A product launch can easily cost a company millions of dollars. Obviously, the manufacturer thinks that the product is a good idea, but what does the marketplace  think?

Before an advertiser spends those millions of dollars promoting a product, he wants to have some idea of the odds of his product being successful in the marketplace. Online surveys are one way to determine that. And more advertisers every day are taking advantage of this relatively low cost of doing market research that can prevent them making huge marketing and production mistakes.

The greatest benefit of online surveys is that they give corporations instantaneous feedback on their ideas, products, and services. They can find out, in short order, how much demand there is for their idea or product among their potential customers. In addition, paid survey sites enable them to tweak their offer many times if necessary until they are either comfortable that their idea is worth going forward with or is one that should be dropped. And, often times, it lets them do this at a fraction of the cost it would have taken to produce the product and market it.

Online surveys give companies one other advantage. Surveys help companies to accumulate an email list of possible buyers who have conveyed an interest in what they have to offer.

From the user’s standpoint, paid online surveys give them a chance to make a little money. If they are also interested in the product that they are evaluating, as they should be, it let’s them keep up on the latest innovations on that product. For example, if you are a Linux guru and love working with it, you might be the perfect candidate for a company about to promote a new Linux software add on. And it’s even sweeter for you, if the company is willing to pay you for your opinions.

Typically, a marketing survey form will ask a potential buyer questions about the product or service. What is it they dislike about it? What do they like about it? How much would they be willing to pay for it and so on. This gives the company a chance to modify the product, if necessary, before the intended product launch date.

As a buyer, you may also be asked about your buying patterns. For example, how often do you buy a new car, upgrade your software, or buy pasta? This helps the company gauge the size of their potential market. A company may have a product that they believe only appeals to men. If their survey reveals that it has an equal appeal to women as well, they have potentially doubled their market size. And, of course, it works in reverse as well. They may think they have a product that both men and women will enjoy, and sadly find that only men are interested in it.

With paid online surveys, both the company and the user win.  If you’re a user, the key thing is to get on the right notification lists so you’ll be aware of the online surveys that are available.

Even public transport operators who already use passenger surveys may not fully appreciate the multiple benefits that surveys can bring. Gathering market research is only one use for surveys, a second is the ability to measure the effectiveness of new initiatives as they are introduced and a third is to help promote the new initiatives to the customers.

 

Establishing a Starting Point

When embarking on any change management programme it is always good practice to establish a base line before any changes are made. This baseline survey can serve four purposes, it will:-

• allow the proper targeting of investment
• allow measurement of the effect of change
• assist in the moral of those implementing change
• ensure that new issues are kept separate from the original plan and budget

 

Targeting Investment

There are many areas of any public transport system that can cause passenger dissatisfaction all of which need to be monitored to ensure that the service being provided meets, and where possible, exceeds, performance level targets.

Issues that can be of concern to passenger include:-

• safety and security
• punctuality
• fares and ticket types
• capacity and overcrowding
• quality and design of vehicle
• cleanliness
• facilities at stations and terminals
• facilities for passengers with disabilities

Often limited resources and budgets means that investment needs to be carefully planned and properly targeted.

Passenger surveys allow operators to identify those areas that are of most concern to their customers. By analyzing passenger feedback operators can confirm that their improvement and investment plans are in tune with the passenger demands and concerns. Issues can be classified into high and low priority, as well as long and short term plans.

Major capital investment such as the building of infrastructure for example new terminals, runways, laying new track or upgrading air traffic control or rail signalling equipment may take many years to implement. However, the initial survey may identify some high profile areas where a solution to the raised problems can be implemented almost immediately.

 

Measuring Change

From having established a comprehensive programme from an initial survey the objectives for running periodic surveys are twofold.

One aim will be to verify that passenger concerns have been properly addressed by any of the changes and initiatives that are implemented. A second objective will be to promote and advertise the initiatives that have been implemented and also inform and educate passengers of ongoing improvements and future plans.

Passengers will hopefully be more positive when they can see that improvements have been made and if they know that problems have been recognised and are in the process of being addressed they can be more accepting of the outstanding problems.

 

Keeping Moral

Those implementing change can often develop a siege mentality. It can take time for changes to take effect and for any improvements to be noticed by the passengers.

By canvassing passenger opinion and measuring the results against earlier surveys a successful change programme should see passenger issues change over time, some issues that were problems will no longer be raised.

Those tasked with implementing change and making improvements can become very demoralised as suffering passengers are slow to appreciate the efforts that are being made and are therefore negative in their comments. It is essential that a team implementing change can see clearly the effects of their efforts.

 

Identifying New and Old

In any long term change management programme issues can change over time. The situation can change instantly so that due to an event what was important, is no longer important and what wasn’t an issue, is suddenly an issue.

Having a survey that will act as a baseline will make sure that the passengers concerns can be chronologically documented. Passengers are themselves an evolving group, individual travel arrangements change, fashion changes, life styles develop along with technology. Periodic surveys will ensure that any changes in passenger attitudes are monitored.

 

Online Surveys Make It Easy

Online surveys can reach a broad cross section of any travelling public. They are quick to design and implement and they provide feedback in a format that is ready for detailed analysis. A main features of online surveys is their low cost and flexibility that allows operators to publish multiple surveys that will target individual groups who may have specific concerns.

Not only will online passenger surveys make it easy to collect important market research data it will also deliver a message to the passengers that the operator has a genuine commitment to securing positive passenger satisfaction.

