Top box vs. brand selection vs. yes/no: Survey options for purchase intentions that are highly predictive of purchase behavior

The effectiveness of the method of presenting options in a purchase intention survey, essential for demand forecasting, is examined in four industries in Japan: tea, beer, cafes, and restaurants. To improve the prediction accuracy of actual purchasing behavior, brand selection should be adopted with a top-box or single-answer approach. These methods present a high psychological barrier to positively expressing purchase intention in the survey. However, to comprehensively identify people who will actually purchase, a yes/no question should be adopted. This is because, as a two-choice question, researchers can confirm the intention to purchase multiple brands without giving ambiguous answers, as with the top-2-box or multiple answers. Moreover, because the psychological barrier is not as high as that with a top-box or single answer, there is less chance of missing out on buyers. Practitioners must design options for purchase intention questions based on their market research purpose.