Are surveys a tired PR tactic? Let’s watch IBM’s “C-Suite” study to find out.

“Let’s do a survey!”

We PR people throw out this suggestion a lot. Why? Numbers and data help us get media interested in a story by validating a problem and solution.

But we’re getting close to overplaying our hand. I’ve been sensing survey fatigue for a while now. Survey results are losing their value, because for every survey that concludes X, you can commission a survey that will conclude the opposite of X.

I’m curious to see whether the latest results from IBM’s C-Suite survey catches on for a couple of reasons:

• Its results should be strongly authoritative, considering that its researchers spoke with more than 12,500 c-level executives around the world. That’s a huge sample size for that population.
• Yet it’s presenting a narrative (“Incumbents strike back!”) that, in my opinion, is very lackluster. In fact, one of the few headlines it has generated thus far uses the term “old tech.” Does that strike you as compelling reading during a time in which fashion designers are replacing runway models with drones?

I’m not ready to give up on surveys — and, with loads of data points, this IBM study has a long shelf-life — but I do think we’ll have to get smarter about how we use them very soon.