Passengers benefit by having an effective channel to raise issues and through periodic surveys will begin to appreciate that the operator is continually investing and improving the service. The following are links to samples of Passenger Surveys

Sample Passenger Survey for an Airline Carrier: Airline Passenger Survey

Passenger Survey for a Train Operator: Train Operator Passenger Survey

Sample Passenger Survey for a Bus Operator: Bus Operator Passenger Survey

If a business strives to become more streamlined and productive there needs to be acknowledgement that such efforts may not bare any fruit if the results of their initiatives cause among the workforce widespread dissatisfaction and a high turnover of staff. Organizations that have a highly motivated workforce can benefit enormously and having a workforce that is both productive and motivated should not be regarded as being mutually exclusive to one another.

Left unattended employers run the risk of alienating their employees, events can cause employee frustrations to boil over resulting in employers finding themselves on the back foot, faced with a problem that cannot be ignored.

Ideally employers would take time to understand the needs of their employees and learn from their experiences of working on the front line, but employers are often themselves tied up day to day fighting their own fires.

By automating much of the intelligence gathering process and providing the findings in a format that can be readily analysed online surveys provide employers with an efficient, effective and low cost method to help achieve a pleasant working environment, where staff satisfaction and productivity is high.

 

Unproductive & dissatisfied

There are a plethora of reasons why employees may become dissatisfied with their job that can result in them channelling their frustrations into demands for higher salaries and reduced hours. Managers who tackle problems thinking it is all about salary and hours, will often find later that they have been dealing with the symptoms and not the root cause.

 

It’s not just about the money

The following are common barriers to achieving productivity, none of which are likely to be resolved by increasing salaries or reducing hours:-

• Insufficient training
• Out of touch management
• Dated working methods
• Lack of proper tools and equipment

Paying higher salaries is not always a solution to an employee’s problems nor as many studies have revealed is it the most important motivator for employees.

Take the case of a single mother who is juggling a full time job with the need to look after four children. Out of frustration she may demand more money so that she feels that she is able to cope where a better solution, for both her and the business, may be more flexible working hours.

 

It is about communication

It is important for any organization to encourage communication. A company where the management does not communicate well with their employees, or will wait for any problems to be raised, can often be deceived into thinking that they have a content workforce when they don’t. It can very easily start with a small problem and one aggrieved employee for the problem to escalate to involve an entire workforce and generate a ‘them and us’ attitude.

 

Improving communication

Ideally management would hold one to one meetings with each employee but in practice this would only seem practical for very small businesses.

Regular meetings between management and worker representatives are good in theory but can degenerate into talking shops and slowly lose their purpose as the participants from both sides become familiar with one another and the meetings run the risk of being hijacked by the more extreme personalities.

Having suggestion boxes are useful but can be viewed as token efforts by management as they wait for personnel to highlight a problem.

Newsletters can be useful, but their main purpose is generally to inform and not discuss issues.

 

Keeping the initiative

An employee satisfaction survey run on a regular basis is able to ask each employee specific questions and represents a pro-active management initiative where the whole workforce can be consulted on various issues. Surveys are able to provide a level playing field between the quieter and more vocal employees.

Consultation should not be seen as a sign of weakness, a confident manager will take counsel from all quarters before making a decision. By issuing a survey the employer is able to keep the initiative and tackle problems from a position of strength as opposed to waiting for problems to manifest and then possibly develop out of proportion.

Leave lots of minor problems unresolved and a further small problem might just break the camel’s back and in a blink of an eye change the mood of the workforce from positive to negative.

 

It’s easy and quick

For most organizations online surveys represent a proactive and low cost solution. For the majority of organizations where most of the personnel have desktop computers making online surveys quick to design and quick to deploy direct to the individual.

Where not all of the personal have access to a computer there are various options available that will allow you to accommodate their responses such as providing a shared computer, conducting telephone surveys or as a last resort, a hardcopy survey where the hard-copy responses can be added to those who competed the survey online.

 

Job satisfaction

There are many elements that go towards providing an employee with job satisfaction, from the working environment, working methodology, working ethos, company ethics to having good and effective management. Job satisfaction brings benefits through improved productivity and motivation from a workforce that feels that they are treated as individuals and not a commodity item.

 

Inform and educate

A less appreciated benefit of online surveys is that they can be used effectively to educate and deliver important information to the workforce, ensuring that the ‘message’ is delivered consistently and does not become corrupted as it is passed down the line.

An online survey can explain to the employees a difficult situation and get valuable feedback as to the best solution. It is rare in this situation that the workforce would appear negative; it is more likely they will feel informed and empowered and that might be enough to unite the workforce and turn a negative problem into a positive challenge.

 

Exit surveys

Exit surveys are a method for management to confirm that when people leave the organisation they are leaving for valid reasons and not for reasons that if appreciated earlier could have been addressed and possibly resolved. If a problem has been identified it may be too late to prevent an individual from leaving but if addressed it could prevent other key personnel leaving for the same reasons.

 

Analysing the results

After having consulted with the workforce using an online survey the survey results are available for instant analysis. Common and specific problems can be identified and the senior management informed who then will have the chance to address the issues that have been raised.

 

Summary

Used regularly online surveys represent a simple and productive method of taking the pulse of an organisation and an easy way to establish a two way communication channel between employer and employee with the results providing management with vital, accurate and significant information.

For a Sample Employee Satisfaction Survey:- Employee Satisfaction Survey

For a sample Employee Exit survey:- Employee Exit Survey