RRC Associates Takes Remote Surveying to New Heights

Founded in 1983 in Boulder, Colorado, RRC Associates is
a recognized leader in consumer intelligence and strategic
market research for the tourism and recreation industries.
RRC Associates provides a broad range of market research,
land use planning, real estate, customer satisfaction, and
media and communications research services. Their focus is on
providing high-quality, customized market research, planning,
and analysis services to their clients. A staff of around 20
experienced professionals with a rich perspective on research
and tourism administer 100 or more projects that involve faceto-
face research every season.
RRC Associates work extensively with the National Ski Areas
Association, Whister-Blackcomb, Aspen Skiing Company,
the Canadian Ski Council, Jackson Hole, and many ski resorts
across North America. In addition, they also work with many
resort communities and mountain towns, including the City of
Boulder, Steamboat Springs, and the Golden Isles of Georgia.

Over the years, RRC Associates utilized a variety of survey
techniques, including paper forms and other types of
electronic surveys. Nate Fristoe, Managing Director of RRC,
explains: “Our face-to-face interviews are often conducted in
remote environments with poor internet access. It was important
for us to have a solution that is robust enough to accommodate
offline surveying and secure data transfer.”

RRC Associates considered, and in some cases purchased, almost
every offline survey tool on the market today.
“We researched solutions for several months before deciding to
go with SurveyToGo. What really made the difference was Dooblo’s
understanding of the importance of the underlying data structure and
appropriate variable and value labeling on the
back-end for automating downloading the data into analytic platforms
like SPSS,” Fristoe describes the software selection process. “Other
companies just didn’t seem to get the importance of this at all and
were more enamored with their own fairly shoddy reporting platforms.”
The key factors that affected the RRC software selection were
the ease of survey design, the reliability of the offline interview
process, and the ability to automate customized downloads. “The
geo-tracking has been a useful feature, especially in the context of
doing interviews on-mountain at a ski resort. It is extremely helpful to
see where interviewers are on the mountain and make sure they’re
following appropriate sampling protocols. SurveyToGo is a superior
solution with a much more sophisticated understanding of how
researchers actually use the data,” concludes Fristoe.

SurveyToGo’s Studio survey-design software was installed
on every machine in the RRC office. The remote application
was installed on hundreds of devices. Fristoe describes the
implementation process as “very easy. Our staff required very little
training due to the fact they were already familiar with many other
platforms. The project was completed in a timely way. We used Dooblo’s team to assist us with the development of a special
question type that could utilize Android devices’ NFC chip. We’ve been
very pleased with the SurveyToGo team.”

RRC Associates reported an immediate return on their investment
in SurveyToGo. “It has allowed us to have a greater confidence level
when deploying remote surveys in an offline environment,” explains
Fristoe. “The efficiencies generated through use of SurveyToGo have
allowed us to improve the deliverables we provide to clients.”
Fristoe estimates that the use of SurveyToGo has allowed RRC to
cut down average project time by 10 to 15 percent. Data quality
was considerably improved thanks to the ability to customize
and automate the data downloads. RRC further reported a 10
to 15 percent reduction in interview length, depending on the
device running the survey. “We have greater confidence in proposing
electronic surveying in remote environments than in the past,”
summarized Fristoe.

When asked to provide advice to other research firms, Fristoe
is very specific: “Before deciding on a platform, make sure to spend
significant time analyzing the quality of the data produced on the
back-end. The reporting solutions most survey companies provide
are, in many cases, entirely inadequate for professional analyses.
SurveyToGo seems to have a much better grasp of this issue than
other companies.