survey is a joke

[daveccampbell 3]

way too long and detailed.

 

[KimWyatt 0]

I guess they really don't want my opinion, the link they emailed for my survey is broken. 

[jefito 5,589]

So don't finish it. That'll show 'em, yeah... 

[daveccampbell 3]

believe me, i didn't finish it.  i'd be curious about the response rate to that survey, particularly if there were others like me - willing to help, but caught off-guard by the complexity and duration.  i think if you consider the drop-off rate (those who finished / those who started) you may find some surprising results.

[jefito 5,589]

I finished it; can't speak to other peoples' motivations, but I had a few things to say / suggest. I'm less interested in team / business usage stuff (even though I use it at work every day), but since I've been using Evernote for 9 years now, a few minutes of time (over dinner, mind) didn't seem all that much, particularly as it was indicative of some of the directions that they're thinking about going. I doubt that they'll publish the drop-out rate, so that's moot, but I've dropped out of other surveys, so I understand that as well.

[FriarKupp 0]

I tried to take your survey but when I got about 35% into it, it asked a question about acceptable annual price per user per year, similar to the previous question. When I attempted to answer (several times with several different prices) the survey would not continue. There was no message about why I couldn't continue, if there was a problem with my answer and no way to skip the question or get help. I had to close the page after wasting my valuable time and losing all my answers. I will not take any surveys from you again. I'm serious considering moving away from Evernote but it will probably take more than this survey to pry it from my cold dead hands. 

 

I'm sorry you won't see my responses but I will not reply to any of your emails either. This was a very frustrating experience. I've never paid for Evernote and now it isn't likely that I ever will. 

[Wanderling Reborn 185]

Didn't finish it either, since it would not accept the "None" answer.

My impression is, Evernote is concentrating on attacking the business world, where the competition is huge and already dominated by the giants like Microsoft and Google. Every company that subscribes to either MS Office / Office 365 or Google Suite is also getting the collaboration / note taking tools with their subscriptions. I am not very familiar with Google Suite, but Onenote is very deeply integrated with Office and Sharepoint, so there's already a fairly high benefit threshold to cross. Persuading our company to spend additional software, training and support funds to invest in a 3rd party tool over Onenote that they already get with Office would be quite a challenge. Not to say an insurmountable challenge.

The big question is, what does this do to individual users who don't necessarily need collaboration tools, and have other priorities.

[jefito 5,589]

3 hours ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

The big question is, what does this do to individual users who don't necessarily need collaboration tools, and have other priorities.

Evernote has had a business product for years, without it affecting individual users much, of at all. The essential client remains the same, some capabilities are necessarily different (e.g. sharing controls), there's admin for the business, of course. I've never felt left out in the rain because of the existence of Evernote for Business.

That being said, I'm guessing that it's less a matter of Evernote "attacking" the business market with the intent to own it so much as Evernote recognizes that some folks who prefer the "Evernote way" want more expanded team / collaboration options than what the current individual Evernote clients offer. So they're aiming to beef up the business product, without trying to be the be-all / end-all ecosystem. You get a hint of that in this recent interview with Chris O'Neill: https://www.cnet.com/news/evernote-raised-prices-got-more-of-us-to-sign-up. Will it work? Not sure, but I think that they need to play better with others in order to maintain their place in the world.

[bill77 10]

On 10/12/2017 at 11:10 AM, FriarKupp said:

I tried to take your survey but when I got about 35% into it, it asked a question about acceptable annual price per user per year, similar to the previous question. When I attempted to answer (several times with several different prices) the survey would not continue. There was no message about why I couldn't continue, if there was a problem with my answer and no way to skip the question or get help. I had to close the page after wasting my valuable time and losing all my answers. I will not take any surveys from you again. I'm serious considering moving away from Evernote but it will probably take more than this survey to pry it from my cold dead hands. 

 

I'm sorry you won't see my responses but I will not reply to any of your emails either. This was a very frustrating experience. I've never paid for Evernote and now it isn't likely that I ever will. 

