look forward to learning what you have to say about these issues and we hope that you will visit the website every week. As a token of our appreciation, you will receive $5 for accessing the study materials and taking the follow-up survey.
    I’M STILL WAITING FOR THE PROMISED PAYMENT OF $5. UNTIL I RECEIVE IT, I WILL NOT ANSWER ANY MORE PP SURVEYS.

  • Dylan

    Polling Point usually asks me a funky combination of domestic political questions and brand usage information. Recently through PollingPoint, I joined a supposed co-producers group for consulting on film projects. I’m hoping this is a real group and not something designed to suss out my overtly Anti-Bush/anti domestic fascism agenda. I am cooperating with “Co-Producers” at the mo mo but with some suspicion.

  • somereader

    I came across pollingpoint from an ad on Snopes.com. I noticed the obama myth list was quite long and I wondered what was on the mccain list. mccain only has 5 articles which I thought was surprising. Then, in the left quicklist/ad space there was a small caption or ad that said something like, read what joe biden has said about obama, and then another mccain ad, and then a poillingpoint survey wanted to know if “john mccain will get your vote.” I’m no developer, but I wonder if the text on a web page make a google ad that has the same text.

  • Sue Deaunym

    I just tried to leave the following comment at the end of my “polling experience,” but the webpage failed:
    ________________________________________________________________

    Again, I WILL NOT answer marketing questions, unless they resemble this:

    Do you believe marketing agencies of major corporations

    1. are concerned with your wants and needs?
    2. genuinely intend to help you make informed choices?
    3. maintain ethical standards of responsibility and fairness?
    4. are back-stabbing pimps who lie, cheat, steal at whim and employ Polling Point to aid and abet their exploitation of both companies and the general public?

    Does anybody read these comments? Does anybody ever respond to them? Or are you just marketing whores yourselves?

  • Dan Fraley

    I’m frustrated and disappointed in the entire process. I thought this would be fun. I even referred a friend. Well, my requests ended and my friend got numerous polls to complete. They also offer they bogus points for polls you complete. They don’t deliver on that either. I learned my lesson. I never want to see Polling Point again. Not ethical.

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