---
title: "Customer Research Survey: Market Research Survey Options, Tested"
description: "We coded 1,116 buying reasons from public comments. One template's vague option swallowed 75% of them. Write survey options that say which reason it was."
canonical: https://tryadlicio.com/blog/customer-research-survey
---

# Customer Research Survey: Market Research Survey Options, Tested

Published 2026-10-30. https://tryadlicio.com/blog/customer-research-survey

A customer research survey is a short questionnaire that asks buyers why they bought, what almost stopped them and what they used before, and its answer options should come from what customers already say in public. We tested published options against 1,116 buying reasons from public comments about self-cleaning litter boxes, then wrote better ones from the same comments.

## What we found

- One template's vague option, "Solves a specific problem I have", took 75.4% of buying reasons.
- The four answer examples another guide names leave out 77.4% of those reasons.
- A published hesitation list misses 7.9% to 37.0% of buyers' main worries, read generously or strictly.
- Public comments give a counted answer to 18 of the 58 sample questions on the top 10 pages.
- In Reddit threads, pressure to give a top score was the top reason to skip surveys: 109 of 152.

## Why market research survey answer options miss the real reasons

Mapster's [post-purchase survey template](https://www.mapster.io/templates/product-post-purchase-survey-template) asks "What was the main reason you decided to purchase today?" with five options. They cover 99.1% of the 1,116 main buying reasons, but "Solves a specific problem I have" absorbs 841 of them (75.4%) without saying which problem. Inside it sit tired of scooping (40.3% of the 841), the owner's health or body (13.9%), smell (10.4%), several cats (9.1%), tracking the cat's health (7.4%), a clean box for the cat (7.4%), travel or long days (6.5%) and less litter (4.3%). "75% bought it to solve a problem" is true, and you cannot write an ad from it. Two reasons hiding in it:

> "I'm physically disabled, with mobility issues, a full time job, 2 kids, 5 cats. It was a great investment for my family." ([YouTube comment](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HlzcEBqr4M&lc=Ugy5TuIfJnmD7rIhIqd4AaABAg))

> "I have caught my cat's UTIs after getting bombarded by notifications and realizing something was wrong." ([YouTube comment](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IHJJ6Jaz_o&lc=UgwCW6YsFCJsFfpEb9B4AaABAg))

| Published answer list | Main reasons no option covers |
|---|---|
| Mapster, 5 options | 10 of 1,116 (0.9%), but one option holds 75.4% |
| The four examples [KnoCommerce](https://knocommerce.com/blog/customer-research-survey-questions/) names: quality of products, price point, brand values, sustainability | 864 of 1,116 (77.4%) |
| [Yotpo](https://www.yotpo.com/blog/post-purchase-survey-questions/): price, quality, reviews, shipping, brand reputation | 58 of 135 (43.0%) |
| [SurveyMonkey post-purchase guide](https://www.surveymonkey.com/learn/post-purchase-survey-questions/): price, delivery speed, reviews, returns policy, recommendation | 123 of 135 (91.1%) |

KnoCommerce's list answers a brand-choice question and ends in "etc.", so read it as four examples, not a full list. Yotpo's and SurveyMonkey's lists answer "why us over a competitor", so we tested them only on the 135 comments naming a rival brand.

Vague options also shift with the reader: two AI models sorting the same 32 buying reasons filed 28 and 3 of them under "Quality of products". Either way, a generic list hides the reason or leaves it out.

The "Other" box will not warn you. In a [Pew Research Center](https://www.pewresearch.org/writing-survey-questions/) experiment, 8% gave an answer outside a closed list, but 43% of people asked open-ended gave one not on it. Building options from open answers is not new (Pew describes an open-ended pilot for it); public comments let you measure the gap before launch.

## How to write customer research survey options from real customer words

1. Collect public comments and reviews until at least 30 answer your question, and keep only those. About 1 in 5 of ours gave a buying reason (1,116 of 5,524), so 150 comments is a floor. Our guide to [finding customer pain points on Reddit](https://tryadlicio.com/scrapers/guides/find-customer-pain-points-on-reddit) shows where buyers talk.
2. Write one short label per reason, test the labels on a sample, then freeze them.
3. Give each item one main label, count the labels, and write one seeded option per label in the commenters' words, plus "Something else, please tell us".

