Wednesday, February 17th, 2010 at 11:43 am

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Well if you look at it’s antonym (it’s opposite) you find the word “amateur.”

How many businesses have you worked with that could be considered amateur?  Hmmm… wrong line of questioning maybe….  What do you deem to be professional in business and what do you deem to be amateur?  And who gets to decide?  An umbrella group or association?  Some kitemark that proves professionalism to the public?

The reason I ponder the question is because of the proportion of services we deliver to the “professional” services sector.  We’re talking with law firms, accountants and ifa’s most days of the week.

And if I can be allowed (well it’s my blog so I think i’ll brave it), the professional services sector seem almost obsessed in being professional at all cost.  We discuss business with them, we talk about how they think clients view them ahead of undertaking a feedback exercise.  More importantly we ask them what they WANT to be viewed as.  And 80% of the time (unscientific but accurate) the first word that passes the lips is……

Professional

My perception (and coming from a professional services background I’m qualified to say this) is that professional is a bit of a nondescript word.  It’s a bit like “satisfied” a bit like “ok”…. it hardly gets you excited about things does it?  It doesn’t say go-ahead, it doesn’t say proactive and it definately doesn’t say dynamic.

Accountancy, law and financial services to the outside world are seen as dull. So consider this…. how are you going about showing that your firm isn’t dull?  And what vision does “professional” conjure in your mind?

Is there a pin stripe suit in that vision?  A small meeting room with pencil pot, branded paper pad, telephone and insipid wallpaper that’s neutral so it doesn’t offend anyone?  A standard Ikea type table, royal blue chairs, beige/ grey/ bland carpet.  Do you imagine the bowler hatted people that used to mark the Bradford & Bingley logo?  Is the temperature you feel a little chilly, the air a little dry?  Do you feel comfortable thinking about that situation?  Is it one you relish being in?

Have you been offered a drink?  Out of a machine?  Is the cup a plastic one even fine china, maybe royal doulton, maybe a denby mug? 

You may see all this as an exaggeration of one end of the professional services spectrum, but it’s more common than you might think.

The true reality is that most accountants are professional.  As are solicitors, as are financial advisers.

So if that’s the case…. what sets them apart?  Why do people buy from an IFA, lawyer or accountant as opposed to another?  Apathy or recommendation.  And because the bar is set quite low, these professional services organisations meet the standard.  Don’t surpass, simply meet.

We’ve never met someone who wasn’t technically able.  Or someone who wasn’t too bright.  But we have struggled to meet someone in the professional services sector who stands out radically from the crowd.

Our challenge if you’re in the professional services sector.  Be different.  Dare.  Ask your clients what they really want… blank canvas.  And be prepared to stand out from the crowd.

Professional may be the traditional standard term for the industry… but is it still relevant in 2010?

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Monday, February 8th, 2010 at 8:56 am

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We don’t mean have businesses brought in Phil, Kirstie and the Beeney woman (what happened to her?) as they slip down the pecking order at C4.

Think about this.  Go back just over a year.  Let’s start the page on 1st January 2009.  The new year’s in, the end of 2008 was filled of uncertainty, the UK is now in recession for the first time in 17 odd years.  Worrying times.  We spoke to businesses across a variety of sectors and the mood was one of doom and gloom.  We spoke to accountants and they were fearful for their client bases and their own potentially dwindling revenues.  Remember how it was?

Pay squeezed, investment held.

Fast forward to the present day.  Now looking back…. what did you cut?  Marketing?  Training?  They are the usuals.

We have a theory.  We think UK plc took up DIY.  Not with a hammer and spirit level but shifting from an outsourcing mentality, to bringing things back in house.  Finding a cheaper way to do the things they feel they needed to do, while taking a blunt axe to those things that weren’t essential.

Our marketing contacts weren’t very busy, our accounting and legal contacts weren’t as busy as usual.  Builders and tradesman starting to twiddle thumbs more.

All because we were collectively squeezing profit out of the equation and doing things ourselves.

