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Young Professionals
REALTOR® Emeritus | |  Tips for Writing Better Surveys | | ||
|  Setting Marketing Strategies Creating Your Market Identity Planning Your Advertising Coordinating Company and Salesperson Marketing Developing Public Relations Strategies Enhancing Customer Service | A professional market researcher is the easiest route to surveying clients and prospects, but if you choose to create your own survey, keep these suggestions in mind.
Avoid Common Survey Mistakes The quality of the information you gather from your survey depends on the quality of the survey itself. Mary Ann Gordon McDaniel, former vice president, associate research director for Leo Burnett Company, tells how to avoid some of the most common pitfalls of survey writing. Q:What is the most serious mistake people make when writing a survey? A: Many people don’t put enough upfront thought into their surveys. Before you start writing, think through exactly what you want your survey to accomplish. Keep your goals simple. Define several marketing or customer service key issues and identify exactly what information you must have to address those issues. There’s a big difference between what you want to know and what you need to know. Focus your questions on what you need to know to develop your marketing plan or improve your customer service, no more. It’s easy to get sidetracked, but if your questions wander, your results will suffer. Q: In what ways will the results suffer? A: When surveys don’t stick to the point, they tend to get long and boring. The people who receive such surveys often either throw them in the trash or reply quickly, without giving their answers much thought. They’re reacting to another common mistake, which is that survey writers sometimes forget that the people taking their surveys are only human. If survey writers don’t respect their respondents’ time and intelligence, the respondents can get irritated, cranky, and downright hostile. In such cases, they may purposely give false or misleading answers or refuse to answer at all. Q: How can I make sure my survey communicates respect for my respondents? A: First, show respect for your respondents’ time by keeping your survey brief. A mail survey should fit on a postcard or a single sheet of paper. If your survey is longer than that, scale back your priorities, and throw out all nonessential questions. You can always send a survey on another topic later. Save your respondents more time by making your questions easy to answer. For example, use multiple-choice questions and checklists instead of asking open-ended questions that require people to write their own responses. Second, show respect for your respondents’ intelligence by making sure your questions are well written and follow a logical sequence. Ask the most important questions first, and move from the general to the specific. For example, first ask “Overall, what services are the most important to you in choosing a real estate company?” and offer a range of possible answers. Then ask “How important is each of the following services to you?” and list specifics, such as “Provides mortgage advice.” and “Helps us get the best price.” 10 Questions to Ask Prospective Customers > | |