Extend the Life of your Articles

April 3, 2010 by · 4 Comments 

Calling all writers and freelance journalists, editors and publishers. Give your copy a boost. Turn your articles into living pieces that spark measurable debate, get closer to your readers and engage their mind and soul – we’re talking revolution.

As it was in the beginning

Publishers have for many years relied on letters to get feedback from their readers and although email has opened up this method of communication it is still time consuming and difficult to monitor and process, and for the more popular articles, it is either a case of only a fraction of the received correspondence ever being used, or where online comments have been allowed, well written and good comments can be buried under poorly written and abusive comments.

As well as being an overhead for the publisher, to most people it is an unrewarding medium in terms of the amount of effort required and response received, just consider the number of letters that go unpublished and unread.

As it is now

New channels of communication have been created by the Internet and this in turn has created opportunities that allow us to challenge traditional methods. The Internet is now a mature technology, no longer the preserve of the new fad brigade but a technology that has been embraced by a global population, young and old alike and it allows us now to re-evaluate the way things are done. Newspapers, trade journals, periodicals and ezines now have the opportunity to change the mental process.

Readers like to have the opportunity to comment and traditionally they may have composed a letter or send an email or write a comment. Emails make communication easier but it still takes time to craft an email and time for the majority, is what they haven’t got.

The letters page, or a list of comments, although interesting, are often only a snapshot of views, or an endless unmanaged list of comments; a well crafted and well written letter on any given subject may hold the view of the majority, or the minority, but due to its free text form it is difficult, or near impossible, to measure.

As it should be

Now consider the advantages of linking articles to online surveys where as a publisher you will have the ability to obtain valuable readership feedback in a form that can be properly measured. Communicating with your readers is one thing but having a channel that allows your readers to effectively communicate with you is just as important.

Want a snapshot of opinion? How much did they like the article? Did the sentiments expressed in the article have the support of the audience or do the readers have a different view?

Now it’s easy

Historically surveys would have taken considerable effort to design and publish and altogether was a process too long winded and often reserved only for the niche and bigger topics.

However, using a hosted survey site surveys and questionnaires can be created and published via the Internet by anyone who has a pulse. Professional looking questionnaires and surveys created in minutes make the perfect complement to articles that prompt opinion and debate.

The advantage online surveys have over letters, e-mails and comments are that feedback can be properly managed and measured and online survey websites furnish you with polls and real time charts that you can either keep private or share.

Linking articles to online surveys will not only extend the life of the article but will involve your readers in the discussion and in a way where that they know that their opinion will be counted.

If you think they would rather send an email? – not a problem – just include the facility within the survey and get the best of both worlds.

It’s quick, low cost, and easy to do; it will empower and engage the reader, provide first class feedback and having established a communication channel you then have the opportunity to promote other related articles.

See for yourself and register your opinion of this article here:- Readership Feedback Survey

Informatio

Get Paid for Online Surveys

January 22, 2010 by · 3 Comments 

A great deal of business is being done over the Internet these days. People are making a lot of money there. Instant connectivity means that the whole world (well, maybe not ALL of it, but billions of people anyway…) are available to buy goods and services. The largest market is that for information. The Internet marketplace never sleeps. At any hour there are millions of people connected, most are looking for information; many will be looking for ways to buy and sell services and merchandise.

Most ways to make money on the Internet require preparation, special training and knowledge to get started. However, there are still a few exceptions to this rule. Routes to making money that practically anyone can use.

One of these exceptions is taking online surveys for cash and getting paid for your opinion.

You see, large companies spend billions of dollars on market research every year. They need to know what consumers prefer and why in order measure the effectiveness of their advertising, to develop new products and to improve the competitiveness of products they already produce.

To get this marketing info they hire professional market research experts. These market researchers use surveys to measure public opinion The fastest, most effective and most economical way to make surveys is over the Internet. By using the Net they can get answers in only a few hours, with no mailing cost! Now surveys are big business on the Net. There are literally thousands of surveys going out every week, on practically every topic you can imagine!

