Professional Documents
Culture Documents
SurveyMonkey in 2014
Customers were overcoming language and currency barriers to access the tool
Goldberg and his newly hired team pushed to localize the SurveyMonkey website
to support the language and currency of its most prevalent international users
(They started with Dutch)
Debate occurred over how much to push the annual model since there was no
guarantee that the bump in revenue per user would compensate for the decrease in
volume of monthly members
o
With the belief that these lower-churn members were a better long-term
investment for the company, the team decided to actively target a heavier
distribution of annual users (This strategy only made sense in markets with
higher penetration)
SurveyMonkey increased its capabilities and user base without creating a significant
drain on its technical resources by acquiring Precision Polling in 2010, a company that
developed, designed and implemented all of its surveys via an online interface
Survey questions were also asked in countless different ways, resulting in inconsistent
and often inaccurate answers
o
In February 2013, SurveyMonkey announced the launch of its Developer portal, which
provided access to their Application Programming Interface (API), enabling developers
to integrate survey functionality into their own applications
Though SurveyMonkey had always been sold as an individual solution, it made its way
into businesses large and small - causing it to rethink its approach
o
There were more pushback and increased demands around the products feature
set
Up until the introduction of the tiered pricing structure, about half of the paying user base
was represented by monthly subscribers
o
They represented an area of high growth, but also high risk due to their rapid
churn rate
Many of these users were students who used the tool for a specific project that
lasted between a month to a semester, at which point they canceled their
membership
More technical needs diverted key resources away from the strategic, but less urgent
initiative to help improve overall survey data quality
o
While international expansion was a key driver of growth, it was also a highly resource
intensive effort with varying timelines around the return on investment
o
SurveyMonkey needed to maintain 20 different sites, each with its own language,
currency, and cultural nuances
Alternatives:
1. Focus on solidifying their position in the international markets they have already secured
2. Outsource the maintenance and services of international sites
3. Find a cloud-based translation platform to easily translate their website to different
language
Decision Criteria:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Return on investment
Quality
Company Growth
Cost
Time
Alternative Assessment:
Focus on Currently Acquired
Outsource
Cloud-Based
International Markets
International Sites
Translation Platform
Return on
Investment
High
Medium
High
Quality
High
Low-Medium
High
Company
growth
Moderate
Moderate-High
High
Cost
Moderate
High
Low
Time
High
Low
YES
YES
Decision
Recommendation
SurveyMonkey should use a cloud-base translation platform that enables them to reach new
international markets by being able to automatically translate website content. This platform
would automate the process of coding and translating, decreasing the amount of internal
resources needing to deal with language and cultural nuances on their 20 different international
websites. With the cloud-based translation platform, SurveyMonkey will be able to streamline
their entire localization process. SurveyMonkeys web content will be stored on the cloud
platform and then when request, the web content is translated in any chosen language the user
clicks on. There is minimal coding, only translation of content. This centralized cloud platform
will allow managers, developers and the translation provide to increase consistency and speed,
while reducing costs. We also recommend on hiring a company to provide us with the cloudbased translation platform, rather than making one customized. There are companies that offer
translation platforms that are ready to use that fit all the requirements of translating strictly web
content and do not compromise the quality of SurveyMonkeys services.
Implementation
1. Create and get approval of scope statement to determine requirements and scope
2. Research and hire/partner with Company X that is able to provide a cloud-based
translation platform
3. Adopt the cloud-based translation platform that has the capabilities of processing
requirements for Survey Monkey
4. Training on how current process will adopt the new platform
5. Communication between senior management and departments is essential
6. Test the quality of the end product of the cloud-based translation platform
7. Mitigation plan of security, adoption and functionality
Who: SurveyMonkey, and an external company that offers a cloud-based translation platform.
What: SurveyMonkeys Strategy and Website Processes