Ask yourself why social media was so popular in 2009.  Was it because everyone was generating oodles of new business?  Was it because every twitterer couldn’t get enough money earned from this new marketing space?

Or was it because the activity was deemed to be free?

After all…. can’t anyone type ramblings (well judging by my tweets and blogs yes!!!)… can’t anyone put their details in LinkedIn?  So all of a sudden UK plc tightened it’s belt by doing things on the cheap.  DIY websites (CMS), DIY marketing (social media), DIY training (or maybe that was none at all), DIY business advice and internally driven change (aside from distressed change).

Our question in all this.  Is going down the DIY route the best?  How wide is the skills gap when compared to PSTDIFY (Pay Someone To Do It For You!)?

We’ve seen it in our sector too.

Just the other day, mentioning no names but you know who you are!?!?!  One of our contacts gave us a call.  Just a simple catch up call.  They’d been quiet for almost a year after we’d asked them for some information.

The nutshell….. they had gone and DIY’d a survey.  Not an online one.  Not a paper one.  A telephone one.

A girl internally (with a business or research background I wonder?) had been charged with ringing clients.  Now…. in our experience, if there is anything that is highly skilled, it’s speaking with business owners who are fretting about their business future!

So picture the scene, business owner sat at their desk.  The phone rings.  They answer it because it’s from a supplier.  And then they are asked a range of questions.

We don’t want to tar everyone with the same brush here…. and please don’t think less of us for saying this.  But do you always tell the truth?  Not in a bad way… but in a way that sort of helps people and doesn’t hurt or upset them?

So if a girl from a supplier calls you and asks how things are… there’s a better than average chance you might slightly pass over the slow service you had the other week, or that prices went up or quality diminished or that you never hear from them other than when they are trying to sell you something.

There’s a place for telephone interviews.  The danger of DIY though is the effect of ignorance.  You can lead without realising.  You can coerce without realising.  And as a result, you can find out nothing of value…. without realising.

The more personal you make a feedback exercise, the more in danger you are of glossing over the truth.  It’s essential to find out the bad stuff so you can fix it.

Finally, consider this.  If you do it yourself, you save cost.  Other than the labour you use and any allocation of fixed costs and obviously the costs directly associated with the exercise, phone, print and so on.  However…. are these costs that you might save worth more than the loss of value, missed opportunity and failed understanding by asking the wrong questions, in the wrong order with an influencing tone of voice?

The clients who are too nice to tell you the truth,  the contacts who are influenced to give you a positive answer and therefore distort the results…. and maybe the lost opportunities to generate new ideas and maybe some new business leads.  

Is it time for business to start shifting away from DIY and adding value again, instead of saving cost?

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Saturday, January 30th, 2010 at 12:43 pm

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The time was ticking past 10pm, the networking event winding down and then from left field a suggestion that surprised me.

Quote

“Online surveys have only got 2-3 years left so make the most of it”

So taking that line of thought, I asked why, thought about it some more and came up with a conclusion.

And that conclusion for those of you interested…. rubbish!  Hmm was that too subtle?  No?…. Good…. So, why do I think that?

Let’s look at the sectors that influence online surveys.  Research and technology.

Research is a mature sector.  Technology is evolving at break neck speed and changes are occurring every day.

Now let’s consider information and knowledge.  Is there a chance that in say 3 years time, society will lose its thirst for knowledge?  Is it likely business leaders will stop undertaking research ahead of fundamental business change or merger and acquisition activity?  Is it likely companies launching new products and services will do so without a research project?  No.  If anything, we can perceive this becoming more of a crucial aspect of business to ensure company directors are protected from stakeholders as legislation changes and evolves. 

None of us know the future with certainty but if we look back 3 years, maybe that could provide an inkling of insight.  3 years ago… where was the iphone or its smart phone counterparts?  What version of internet explorer were we running? And how intuitive and accurate was google?

Smart phones, web browsers and search engines all utilise information.  Some entered, some interrogated.  Three years ago information was crucial.  Today information is crucial.  In three years time information will still be crucial.

If we go back further to the start of the internet.  Consider the dotcom bubble.  Technology has evolved incredibly in that time, and it would be naive to say that online research will stay static. 

