Reddit mentions: The best web marketing books

Qualtrics and Questionpro are tools I've used in the past. Qualtrics is very good, but it has a couple of limitations. It's matrix question tool leaves a lot to be desired from time to time, among a lot of other things. Questionpro had slightly more intuitive pipe/skip logic tools, but Qualtrics has a survey flow tool that is fantastic for visualizing how things play out. If I had to make a recommendation for one or the other I'd lean towards Qualtrics. Other programs like surveymonkey always come off as tacky and unprofessional looking to me, but then again the ones I've seen are made by people who clearly don't know much about survey design and are just trying to get some quick responses for something.

Check if your university has a subscription to either of the above. I have made formal, professional surveys using both Questionpro and Qualtrics with a good deal of success. I don't know about qualtrics, but questionpro has several different versions you can buy- some are more crippled than others. Be wary of this, and make sure you can export SPSS format so you don't lose variable labels that you set up in the survey software.

Ask me any questions you might have, I'll be happy to help. I'm doing my MA thesis right now too, as well as a separate web survey.

Edit:
IAMA Sociology grad student that specializes in web survey design

From my experience qualtrics support is also excellent. I've always heard back from them in around 24 hours with videos of them acting out the answer. Totally helpful.

Also, I recommend you read and memorize Dillman et al. 2009 : http://www.amazon.com/Internet-Mail-Mixed-Mode-Surveys-Tailored/dp/0471698687 . The definitive source IMO.

From your link, I'm guessing you're looking for aesthetics. The main idea is to think about how paper based content is layed out. Structure, hierarchy and usability heurisitcs will in turn make your sites look better.

Colours, fonts and the like are subjective; but you can't beat content which has great usability.

My course book for Web development was Web Design: A complete introduction, the technology it mentions is somewhat outdated but the design principles hold up well I found (2006).

Here's a list of books for web design by Creative Bloq:

http://www.creativebloq.com/inspiration/books-web-designers-11122782

My personal favourite:
Content Management:
http://www.amazon.com/Content-Strategy-Voices-That-Matter/dp/0321808304/ref=sr_1_1?tag=georiot-cbq-20&ie=UTF8&qid=1352287559&sr=8-1%3fie%3dUTF8&ascsubtag=hawk-884446355-21

Usability:
http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Make-Me-Think-Usability/dp/0321344758/?tag=georiot-cbq-20&ie=UTF8&ascsubtag=hawk-318142612-21

Don Dillman is who you need to look towards when starting out on survey design issues. He doesn't deal with measurement issues that /u/DirtGotWet refers to. Instead Dillman focuses on the design of surveys (such wording, layout, pacing, length), ensuring that you get a quality sample from you population, and reducing attrition. There has been a lot of research on which approaches get the best results. I highly recommend it for anyone starting out.

Did you log of your google account before you did the search? Google knows you and what you want to see, its called the filter bubble. This book from the author that coined the term is the best I've read on the subject. His TED talk is also very imformative.

The Filter Bubble: What The Internet Is Hiding From You.