Seeded options for "What was the main reason you bought it?", each an ad angle you can test:

| Seeded option | Share of 1,116 comments |
|---|---|
| I was tired of scooping every day | 29.1% |
| I wanted one that lasts and is safe (warranty, support, safety record) | 10.3% |
| Scooping is hard for me (health, pregnancy, pain, energy) | 10.0% |
| The litter box smell | 7.5% |
| I have several cats and could not keep up | 6.5% |
| Someone I trust recommended it | 6.0% |
| I want to track my cat's weight and visits | 5.4% |
| My cat needs a clean box every time | 5.4% |
| I travel or work long days | 4.7% |
| I found a deal (sale, used, refurbished, gift) | 4.3% |
| To use less litter | 3.1% |
| To keep a dog or kids out of the box | 0.4% |
| Something else | 7.2% |

"Someone I trust recommended it" is 19.0% of YouTube reasons and 2.1% of Reddit reasons, because people under review videos credit the reviewer. If you [analyze YouTube comments](https://tryadlicio.com/scrapers/guides/youtube-comment-analysis-for-ads), keep them apart from forum threads. On the one Amazon listing we read, tired of scooping also led, at 43.9% of 41 reasons.

For "What, if anything, almost stopped you?" (known buyers own or owned one):

| Seeded option | All hesitations (1,044) | Known buyers (365) |
|---|---|---|
| The price | 29.2% | 35.9% |
| Worried it could hurt my cat | 13.8% | 5.5% |
| Worried my cat would not use it | 12.0% | 11.2% |
| Worried it would break or malfunction | 10.4% | 17.3% |
| Not sure I need one (one cat, scooping is easy) | 6.3% | 6.3% |
| Worried it would still need a lot of cleaning | 6.3% | 6.8% |
| Could not decide which model or brand | 3.7% | 3.3% |
| I would not see my cat's pee and poop anymore | 3.6% | 1.4% |
| Something else | 6.0% | 4.1% |

Mapster's six hesitation options miss 37.0% of known buyers' main hesitations read strictly and 7.9% read generously, because "Wasn't sure it would solve my problem" can cover almost anything. Read strictly, nothing covers worry that it would break (63 of 365), not being sure you need one (23) or fear it could hurt the cat (20). Your ads must answer those objections, so name them in the survey.

For "What did you use or consider instead?" (1,258 comments, several answers allowed): a regular box and scooping (46.0%), another Litter-Robot model, or a used or refurbished one (30.3%), another self-cleaning brand (27.8%) and a non-electric system (7.1%). No template we checked offers options for it.

## Which market research survey questions public comments already answer

[SurveyMonkey's market research survey guide](https://www.surveymonkey.com/learn/market-research/market-research-surveys/), ranked first, says many teams "lean on secondary sources first to understand what is already known, then run a survey to fill the remaining gaps", but not how. We scored all 58 sample questions on the top 10 pages against the comments: 9 answered, 9 partly, 35 need a survey and 5 not measured. Public comments give a counted answer to 18 of the 58, so for those you can start from the category's answer. Answered ones include the three questions seeded above, what people typically pay (median $700 across 184 list, sale and used prices) and what would improve the product (malfunctions and errors lead, 29.3% vs 16.0% of 1,218, for the category leader).

The 35 that need a survey include demographics, "How did you first hear about us?", brand values, checkout, hypothetical prices and NPS. Every commenter already found the product, so awareness and attribution cannot be read from them.

Skip a question only when at least 30 public comments or reviews in your category answer it and the top answer is at least 1.25 times the next. Ours passed: 2.83 times for buying reasons, 2.12 times for hesitations. "Improve the product" answers describe the product people discuss, here the category leader, so they fit yours only if it has 30 or more public reviews or comments.

> "They really need to focus on the quality of their firmware" ([Reddit comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/litterrobot/comments/190bzm2/_/kgndc3d/))

## A 10-question customer survey that asks only what public data cannot

Public comments write the options, including the [customer objections](https://tryadlicio.com/blog/extracting-customer-objections-for-ecom-ad-messaging) that almost stopped the purchase. The survey measures your own buyers' shares, which can differ from the category's.

1. How did you first hear about us?
2. What was the main reason you bought it? (seeded options, plus "Something else, please tell us")
3. What, if anything, almost stopped you? (seeded options, plus "Nothing, it was an easy decision")
4. What did you use before? (seeded options)
5. How many cats live with you?
6. Who is it for? (you, a family member, a gift)
7. Before checkout, what price did you expect to pay?
8. How easy was checkout? (very difficult to very easy)
9. How did you pay?
10. Anything else we should know? (open)

## Why people skip customer surveys, in their own words

Utpal Dholakia's [Psychology Today post](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-science-behind-behavior/202106/why-customers-hate-participating-in-surveys) (2021) quotes 11 reader letters, including "If you don't give me a ten I'll lose my job", without counts. Shep Hyken's [2024 research](https://hyken.com/customer-service-strategies/customers-could-stop-doing-business-because-of-a-long-survey/), sponsored by RingCentral, reports "67% of customers said they don't complete surveys if they are too long", and [HubSpot](https://blog.hubspot.com/service/survey-fatigue) found 43% of 100 US consumers wanted surveys shorter than 10 to 14 minutes. Ours counts reasons people raise unprompted.