So with thousands of surveys going out, where in the world do they find people to actually fill out the forms and complete the surveys? Easy! They PAY them! They pay them enough to make it well worth their time to fill out their surveys! To find online surveys that pay you can check with guide companies who compile lists of the best paid surveys, companies like Express Paid Surveys and others like them do this very well.

That’s how, if you are a consumer (if you buy groceries, you are a consumer!) with sufficient tech skills to send and receive e-mails, you can make good money on the Internet. You can make money by taking paid surveys at home, using your computer on the internet!

by– David Fullman

Have You Sell On The Web

November 29, 2009 by · 4 Comments 

 

Take a moment to think about how you would really answer this question. If given enough thought just about any business owner who utilizes the Internet for any purpose will likely find that whether or not they intentionally organized an Internet marketing campaign, they may already be marketing their products and services on the Internet. This article will examine some subtle ways business owners may already be marketing their business on the Internet.

Do you participate in message boards and include a link to your website in your signature? Again business owners who answer yes to this question are already marketing their website online.

Do you include keywords which are relevant to your business in the content of your website? Business owners who answer yes to this question are also already marketing on the Internet by optimizing their website for these keywords. These search engine optimization (SEO) affects the websites whether or not they were even aware of the concept of keyword density and how it can help to SEO a website.

Are you ready to start being successful and start making money online? It might take a little while for you to get the project payday you’ve been looking for but as long as you’re a treasure trooper, you will be able to generate residual income soon enough.

Do you solicit feedback from your customers online? This is yet another example of how business owners may be accidentally marketing their business on the Internet. Most business owners realize the importance of soliciting feedback from customers for business purposes and business owners who offer products online might solicit feedback in the form of online surveys. Although the business owners may be doing this simply for a business purpose the fact that it is done online makes it fall into the category of Internet marketing.

The first step of an email marketing campaign should be creating an email distribution list. This article will discuss some popular options for doing this and should help to the reader to learn more about what is acceptable and what is not when it comes to email marketing.

One common way to gain a list of email addresses is to purchase a list from distributors. However, this method is not very effective at all and we do not recommend it. The problem with purchasing an email list if you have no way of knowing whether or not the members of the list would have any interest at all in your products or services. This is very important because while you want to reach a large audience with your email marketing you also want this audience to be members of your overall target audience. When you purchase an email list you may be sending your email messages to some users who might be interested but this is largely coincidental and is not likely to be well received because the message was not solicited.

Internet users are very quick to delete materials they believe to be spam without even opening or reading the emails. In fact some Internet service providers include spam filters which may automatically delete your emails if your messages are deemed to be spam.

 

Why Staff Satisfaction questionnaires and Exit questionnaires Make Good Sense

July 10, 2009 by · 4 Comments 

Organizations that implement a change management programme need to be careful that all the predicted efficiencies are not then negated by an abundance of dissatisfied employees suffering from low moral and excessive pressure. Organizations that have a highly motivated workforce can benefit enormously and having a workforce that is both motivated and productive should not be regarded as being mutually exclusive to one another.

When problems are left unresolved then there is a risk of companies alienating their employees leading to employee frustrations growing to a point where managers find that they are on the back foot with problems that just 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.

Online surveys can automate the intelligence gathering process allowing the collated data to be instantly analysed thereby providing the management with a low cost and effective method to help towards achieving a pleasant working environment with the aim of promoting employee satisfaction while still ensuring that productivity is high.

 

Dissatisfied & unproductive

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 these issues head on, making it all about salary and hours, will often find themselves dealing with the symptoms and not the root cause.

 

Not just about the money

The following are 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

Numerous studies have shown that salaries are rarely the most important priority for employees and providing an employer is paying a fair rate they would be fundamentally wrong to think that paying higher salaries is a panacea to all employee problems.

Take the case of a single mother who is juggling a full time job with the need to look after two 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.

 

Communication is what it is all about

It is in any company’s interest to establish good communications. An organization where the management do not communicate well with their employees, or will wait for problems to be raised, can often think that they have a content workforce when the reality is that they don’t. It can take only one small problem and one employee to feel aggrieved for an entire workforce to develop a destructive ‘them and us’ attitude.

