Using a Multi-Mode Survey Design on a Panel Study of New Businesses

• Activity Number: 159
• Type: Topic Contributed
• Date/Time: Monday, August 1, 2011 : 10:30 AM to 12:20 PM
• Sponsor: Section on Survey Research Methods
• Author(s): David DesRoches*+
• Companies: Mathematica Policy Research, Inc.
• Keywords: establishment surveys ; entrepreneurship ; multi-mode surveys ; business surveys

Abstract

Since 2005, Mathematica has conducted the Kauffman Firm Survey (KFS) for the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. The baseline KFS survey recruited a panel of U.S. businesses which were founded in the same calendar year (2004) using a multi-mode web/CATI design. This group of businesses (the KFS panel) has been contacted annually for follow-up data collection since 2006. The main goal of the KFS is to investigate how new businesses are structured and funded in their early years, and to measure the changes in business financing and productivity over this period. With the use of this multi-mode design, much of the data collection in the follow-surveys has been migrated from CATI to the web, reducing the costs and respondent burden associated with extensive telephone follow-up efforts. This paper will explore the experiences of recruiting a panel of establishments through a multi-mode survey, as well as the technological improvements made over the course of the study. The paper will also examine the cost effects of increasing web survey data collection in the follow-up surveys.