As humans we naturally want to learn, to know, to understand.  And surveying is a vital way to do that.

Will the survey market be the same as it is today?  I would hope not.  My hope is the seedier side of “research” is exposed for what it is (data reselling of personal information) and that technologies improve and allow a more intuitive mechanism for canvassing opinion.

The questions I would pose to our online surveying counterparts.  How are you going to remain relevant in a market that burgeons with cheap or free solutions that show no desire to gain information of value?  And by value I don’t mean in monetary terms.

How will you capture information safely and share it in a method that assists, analyses and translates into knowledge? 

And how will you demonstrate the value of sharing opinion to participants and encouraging uptake in surveys once society understands the downsides to financial inducement?

We believe our collective quest should be to harmonise with companies and individuals.  Not interrogate and pester.  Not to negatively impact on an individuals activities.  But instead to run alongside them.  Provide honest choices and options and ensure our views aren’t impressed upon others.

And if we’re waving a magic wand now…. in three years time I’d love web surveys that pop up before I’ve had chance to look at the site itself to explode!!!  Seriously… how annoying are they???  Maybe we should look at creating a web tool that smashes web pop up surveys… hmmm, that’s a thought!  Sorry… a very swift soliloquy.

As with all sectors, all industries and all businesses of varying shapes and sizes…. our industry will evolve.  It’s a relatively new addition to a mature market.  We hope we’re not alone amongst our peers in driving that evolution to be moral, ethical and innovative.

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Monday, January 25th, 2010 at 9:53 am

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We receive or are forwarded around a dozen online survey links a week, so it’s fair to say we see a wide variety of surveys and can make a solid judgement as to how we compare.

One of the main distinctions we see is how they look.  The design, the visual, the brand and identity.

We can’t believe that online survey products can look as bad as they do.  Let me give you an example.

Just last week we picked up an online survey link through Twitter asking us to take part in a survey relating to financial services.  Nothing wrong with that.  We followed the URL link and there in glorious bogey green (sorry but there really is no other way to describe it) was the survey.

For once we’ll ignore the content, instead we’ll focus purely on how it looks.

Firstly.  No brand identity.  None at all.  Just an awful shade of green.  And a darker shade of green on a top menu asking you to exit the online survey if you wish.

Black text.  All in arial.  Fine.  But nothing inspiring.

The text and headers all stretched across the page making it quite hard to follow the options and the questions on the page went on and on and on.  We’ve found people taking part in surveys prefer the questions to fit the length of a page as near as possible and then click to the next page.

And finally a simple microsoft grey “done” box with a mismatched font to the body text.

So why do we think that’s not good enough?

Firstly…. if you were writing to a client…. would you run off a black and white photocopy of your letter head … maybe on tracing paper or something equally random?  Would you be happy for the printer to be skewed so the printout is wonky or smudged?  Would you be happy if the page clipped the margins or ran on through the footer?

We hope not.  We all want our impressions to be good in the eyes of those who see us.  We want our letters to be accurate and professional.  We want e-mails to be spellchecked.  We want our brochures to be glossy and in our brand imagery.  All in all, we don’t want people thinking less of us.

So why….. I mean really, think about this….. why…. is it acceptable to send an online survey communication to hundred’s if not thousands of people that looks as bad as the letter example above?

The simple answer is “it isn’t” and the reason some people do is due to a lack of awareness of alternatives mixed with the fact many people just don’t think about the key issues before pressing the button to send a survey.

This is what we put at the heart of designing a survey template for a client at Clarity.

Firstly…. who’s the survey for?  Is it a young audience, an old audience, do they know you, or is it a new group of people?  All of these things impact on the structure of the survey and how we make it look.  Think about font size alone.

Secondly…. whitelabel (we use this when the client feels their presence would distort true results and opinions) or brand as the client?  If it’s the latter we ensure the survey is as good as (and in some cases better than) their website.  We look at their materials that clients would see and we wash that through the survey.

