Synchronization

The synchronize functionality allows you to update and/or append records from the respondent list into the response data. This can for example be useful in the following scenarios:

• If you have to make changes to background variables after data collection has started and some respondents have answered the Survey. These respondents will then already have data in the background variables in the response data set. Background variables in response data will not be affected by changes performed in the respondent editor. To have the changes applied to records already in the response data, you can update these variables with the synchronization functionality.
• If you want to include all records from the respondent files into the response data to be able to report on total response rates. As reporting is done only on response data (not including respondent list), you can use the synchronize functionality and append records from the respondent list that are not already in the response data.

Note: These records will be given the status "incomplete", meaning the Appended records:
1) will not be included in email tasks that use Not Answered for their criteria,
2) will be counted as Incomplete in response rate reporting,
3) will not be included in PII Data Cleaning tasks that use Records Older Than N Days functionality (because the task uses Interview Start to determine if the record should be cleaned).
Existing records will retain their current status.

• The Authoring Individual Reporting functionality can be utilized as an entry point to interviews. This is done by using individual reporting to search through the records, and then when a record is selected in the hit-list, the single view is opened for that particular respondent with the unique URL to the survey for that record/respondent. Individual Reporting is only performed on response data, so to be able to search for respondents who have not answered the survey, the records have to be appended using the synchronize functionality.

Synchronization is only performed on the respondents resulting from your search in the respondent editor. The only variables that will be populated are the system identifiers respid and responseid, and the variables you have included in respondent editor which are defined as background variables in the survey.

In the event the task is set to be Recurring, you can synchronize all the data or you can synchronize only data that has been changed since the previous synchronization. Set the Data to be included property as appropriate.

Example:

In this example, assume we want to update the background variables "name" and "email" in a survey. When you click the Synchronize button, the Synchronization Properties window opens - .

Figure 1 - The Synchronization properties window

Check the Update existing...box to update those background variables for respondents resulting from the search (in our case "email" and "name"), which are already represented in the response data.

Check the Append missing...box to add respondents resulting from the search, which are not in the response data, and insert data for those background variables.