Agencies run many studies for many clients, sometimes at the same time. That makes platform choice more than a feature question. You need to keep client work separate, protect respondent data, hand over outputs that stakeholders can use, and still move quickly. This checklist is organized into five areas. Under each, you will find the questions to ask a vendor and what a good answer looks like, so you can evaluate responses instead of just collecting them.
How to use this checklist
- 1Share the questions with each vendor before the demo so they can prepare real answers.
- 2Ask to see each answer demonstrated on a sample project, not described on slides.
- 3Score answers 0 to 2 (missing, partial, convincing) and add notes on risks.
- 4Weight the sections by your agency’s biggest exposure: client confidentiality, delivery speed, or margin.
1. Client separation and tenancy
“Multi-tenant” means one platform hosts separate workspaces for different clients or teams without mixing their data. For an agency, this is the difference between a clean operation and an accidental disclosure.
Client separation questions
2. Outputs your clients can use
Clients rarely log into research tools. They consume the output: a deck, a summary, a few strong quotes. If the platform cannot produce material that is easy to turn into that, your team rebuilds it by hand every time, and your margin pays for it.
Output and reporting questions
3. Privacy and legal handling
Respondents share personal details, home photos, and sometimes confidential product concepts. Agencies carry the legal exposure, so privacy features are part of your risk management, not just a checkbox.
Privacy and legal questions
4. Fieldwork and respondent experience
This section decides whether you get a usable sample. Test it yourself on real phones; do not rely on screenshots from a slide deck.
Fieldwork and respondent questions
5. Analysis and speed
Speed is your margin. The less time you spend retyping, chasing, and coding from scratch, the more studies you can run profitably. These areas show where time is saved or lost.
| Area | Question to ask the vendor | What good looks like |
|---|---|---|
| Authoring | Can we paste an existing guide? | Import preserves wording, scales, and day structure; you review before publishing |
| Themes | Do we see themes while the study is live? | Coded themes with respondent counts and links to evidence |
| Transcripts | Are video and audio transcribed automatically? | Fast transcripts with searchable text and support for your languages |
| Quality | How do you flag mismatched or low-quality media? | Source labels, camera capture options, and flags for off-topic images |
| Reuse | Can we reuse templates across clients? | Template library without leaking client-specific content |
Example: an agency has three clients in field this month. With separated workspaces, a share link for Client A never exposes Client B’s data. The agency still uses the same guide patterns across projects, which keeps delivery quick and consistent.
FAQ