In 6 Reddit threads with 30 or more comments about a business surveying its own customers, 152 of 1,091 comments give a reason for skipping, quitting or distrusting a survey.

| Main reason | Comments (152) | Ranking-page tip for it |
|---|---|---|
| Told or pushed toward a top score, or skipping to protect the worker | 109 | none |
| Bad or irrelevant questions (a 1 to 10 recommend scale, 1,000 images to scroll) | 14 | neutral wording (6 pages) |
| Nothing changes, nobody reads it | 8 | close the loop (1 page) |
| Too long | 2 | keep it short (6 pages) |
| Unpaid work | 2 | incentives, partly |
| Too many surveys; asked too early | 1 each | none |
| Other (tone-deaf timing after a bad event) | 15 | not mapped |

Score pressure is the most-named reason, in 4 of 6 threads, and no top 10 page mentions it. One dealership thread supplies 88 of the 109, and 2 of the 6 threads were started over a score request, so treat it as a count, not a share of customers; without that thread, it still leads with 21 of 45. "Keep it short", a tip on 6 of the 10 pages and the subject of Hyken's 67%, is the main reason in only 2 comments (5 mention length), though no thread was about a long survey.

> "Took our car to the dealership for a checkup. They then said we would be getting an email survey... the green is how they said we should answer. Told us not to do the survey if our answers didn't match." ([Reddit post](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinfuriating/comments/yzoe7s/))

> "Not a single person at the manufacturer will look at your survey and not a single higher up at the dealer will either. It is one of thousands." ([Reddit comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/askcarsales/comments/1okk39g/_/nmb9va9/))

For a store (our reasoning, not data), two patterns carry over. A restaurant flyer asks people to answer ["if you're happy with your experience"](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinfuriating/comments/1vwgvel/_/p5gyoit/), and a commenter objects to feedback requests [before the buyer has the item](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinfuriating/comments/yzoe7s/_/ix4knzr/). Keep any reward independent of the answer, word the invitation neutrally, send after delivery and tell people what you changed.

## Rewrite these common market research survey question mistakes

Of the 58 published sample questions, 6 break a basic rule, 12 more are borderline and 40 pass. All 6 clear cases, and the borderline one below, come from [KnoCommerce's 37-question list](https://knocommerce.com/blog/customer-research-survey-questions/). One is the brand-choice list tested above. The rules come from [Pew](https://www.pewresearch.org/writing-survey-questions/) (options that miss answers), [AAPOR](https://aapor.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Question-Wording.pdf) (unbalanced and double-barreled questions), [GESIS 2.5](https://www.gesis.org/fileadmin/admin/Dateikatalog/pdf/guidelines/question_wording_lenzner_menold_2016.pdf) (hypotheticals) and the [Harvard PSR tip sheet](https://psr.iq.harvard.edu/files/psr/files/PSRQuestionnaireTipSheet_0.pdf) (leading wording).

| Published question | Problem | Rewrite |
|---|---|---|
| "Do you feel our brand values align with yours?" | Unbalanced: opinion asked as yes or no | "How closely do our brand's values match yours?" (not at all to completely) |
| "Do you feel the product was worth the price?" | Unbalanced | "Thinking about what you paid, how would you rate the value?" (poor to excellent) |
| "Would a payment plan or 'Buy Now, Pay Later' option make you more likely to purchase?" | Hypothetical | "How did you pay for this order?" |
| "If we increased the price by 10%, would you still purchase?" | Hypothetical | "Before checkout, what price did you expect to pay?" |
| "Were shipping costs or delivery times an issue?" | Double-barreled: two topics, one yes or no | Ask about shipping cost and delivery time separately (not at all, a little, a lot) |
| "What almost kept you from purchasing with us today?", borderline | Presumes something almost stopped the purchase | "What, if anything, almost stopped you from completing your purchase?" (Yotpo's wording) |

## Market research survey basics in brief

A customer or market research survey is a structured questionnaire about customer preferences, behavior and opinions; for a store, usually a short survey after purchase. The ranking guides agree: start from one decision the answers will change, pick the survey type and mode (online, phone, mail, in person, panel), word questions neutrally, keep it short (no more than 10 to 15 questions per [Luth Research](https://luthresearch.com/glossary/customer-research-surveys-unlocking-insights-for-business-success/)), pilot it and segment the results.