And we’re not talking a simple logo in a top corner.  We integrate images, logo’s, borders, font types, symbols, buttons, shading, spacing and everything needed to make the design the best it can possibly be.  Our client survey templates take around a day to put together (and once we’ve built the design template for a client, we don’t have to incur that investment again).

Imagine this.  Your biggest client clicks on the link and see’s a bogey green background.  No mention of your company.  The survey design doesn’t fit with your brand identity they are used to.  The survey language doesn’t fit the tone of the discussions they’ve experienced with you face to face.

You could easily forgive them for thinking it was spam or a phishing survey couldn’t you?  So what impact would that have?

Twofold.  A drop in survey response rate.  A drop in perception of your brand image and potentially professionalism.

So the next time you think about running a survey, pause, think it through and consider the following point…..

Would sending this survey create a more negative perception than it would positive?

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Thursday, January 14th, 2010 at 5:30 pm

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We saw in the headlines today that one of the countries leading Think Tanks (NIESR) believes the UK will officially exist recession when the next quarter figures are released predicting a 0.3% level of GDP growth.

Our London Business Survey (Autumn) 2009 gave us an insight that business confidence was growing, which seems to be mirrored by the think tank.

But with recession no longer a cloud over the whole economy, what’s the route forward for businesses?  What strategies will prove most effective and is everyone really going to feel rosily confident and let the wash of money swill into the far corners of the economy?  Doubtful.

Let’s run this past you.  How good are you at service?  That ethereal “thing” that is so hard to describe and quantify and as a result often slips between the cracks in business.  So often it’s considered and is seen as a top ambition for a business, but is it truly delivered?

Are you going to place an emphasis on improving the way you do business and how your competitors, employees, customers and contacts see you?  Are you seen as innovative and open minded?  Stuffy?  Old fashioned?  Condascending?  Closed minded?  Are you missing opportunities because of how you are perceived in your market place which you don’t yet realise?

Is your website open and welcoming?  Do you have a consistent tone from face to face meetings to e-mail communications?

Or really….. when push comes to shove, do you think service doesn’t add anything to the mix and could never have the benefit of adding sales and profits to your company?

We believe (and you may or may not agree with us) that service is perhaps the most important factor that will facilitate business growth in 2010.

Now is the time to grasp the nettle.  Look at what you do.  Ask the questions of your customers (they are the only ones who really know how good or bad you are).  And proactively take that customer insight and embed it into your growth strategies.  It’s much less costly to retain your customers and have them come back more frequently than it is to constantly market to replenish your customer base due to attrition.

It’s also less wasteful to change the things your customers don’t like instead of changing things blindly in the hope that your customers will benefit from the changes.  Listen to your customers, change the things they want changing, focus on service and communication and look for word of mouth driven new business.  The power of referral works so much better if it’s backed up with excellent service.

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Monday, January 11th, 2010 at 6:21 pm

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I had a different topic all worked out and then a different thread emerged.

I’ve just been sent a digest from a Chamber of Commerce and one of the links was for a survey to assess the views of apprenticeships.  Now I hope you’ll forgive me… but I’m sure you do this too when encountering exposure to a competitor.  Yes….. I clicked on the survey link for a nosey.

My thoughts….. well it wasn’t visually very stimulating.  Rendered poorly (it was a Populus survey by the way) in the web browser.  It didn’t have a welcome.  And my biggest bugbear, it only had one question per page making it feel like an epic time consuming survey.  Actually, my biggest fault with it was it asking me for lots of company information before I got into the swing of it.  The first 2 questions before I dropped out were,  how many employee’s my company had and what region the HQ was.

The sweetener they used was a free ipod draw.  Now if there is 1 ipod and say 300 responses your chances are slender.  So they get your data, get your e-mail address (populus often ask for e-mail addresses… and how can they send you the ipod if you win otherwise?).  I just thought it was a shame.  We prefer to ask the questions for views and opinions and then if we need to analyse the information on say company size or gender or demographic, we ask that at the end and are open about it.

Anyway, I digress….. Why do people take part in online surveys?