 

Improving communication

It would be ideal if the employer could meet with each employee one on one but in practice this would only be viable for very small organizations.

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.

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

Newsletters can provide a positive contribution, but their purpose is generally to inform and not discuss employee issues.

 

Keeping the initiative

Conducting employee satisfaction surveys regularly you are able to ask each employee specific questions and presents 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 often take counsel from others 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.

Small problems left unresolved can lead to a minor problem breaking the camel’s back and the workforce mood change from positive to negative over night.

 

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, they are quick to design and deploy direct to the individual.

If there are situations where individuals do not have personal access to a computer there are still options available to using the online survey solution such as through the use of a shared computer, operator input or, as a last resort, a hardcopy survey.

 

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

An often overlooked benefit of online surveys is that they can be used to educate and pass on important information to the workforce, ensuring that the ‘message’ does not become corrupted as it is handed down by the phenomenon of Chinese whispers.

An online survey can explain to the employees a difficult situation and get useful 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. Identifying a problem may not be enough to prevent a person from leaving but it could lead to an unappreciated issue being resolved that may be all that is required to stop other key personnel from also deciding to leave.

 

For a Sample Employee Satisfaction Survey:- Employee Satisfaction Survey Template

For a sample Employee Exit survey:- Employee Exit Survey Template

Resume Software

Credit card Faq

June 10, 2009 by · 7 Comments 

The advent of technology has brought some remarkable presents, most of which spell ultimate convenience. Affairs that used to be finished with baffling manual labor can now be established with a elementary click of a mouse. What used to take a whole day can now be implemented immediately, thanks to cutting-edge technology.

One of the revolutionary technological advancements we see in today’s world is the use of the Internet. This has became so prevalent that you can access of almost any goods and functions that are presently available on our planet. In terms of finance, several of the most popular products that are widely browsed for are online credit card debt reduction

Applying for a credit card online is so smooth that even a beginner in the field of financeand computers would scarcely see any difficulties. The opening step is actually logging into the company’s site and completing an application, but we will get to that later as the more key step is the prep phase, which takes place even before you present an online application. Remember though do not borrow more than you can afford to pay back or you may be need to know how to negotiate with credit card companies

Before you sign on your life away, you must do the same steps as you would when applying for a standard credit card on a established paper application. You have read the conditions and conditions, try out the APR and the fees, look into the features and penalties, and ultimately determine whether this is the right product for you or not. Ask a professional for financial advice or read online surveys on diverse credit cards. These things can help you decide.

Moreover, you have to determine the viability of not simply the company to apply for, but for the specific offers themselves. It is not enough that it offers excellent deals, but it should also be responsible and respectable so you can be sure of excellent service.

What is an unsecured credit card compared to a secured one well the easy answer is they do not ask for any sort of financial guarantee from the customer. Even people who have a bad credit rating or previous financial problems may apply for one of these.

10 Reasons for Using Online Surveys to Market Products and Services

June 4, 2009 by · 1 Comment 

Your customers are tough and demanding. They’re extremely media aware and increasingly cynical – it’s a clever marketeer who can get under their skin. Online surveys reinvent the traditional format and offer a unique way of interaction – all the benefits of the internet without the programming. Here are ten reasons why they may be the silver bullet marketeers’ need, complete with examples supplied by Martin Day, managing director of online survey website Survey Galaxy – one of a new breed of websites making online surveys quicker and cheaper

1. It’s cheap as buttons
Select the right survey website and creating surveys can be free of any charge and the cost to publish is minimal.
Useful information derived from survey analysis can be reused and repackaged in other marketing and PR for use in press outlets making it a very efficient form of information gathering.

2. It’s extremely easy
Anyone can create, design and publish an online survey. Online surveys are quick and simple to create and design, no programming skills are required and when publishing completing the surveys is straight forward.

3. Deployment options
Once the survey is online it is a simple step to promote it the most popular methods being either through email (with a link enclosed) or via a link from a website. Once advised of the survey’s URL anyone can link can to the survey at a time that is convenient to them, 24×7.