I had that happen at first, then I realized you had to check the little box (or radial button) under "Free" or "Paid" (something along those lines) and then pick whether you'd purchase it or not, which didn't make since seeing as checking the free version was one of the options you were supposed to select. That bit was a little convoluted and hard to follow, but it won't proceed until you check one. 

[TK0047 422]

The "what would you pay" or compare these three subscription options questions were frustrating and not part of a 'quick' survey. I completed the survey however I was getting overwhelmed with all the options I had to review. I understand what they are trying to do but I am not sure that can be achieved via survey. I am not selecting my membership option now to make a real good comparison about my options.

 

I don't use the collaborative tools since my industry is a little behind on technology and not many people using Evernote anyway. Therefore, sharing and collaboration on notes are not deciding factors for me to use Evernote. I hope they don't abandon some great features so they can focus on the "business" world more to take on Google or Microsoft tools.

[jbenson2 2,147]

On 10/12/2017 at 8:34 AM, daveccampbell said:

believe me, i didn't finish it.  i'd be curious about the response rate to that survey, particularly if there were others like me - willing to help, but caught off-guard by the complexity and duration.  i think if you consider the drop-off rate (those who finished / those who started) you may find some surprising results.

Like several others who commented here, I made a stab at the survey but gave up when it started going into the minutiae and trivial rating comparisons. I was in charge of Marketing for a company for 20 years and would never allow something like this tedious survey to go out the door. The people who came up with this poll were probably trained at the same institution that trained the media pollsters for the 2016 Presidential election.  Evernote seemed more concerned on bribing a few people who wanted a shot at the $100 lottery than there were in solid survey results from a significant number of respondents.

[jefito 5,589]

1 hour ago, TK0047 said:

not part of a 'quick' survey.

If I recall correctly, the request for the survey did say that it would take 15-20 minutes to fill out. That was about right for me.

14 minutes ago, jbenson2 said:

Evernote seemed more concerned on bribing a few people who wanted a shot at the $100 lottery than there were in solid survey results from a significant number of respondents.

Sure, I'd take the $100, but I was also curious about what they were asking (there were interesting hints about what's to come), and there was an opportunity to make my own comments, which I took advantage of.  Some of it was initially confusing, but I got it that they're trying to figure out  distribution of features per price point/product, so I just did my best at guessing, given that I'm not interested particularly in the business application. Unlike many people in that same 2016 election, I cast my vote, despite my dissatisfaction with the candidates...

[CalS 5,280]

i thought a preface of "this survey is aimed at those who use EN for collaboration" would have been helpful and saved me the 20 minutes.  The various option lists and prices were definitely overkill in my view.  If one really took the time to compare them, I mean your looking at 15-20 lines per column, it would have taken in excess of the 20 minutes.  Hard to understand what they were getting at.  My guess would be the results would be less than completely useful based upon the native confusion introduced in the instrument.  There were a couple of free form blocks where one could have one's say though.  End of the day for me it still boils down to "Hey, you are introducing some good stuff, just don't throw away the other good stuff in the process, and for God's sake, fix the editor and kill the bugs."

[jbenson2 2,147]

An effective survey is only as good as the questions used in it. 

A good survey will draw the respondent in, making him or her finish the survey fully rather than leaving the form half-finished because they didn’t understand what the company was asking or they were bored to tears. While getting them to agree to fill in the questionnaire might be a critical first step, maintaining their interest till they complete the questionnaire is just as important.

In my opinion, Evernote did not meet these basic survey goals. 
 

[jefito 5,589]

Cool. More chances for me to win the $100!!

[rebREorg 2]

On 10/19/2017 at 11:00 AM, jbenson2 said:

In my opinion, Evernote did not meet these basic survey goals. 

Agree completely! One of my clients emailed me a rant about how Evernote is supposed to make things simpler for users and this survey does the opposite. It made him nervous how this survey got approved.