Hanover Housing – one of the first to use Snap Online to improve their research service
May 2007
Hanover Housing Association, one of the oldest, largest and leading providers of retirement housing in England, is one of the first to use Snap’s new online analysis and response management tool in their emergency alarm call and monitoring service. Hanover has until recently used Snap’s Internet module to conduct telephone feedback amongst its residents. With the release of Snap Online, Mike Williams - Hanover’s Group Research Advisor saw the potential that this new tool could bring to the call centre. Since implementing this new technology the tool has now revolutionised their research work.
"Older people do not appreciate being asked demographic questions, particularly if it is information they feel that we should already have on our databases. With Snap Online we can hot link the database information straight into the survey and never have to worry about asking repetitive questions yet still retain the functionality of full analysis.”
Hanover owns and manages over 10,000 retirement properties and manages an additional 500 homes on behalf of other organisations. Research has always been an integral part of their ethos but they found that surveying their elderly residents using the traditional postal survey was becoming increasingly difficult. Mike saw an opportunity to increase response rates by utilising the existing capabilities of the Hanover OnCall team and decided to use their spare capacity to conduct telephone feedback surveys. Six operators were trained as telephone interviewers so that in between incoming calls they could phone residents and input feedback straight into an online survey with coded interviewer prompts. This solution has continued to be extremely effective since its implementation but Mike realised that Snap Online would make this process a lot more efficient and manageable. Mike explains, "Older people do not appreciate being asked demographic questions, particularly if it is information they feel that we should already have on our databases. With Snap Online we can hot link the database information straight into the survey and never have to worry about asking repetitive questions yet still retain the functionality of full analysis.”
The Interviewer facility of Snap Online enables users to manage and deliver surveys via the web, giving the researcher more control and flexibility. The software allows you to create and schedule invites and automatically sends reminders to non-respondents. All respondent replies can be captured even if the survey is abandoned and code lists can be filtered to reflect replies to previous questions. To utilise these advanced features, Mike signed up to Snap Online and the system is now being used to full effect. A survey is published to Snap Online so the operators can pick it up and start working through the respondent list. The advantage of using this for telephone interviewing is that if the operator can’t get through to a resident then the name is just left unread, ready for the next operator to call. This tool also allows management to monitor the progress of the team to check their efficiency and speed. In addition, the telephone interview is used to clean the residents’ database. This is a simple process in Snap using the database link facility, which updates the data automatically.
Since using this system, the OnCall team of which there are between 4-6, now conduct on average 561 surveys in the space of 5 days. Snap Online has helped to empower these employees, as they are now able to manage their projects independently and more effectively. Hanover’s vision of a society in which older and disabled people can freely choose and afford housing and support options puts them at the forefront of the retirement housing sector. With the introduction of Snap Online, they are now also leading the way in research to truly meet the needs and wants of their residents.
Snap Online now has a new build available, which contains a whole host of new features; click here to find out what these are.