Apple CEO Tim Cook likes to cite Wristly.co‘s Apple Watch customer satisfaction numbers—97% last time they looked. But the folks at Wristly, a Web-based research firm, know better than anyone what’s wrong with their surveys.
It’s not Wristly’s sample size (2,300 Watch owners). Or their surveys. It’s that someone who paid for an Apple Watch and wears it regularly is far more likely to fill out Wristly’s weekly questionnaires than someone who gave up on the thing.
That’s known as “positive bias,” and Wristly has been trying for months to find a way around it.
“This week we’re finally putting a dent on this conundrum,” co-founder Bernard Desarnauts said in a report posted Tuesday evening.
“First we asked you about it and 12% of you stated that you knew at least one other person who owned Apple Watch and wasn’t satisfied with it. We subsequently contacted those respondents and asked them to forward our ‘Unsatisfaction’ anonymous survey to these people—the link for it is here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/wristly-no-usage
“We will report the findings in the next weeks once a sufficient quorum of users has been polled. If you know someone not satisfied with Apple Watch, please ask them to take this survey. It is only five questions and is completely anonymous.”
I can’t wait to see what they find out.
See also: John Gruber Has Stopped Wearing His Apple Watch Every Day
Follow Philip Elmer-DeWitt on Twitter at @philiped. Read his Apple (AAPL) coverage at coins2day.com/ped or subscribe via his RSS feed.You might also want to subscribe to Data Sheet, Coins2Day’s daily newsletter on the business of technology.
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