Safety Consulting Corner

Surveys Part 2

Yesterday we talked about what might get someone to take a survey (or not). Why would you want to create and send out a survey in the first place? There are many reasons. One of the most important is to find out what your market wants or needs. If you don't ask them, how will you know? Once you have this valuable information, you can provide new products that provide true value to your clients and potential clients. You can also take a survey to see how you are doing. Are you doing a good job as a consultant, trainer, inspector, or any other role you fill? A survey can be a great way to solicit and get feedback. A survey can also be an aid when doing research and any research you do, even informal as with a survey, can also be used to issue White Papers, special reports and press releases and all of these can help to build your credibility. Never do a survey simply for the sake of doing a survey. You don't want to ask your clients and contacts to waste their time on anything. Surveys, when created and used with a specific goal in mind, can be a great help to your business.

And the Survey Says....

If you are of a certain age (like me), you probably know what game show this post's title refers to* but this post is not about game shows - it's about surveys. I have been asked to complete a survey at least 3 times in the past week and I have also asked subscribers of my free safety training ezine to partake in a survey. Since I rarely answer survey questions myself (I'll tell you why in a minute), I wanted to make sure my little survey would have a greater chance of success. Just this morning, I received a survey from a professional organization I belong to. The email headline said "Please help by taking our survey" and although I wouldn't generally click through, I did. I was faced with a full page full of questions with 5 different answers for each one. That was bad enough but I scrolled to the bottom of the page and saw that this was page 1 of 8! There was no way I was going to sit and answer 8 pages of questions. Only recently, I started to try to determine the length of the survey before starting one and this came after several other experiences where I would start a survey and after patiently answering a page of questions, come to find that there is another page - and then another page and more. Usually after page 2 or 3, I abandon the survey completely.
My ezine survey has only been active 4 days but I am pleased with the response rate. When I designed my survey, I wanted to make it short to encourage participation (it's only 5 questions) and I wanted to tell people up front how long it would take to complete it (5 minutes). I also wanted to thank them in some tangible way for giving me 5 minutes of their valuable time so I offered to give them 5 free gifts in exchange for their 5 minutes. So far, the response has been very positive. If you are planning a survey, first, think why you want to do one (more on that tomorrow) and then second, plan carefully so you get maximum participation.

*The game show was Family Feud

Hypnotic Writing

I have been busy reading Hypnotic Writing by Joe Vitale and it was great. You might wonder why a safety consultant would want to read this book. If you do any writing at all, then you could benefit from the techniques presented in this book. If you write content for web pages or sales letters, or any document where you want to sell your ideas, services or products, Hypnotic Writing can help you do it better. If you are picturing someone waving a watch in front of your face saying "You are getting sleepy" you have the wrong idea. Hypnotic writing is basically writing so people do what you want (but never for any unethical reasons) by using certain writing styles and words. Some of my favorite ideas in the book include:

*mental images create hypnotic writing
*the higher the cost of what you are selling, the more copy you will need
*website copy should include (in this order) - Promise, Proof, Price
*write as if you are writing it to a friend
*use a "sexy" format (see page 133 of the book)
*Key words for hypnotic headlines (see Chapter 45)

It is available at Amazon - click here. Read it now.

Get It Done!

If you are constantly floating in a sea of post-it notes reminding you of all of the things you have to get done, you might want to consider an online program for keeping those lists organized. Many of these let you email a new task directly to your online list so you don't have to worry about scribbling on that little post-it note again and taking it back to your coputer to enter to the online list. There are a variety of options out there - some free and some not - but most of them do the same basic thing with a few bells and whistles here and there. Check out the following options: (add it to your to-do list:)

Ta-da List
Todoist
Nozbe
voo2do
Vitalist
Remember the Milk
Toodledo
Listigator

If you prefer a non-technical aid to help you get your projects done, I would recommend a book that came out a few years ago called "Eat That Frog" by Brian Tracy. The main message that I got from that book is that you should do the worse part of a project or the thing on your to-do list that you are dreading - first. One of the best books I ever read on productivity was written for creative types (artists, writers, etc.) but it truly is a great "kick-in the-butt" type of book. It is called "The War of Art" by Steven Pressfield. Even though this book is written for artists, I highly recommend it for all consultants. It is quick read and should definitely be on your to-do list, whatever list you decide to use.