Putting Customer Research into Practice: Guidelines for Conducting, Reporting, and Using Customer Surveys Related to Highway Maintenance Operations

Overview

The research objective was to synthesize and provide illustrative examples for existing highway maintenance-related market research or customer survey activities or efforts conducted by SHA. The compilation includes: 1. Documentation of current customer survey practices at state DOTs related to highway maintenance, including cost. 2. Identify what customers are being surveyed – different modal users (i.e. truckers, bicyclists, etc.) 3. Identify current strategies of market research: focus groups, phone surveys, etc 4. Identify how states are interpreting, reporting (both internally within the DOT and externally as part of public outreach), and internally using the data collected. 5. Identify how market research results have impacted SHA decision making in terms of how funds were allocated to the various programs.