It's once again time for our annual Registrar Customer Satisfaction Survey. The survey results can be found in
the article "Does Your Registrar Measure Up?" beginning on page 28. After all of the feedback we received following last year's survey, I wasn't sure that we'd dare to do another one. But, as
Alexander Pope put it, fools rush in where angels fear to tread. We've made a number of significant changes to the survey this year. The most important change is that, as
promised, we have published the complete survey results for each registrar that had a statistically valid response rate. Last year we only published the data for the top registrars in each
category. Our decision to publish the complete data is based on the feedback we received from readers last year. We received a lot of negative feedback from registrars after
our survey debuted a year ago. Much of that feedback was valid, so we decided to enlist the aid of the registrars in making the survey more useful and more accurate. We hosted a meeting in San
Francisco in March to explain the survey process to registrars and to give them an opportunity to provide input into the survey process. Thirteen registrars were represented at the meeting.
Although they provided invaluable input to the process, they were not allowed to develop the customer satisfaction questions. As the article explains, the registrars' customers developed the
questions based on a presurvey we conducted before this meeting. The registrars did help develop the survey categories, two demographic questions and methods for displaying the data graphically. We also significantly reduced the number of questions in the survey. Last year's survey had more than 50 questions. This year's had 19. We hoped this reduction in the number of
questions would increase the response rate. We contacted about 30,000 registered sites in the United States and Canada and received about 2,000 responses, which was roughly the same number as
last year's survey response. We learned a number of things from this year's survey. First, this year's survey validated last year's results. As we discovered last year,
registrars are doing a good job overall. All of the registrars scored above three on all of the survey's five-point scales. In addition, there wasn't a significant shift in any of the registrar's
scores. We also learned that bigger doesn't necessarily mean better. Tiny Orion Registrar scored at the top in the overall satisfaction category and in three other categories as well.
Despite our best efforts--and believe me, we put forth a tremendous effort--I'm sure that there will be some registrars and readers who will criticize the survey. The most common complaint
we received last year was that we had no business doing this survey because we couldn't possibly be nonbiased. I disagree. If we were biased toward our advertisers we wouldn't have done the
survey at all due to the risk of alienating them. We conducted this survey as a service to our readers, most of whom work for ISO 9000-registered companies. We believe that our advertisers,
ultimately, will respect our decision to survey their industry and use the results as an improvement tool. As proud as I am of our survey, I want to reinforce that it should be
used as only one of many
tools when selecting a registrar. There are a number of other considerations, including industry reputation, auditor experience, price and location. Selecting the right registrar can make the difference between an added-value registration and a rubber stamp. Do your homework!
I welcome your feedback on the survey. E-mail your comments to spaton@qualitydigest.com . We'll use them to make
next year's survey even better. |