Are we naive in thinking truth, fairness, honesty and accuracy and sharing what people think are enough?  Do people really want to be rewarded financially or with a prize draw to give some information?

Do you only take part in topics that have or may directly affect you?  Do you care what the results are?  Do you take part if at work or at home?  Is it dependent on day of the week, time of day, the season and whether its sunny or a snow drift?

We’re just curious….. so come on….. what makes you click on a survey link?

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Friday, January 8th, 2010 at 8:41 am

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I’m often surprised at the reaction I get when talking to people about some of the practices that go on out there in the big wide world.  Many people simply aren’t aware of what goes on in some quarters of the research world and how some companies derive their income.

First things first….. do a little search on the internet…. actually, no need,  I’ve just done a quick search and this is what you would find.  Using google and typing in “paid surveys“….. there are 4,120,000 results and just taking the top 3 links….

“Earn £3 per online survey”

“Get £4 for registering and take over £20 in surveys NOW”

“We reward you for taking part in surveys.  Earn upto £50/survey”

All very enticing.  At a time when many people are struggling in the current economic climate you could certainly see why taking part in a paid survey may appeal.  And who am I to say someone shouldn’t earn a few pounds here and there for sharing an opinion?

Well let me lift the lid.

Ask yourself this.  How can a company afford to pay individuals upto £50 per survey?  Let’s say they receive 100 responses to a survey.  That’s an outlay of £5,000, or a typical response level for what are called “omnibus surveys” of say 2,000, thats £100,000 that it would cost the surveying company simply paying for responses.

We all know (or should do) that companies have to make a profit, so as that’s the case, the surveying company is receiving more money than it pays out from one or more source.

What happens in an “omnibus survey” is where companies club together and ask one or more questions and pay per question.  That’s one way some companies generate income. 

There are companies (and certainly be very careful with companies registered and operating outside of your own country that aren’t bound by your laws) that purely operate to groom data.  These are the ones you need to avoid.  And as in other industries, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

So let’s say there is a short survey, you see the details and think…. I’ll do that to get paid £10.  First you put in your details.  Name, age, gender, address, post code.  Some ask for income levels, partner details, if you own your home and much more.  Before you get too alarmed, it’s quite common to ask for that to profile the results into what are called social categories.

You get to the survey itself, and the questions are very broad.  Not linked together too well.  They seem more about spending habits and your retail patterns than about a view and opinion.

Once you have registered and taken part in the survey, those details are sold.  To anyone who will pay.  Often to data farms in India and Cuba in particular.  The more agencies the data is sold to, the more money they make, and the more money they make the happier they are.

But what’s the implication for you?  Phone calls, e-mails, letters, mailshots.  Some from high street names, some purely the seedier end of the spam chain.  Now if you are happy to receive lots of rubbish for £10 or so, don’t let us stop you.  We think it’s important people are aware of the distinction.

So how do you know which companies are using your details to profile results and which are capturing your details to sell over and over again?  

Reputation and size of the company isn’t even a guarantee.  Some of the largest companies have a variety of income streams, some of which come from selling data to agencies.  But here’s what we suggest you do.

First and foremost, if you’re being offered money or entry into a competition or some sort of sweetener to part with personal information, be wary.  If the survey is about your patterns rather than your opinions, be wary.

Search through the company details on their website.  Does it look bonafide?  Is it based in your country?  Does it state it complies with the market research code of conduct or data protection laws?  Does it have contact details and a legitimate office address?

In the survey itself look for opt outs or a survey that gives you the option to volunteer some details or to retain anonymity.  (And remember if you pass through a login portal and take part in a survey, your survey responses can be linked to your personal details.) 

The final point to make is whether you believe you will receive money from the paid survey.  We know several people who have taken part in surveys with a very large well established polling company and have never received a penny as promised.

Be careful out there.

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Wednesday, January 6th, 2010 at 1:12 pm

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It’s a new year and a new decade with new challenges awaiting all of us as the economy looks to recover and maintain a firmer footing.

And maybe I’m being a little naive here…. but as a new decade dawns, wouldn’t it be refreshing if there was more transparency and honesty washed through marketing in brands, both established and new?