## How we got this data

### Comments

On 2026-09-23 we collected 6,039 public comments and kept 5,524 after removing video creator replies (233), comments under 3 words (200), deleted comments (44) and bots (38): 2,148 from 8 Litter-Robot 4 review videos on YouTube and 3,376 from 71 Reddit threads about buying one (r/litterrobot 2,831, r/CatAdvice 383, r/cats 111, r/BuyItForLife 51), dated 2022-11-14 to 2026-09-23.

### Amazon reviews

On 2026-09-24 we read 100 of the 103 written reviews on one Litter-Robot 4 listing (230 ratings), dated 2022-12-31 to 2026-09-22, across all star levels (56 five-star, 20 one-star). 77 are marked verified purchase; 33 were written in Canada. If you [mine Amazon reviews](https://tryadlicio.com/scrapers/guides/mine-amazon-reviews-for-ad-angles), keep them apart from comments too.

### Coding

One codebook, frozen after open-coding 180 items, covers all three questions. Two AI coders from different providers split the comments (2,560 and 2,964); no human coded. Agreement on main reason and main hesitation ran from kappa 0.79 to 0.90 across three checks: the two coders on 208 shared items, the second coder against those items' adjudicated labels (set by a model from the same provider), and a blind third model on 150 new items. The two halves show similar gaps (KnoCommerce examples 78.3% vs 76.5%). Whether an option "fits" is judged poorly (kappa -0.06 to 0.61), so coverage uses a written code-to-option map and hesitations get a range. 95% confidence intervals: Mapster 0.5% to 1.6%, KnoCommerce 74.9% to 79.8%, Yotpo 34.9% to 51.4%, SurveyMonkey 85.1% to 94.8%. A rule set before the second half was coded dropped 79 hesitations whose only code was distrust of sponsored reviews.

### Questions and threads

The 58 questions are every sample question on Google's US top 10 for "customer research survey" on 2026-09-23, scored by rules written first. Answered follows the skip rule above; partly means 10 to 29 items, no clear lead, or a lead that follows where we collected. A second AI model, shown only the question text and our field list, matched our question-to-data map on 21 of 26 scored questions (kappa 0.78); splits went to the verdict that claims less. Two blind AI raters agreed on the wording audit for 59 of 66 questions, including People Also Ask examples (kappa 0.57).

For the skip reasons, we screened 2,098 Reddit posts from title searches for "survey" in 8 subreddits plus keyword searches. 68 had 30 or more comments and 5 were about a business surveying its own customers; we added 1 r/askcarsales thread found earlier and kept 1,091 of 1,252 posts and comments, dated 2022-10-27 to 2026-08-24. A blind second pass on 150 items showed moderate agreement (kappa 0.50 to 0.56). Staff whose pay depends on the score (18 comments) are counted separately.

### Limits

One category, one market leader. Commenters chose to post, many in an owners' subreddit, and are not survey respondents. One sponsored video holds 1,451 of the 5,524 comments; without it, the top five buying reasons keep their order and the headline gaps barely move.

## FAQ

### What are 5 good survey questions to ask customers?

The main reason they bought, what almost stopped them, what they used before, what price they expected and how they first heard about you. For open questions that collect verbatims, our [voice of customer template](https://tryadlicio.com/blog/voice-of-customer-template) lists five.

### What is an example of a CSAT survey?

"How satisfied are you with your order?" on a 1 to 5 scale, then an open "What, if anything, could we have done better?", sent after delivery.

### Why is my customer survey response rate so low?

A poster on r/CustomerSuccess called theirs ["low and not super useful"](https://www.reddit.com/r/CustomerSuccess/comments/1t0bizc/customer_satisfaction_survey_how_are_you_guys/). The threads above point to the fixes: no score pressure, better timing, questions that fit and visible change.

Before you write your next survey, pull 150 or more public comments about your category and count what they say. [Adlicio](https://tryadlicio.com/voice-of-customer) is one way to do that: it pulls verbatim comments and reviews from public sources such as Reddit, Amazon, YouTube, TikTok and Trustpilot, and groups them into pains, objections, desired outcomes and phrases for ad angles.