4. We have an opinion – and we like to give it
The majority of customers do not view surveys as spam and will in fact welcome the opportunity to voice their opinion and have the chance to make an impact on a brand. They can be particularly good for change management projects; a survey asking a workforce on their opinion of change allows the key issues to be raised in a positive manner and encourages employee participation. Deliver a message to individuals and then have the feedback collated in a manageable form.

5. Get inside your respondents heads
With traditional advertising you can lead a customer to an advertisement but you can’t make them think. Surveys actively engage the respondent, who think about the question before giving their response.

6. Building relationships
It needn’t all end at the end of the survey – while you have the respondent’s attention and they are in the mood you can ask if they want to sign up for more information or a regular newsletter – making the most of the window of opportunity where you have their interest.

7. Link your survey to other online information
One of the most important benefits of a survey is the ability to make inspired or useful connections instantly to other areas. By including links within the survey to websites that offer detailed information you are able to maximise your marketing effort and reinforce the marketing message.

8. The soft sell
Surveys can associate a product with a number of positive attributes. By listing the many features of a product and asking the respondent how important they are, regardless of their response, the product will be associated with the features; if they are rated as important the positive impact is endorsed by the customer.

9. It’s not just about selling
A survey is an effective, quick and easy method to help promote and gain acceptance for a difficult proposal; such as a public body trying to gain acceptance and support for a particular scheme.
For example take a city trying to gain support from the general public for their bid to host a future Olympic Games. A survey can explain each benefit putting the respondent in a much better position to appreciate what the real advantages are that might just combat any negative headlines. Using the feedback that is received the overall marketing strategy can be fine tuned.

10. Fresh topics engage interest
By thinking laterally a lively and imaginative approach to surveys could provide a ‘hook’ to engage respondents. The survey subject can be aimed at a particular group on a subject close to theirs hearts. A survey’s marketing message can take the form of a simple brand awareness message by stating that the survey is being sponsored by brand name, or by finding a link from the subject matter to the product – something that is surprisingly easy and highly effective.

Attract traffic by providing a Public Survey section as many people who enjoy completing crosswords and doing word puzzles enjoy completing questionnaires. Having a public survey notice board as part of a website is a low cost and automated method that helps to increase traffic and establish a loyal and returning following. Unlike discussion boards there is no opportunity for people to disrupt the site by inappropriate remarks as the survey results are displayed in summary form enabling them to dispense with moderators and maintenance.

The majority of customers do not view surveys as spam and will welcome the opportunity to voice their opinion and have the chance to make an impact on a brand.

Many of the techniques and a few more are contained in the following sample survey created using Survey Galaxy’s survey software tool.

Thyroid Levels Online

You Can Earn Money Taking Online Surveys

January 20, 2009 by · 4 Comments 

Statistical surveys are used to collect quantitative information about items in a population. Surveys of human populations and institutions are common in political polling and government, health, social science and marketing research. A survey may focus on opinions or factual information depending on its purpose, and many surveys involve administering questions to individuals.

A paid or incentivized survey is a type of statistical survey where the participant is rewarded through an incentive program, generally entry into a sweepstakes program or a small cash reward, for completing one or more surveys.

A paid survey is used to collect quantitative information about the participants’ personal and economic habits set against their particular demographic. Incentivized surveys are considered to be more likely to catch a wider and more representative range of respondents compared to unincentivised surveys.

You’ve probably already had an experience where a company has phoned you up or stopped you in the street asking you to take part in a quick survey? Smart companies do this all the time, in fact they spend BILLIONS every year conducting this kind of research.

Why?

Its simple, they need to get the opinion of the people on the street, regular people like you and me so they don’t waste money on products and advertising campaigns that people don’t want!

More and more companies are turning to the internet to collect this essential research. And they’re willing to PAY YOU for your opinion! People in the know are taking advantage of this to easily earn money taking online surveys

If you can type your name and click a mouse, you can do it too!

If earning an easy part time extra income doesn’t interest you, how about learning some simple ways you can fool your friends and family performing mind blowing card tricks you can learn today?