Why the little ramble? Ok….. the weekend saw a trip to Kew Gardens (had brighter ideas with the temperature at -4!) and a lengthy spell on the District Line.

What caught my eye was an advertisement. You know the ones that sit either side of the tube route? There was a statement from plusnet (the broadband provider) stating that 8 out of 10 customers would recommend a friend to join plusnet.

Scrolling down to the details at the bottom it did indeed say that 79% of polled customers would refer a friend. The research had been independently done by uSwitch.

Now I don’t want to cast aspersions here. But a few things made me question this. Firstly….. don’t uSwitch generate money from clickthroughs and uptake of products?

So it doesn’t really make sense for uSwitch to go throwing about derogatory statistics that might lead to reduced clickthroughs on their price comparison site.

But I also wondered when this research had been undertaken. My ISP hadn’t contacted me to do a survey. So was this just a plusnet piece of research jointly put together by the two organisations?

The sad fact is…. I couldn’t tell. The main devotion was to the headline. 8 out of 10 ……

What if only 50 customers had been asked? Or it was positioned to people who have been with them for a month? Where was the research conducted, London, Sheffield, the whole of the UK?

Again, it was impossible to tell.  We always hope these pieces of work are done for the right reasons and show great service when it’s happening.  If we don’t know the detail though, how can we know for sure?

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Monday, December 14th, 2009 at 8:35 am

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In any given week, we receive around 15-20 requests to take part in online surveys. Many of those are DIY surveys often put together by someone whose been charged with the task of undertaking a customer survey or online research.

Now we could be all protective and keep our cards close to our chest…. but what’s the point of that? So here is a golden rule we believe anyone thinking about putting together a survey in the online environment should heed.

Listening?

Never…… ever… ever, ever, ever…. ask this question or a variation of it….

“Are you a customer of XYZ?”

Now in research circles it’s a pretty accepted convention to ask such questions. After all, it’s important to filter results based on a current customer and a lapsed one. We agree with that.

Look at it a different way though. What message does that give to an ex customer? They aren’t using your products or services anymore and they probably wonder why a survey is being sent to them. They may think you aren’t aware they have left you and it suggests your databases aren’t up to date at best.

Now the current customers. Our belief … if you are spending money with a company is that they should know you’re a customer. A feeling of resentment created right at the outset of a survey.

In the last 6 months alone we’ve seen the AA, Nectar (the loyalty card company) and Sheffield Chamber of Commerce all start online surveys with that approach. It’s not very impressive is it?

There are ways to make a much better impression.

Make sure your database is accurate before you run a survey. Run separate surveys for lapsed customers and current ones. And if you want to just run one survey, you can attach a piece of code in the survey invite that can differentiate a field…. such as customer or none customer.

So please…. if you’re going to send a customer survey, don’t start it by alienating the person you’ve convinced to click on the link. At best it may cost you a survey response, at worst you may just convince a previously loyal customer that you don’t care about them.

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Friday, December 11th, 2009 at 3:42 pm

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There I was.  Dragged to watch my girlfriend’s football team on ESPN in the local.  It was half time and then there it was on the plasma screen.

I looked once and scrunched my face in a puzzled expression.  Looked again and made sure it said what I thought and as my brain processed the information the next piece of small print appeared.

Now I can’t say I’m an expert on the latest facial creams for women (really… I’m not)…. but what I can tell you is how misleading the advert was when you looked at the small print (and how many people look at the small print research figures on television adverts?). 

Their claim. 89% of women had seen the benefit of blah blah cream in X number of days.  Ok… nothing wrong with that. 

Let me ask you this though.  How many people would you like to think took part in that research?  I mean this is a national television advert stating that 89% of women thought it more effective than their usual products.

A few hundred?  A few thousand? 

37

Just 37 women.  So with rounding, that 89% equates to a mere 33 women driving a national TV campaign.

Is that right?  Is that moral?  Is 33 a large enough population to be allowed to tell the nation that a product is so much better than it’s competitors?

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