Shelf test data points

CS platform gathers a large array of data points as the respondent interacts with the survey questions. What follows is a brief description of the data which is available from our API once a respondent has completed a shelf exercise.

The data is available as a JSON object only. For technical details and actual field names please see Liveplano.

Please note that the only supported method of access is via our API and it is highly recommended that you gather the respondent data as soon as each respondent completes an exercise. Bulk access of the API is not supported and maybe subject to operational restrictions. Data dump download of data is similarly not supported.

General notes on data points

All durations are recorded in HH:mm:ss.sss format which is Hours, minutes, seconds and milliseconds.
Times are recorded as for durations with the addition of year, month and day.
All time dates are in Zulu format (also known as GMT or UTC).
Start, end and durations may include setup and teardown time depending which level of the data they represent, generally more fine grained times have less or no additional cost.

Data sections / areas

The data points we collect are created by page. Recall a page in the CS Survey design tool can contain multiple questions, well our data feed is organized and requested by page. The actual data is split roughly into the following areas:

General meta data about the question / shelf and the respondent's overall interaction with the test.
Individual data sections relating to each question in the test.
Full *raw* event feed, this is the raw data we receive back as the respondent navigates and interacts with the shelf and can include full mouse move data (though this is CPU and data size intensive so is off by default)

Taking each area in turn:

General meta data

Name	Description
respondent ID	The ID of the respondent as passed into our system by URL link from you.
project ID	The projectID from the CS Survey authoring tool and part of the calling URL.
page ID	The pageID from the CS Survey authoring tool and part of the calling URL.
total time in survey	This is the total duration the respondent spent interacting with the survey.
start time of survey	Time respondent started survey.
end time of survey	Time respondent finished the survey.

Individual Question data points

For each individual question with a page we collect the following data, please note that depending on the actual question type (qType) more or less of the data points will be valid. The following sections will break this down between shelf and non shelf qTypes.

General and non shelf qType data points

Name	Description
question ID	The ID of the question as auto-generated by the CS Survey authoring tool.
total time spent on the question	This is the total duration the respondent spent interacting with this question.
start time of question	Time respondent started the question.
end time of question	Time respondent finished the question and moved to the next or survey complete.
the type of the question	This is the shorthand code for the question type or qType from the CS Survey authoring tool.
question title	Text of the question title as authored.

Shelf qType data points

We store a large amount of data for shelf questions, the full list is changed and enhanced in response to client requests and is beyond the scope of this document. For a full and current list of all data available please see the API documentation and sample results we keep available online. Do not hesitate to contact CS if you have an idea for extra data we do not currently keep. A summary of the key elements and groups follows:

Basket content

For each item in the respondents basket when the question is finished:

Name	Description
UPC	As entered and client defined UPC - if any.
descriptin	Product description - if any.
price data	The price set for the product.
quantity in basket	How many of this product or item are in the basket. This is always a positive integer more than zero.

Basket events

This section holds more details about the respondents interaction with products and the shopping basket. For example combinations of data points in this section can be used to see which (if any) products a respondent placed in the basket and then removed at a later time.

Name	Description
product meta data	Dimensions, price and so on.
event name	This is the coded name of the even the respondent caused on the product, for example clicking on the product or adding it to the shopping cart.
other data duplicated in the Basket Content section.

Decoration view events

This is data relating to a respondents specific interaction with shelf decorations such as signage and so on.

Hover events

Data points relating t which products the respondent hovered or paused over.

Price view events

Specifics on how the respondent interacted with the pricing labels and other price related features of a shelf test.

Product view events

Here we detail data points gathered from a respondents viewing of a product - that is the respondent clicked and otherwise interacted with a product - note this does not include the basket events.

Name	Description
times	the duration a respondent spent examining the product data and images.

Knowledge Base