Survey Contest Winner
Today we announce the winner of our 2010 Productivity Series Survey Contest! So, without further ado, the prize goes to . . .
Congratulations LaTonya Keaton, winner of Slaughter Development’s 2010 Productivity Series Survey Contest. As promised LaTonya, for completing and submitting your survey within the allotted time frame you will receive a $50 Visa giftcard. Enjoy! To all who participated, thank you! We appreciate your efforts and hope to see you once again at future sessions. To view and read about the 2011 Productivity Series, check out the 2011 session calendar.
As many of us know and have experienced, the existence of surveys with prize incentives in business are commonplace. From restaurants to product reviews to presentations, we’ve seen them all. But are these bonuses a good idea? We want to know what you think. We encourage you to share your thoughts, whatever they may be, to get the conversation going.
Stay tuned to find out how Slaughter Development views these programs.
❖ ❖ ❖
Like this post? Here are some related entries from The Methodology Blog you might enjoy:
Read on »
February 1st, 2011 at 3:47 pm
Congrats to LaTonya!
Robby - let us know when the next contest will be!
February 1st, 2011 at 3:52 pm
Are incentives and prizes a good idea?
This is a loaded question. Some say it teaches people to look for discounts instead of choosing products based on the values of the brand, product or service.
I say that there are places where it does not belong, but I think it is a great idea. It’s a great way of getting the attention of people (hopefully if planned right, it is the correct people for your business).
It also often encourages people to share. Think of it this way, if everybody has motivation, than everyone has a reason to take action - because they have something to gain. Make sure to provide value to those that are responding, and use that new found marketing data to improve your product and message.
Finally, make sure that you provide value (case and point, the productivity series is a value add). This nurtures your potential clients, while you develop the connection between them and your brand.
February 1st, 2011 at 3:54 pm
I actually comment often when invited by a business. Most of the time with businesses where I am a regular customer. I hope by doing so the feedback will give me a better experience on the next visit. Incentives are nice but as long as the survey isn’t too long, I will usually fill one out when invited to do so. Of course, free gifts are always a welcome addition!
February 1st, 2011 at 3:57 pm
I’m the type that will do what I need to do without a bonus and I feel kind of silly to get them. I feel that I am “just doing my job”. On the other hand, we all work for money, really. Even if we love our job, we couldn’t afford to do it for free, so having an added incentive is helpful.
I try not to offer too many incentives to my clients, because I want them to want to work with me sinply because they feel that I am the best person for the job. I also know that I am worth what I get paid, and don’t need to reach into my own pocket to lure clients.
February 1st, 2011 at 4:04 pm
I absolutely think that surveys with prize incentives is a good idea. Furthermore, I think it is an imperative means to conducting surveys. Two reasons: 1) incentivizing can only encourage more participants, it doesn’t discourage. 2) if you were asked to rake a survey, which would you prefer? I’m of the opinion that in order to run a succesful survey campaign, prizes must be offered.
February 1st, 2011 at 4:05 pm
In my opinion, as long as you are measuring the outcome of people using, sharing, and distributing the survey… it makes sense. Just like anything in the marketing world… if you are not measuring the outcome or development of the tool… the tool doesn’t really matter.
February 1st, 2011 at 4:05 pm
There is a place and time for everything, especially in the marketing game.. When wanting to get the most out of customer response I think it’s a wise choice. Everyone wants something for free, there is a reason why that four letter F word works. However, I think it needs to be something that A) is of value to the consumers and B) is a survey, question or contest that the participants feel strongly about. Otherwise, they’re just being active in your giveaway and not in the survey or contest; which leads to answers that are less than truthful or downright dishonest, skewing the numbers and negating the reason for the contest or survey in the first place.
-John Cannon
http://www.MyCarDoc.com
February 1st, 2011 at 4:10 pm
Incentives are a good idea if your main goal is to increase your number of respondents. I think if you can inspire people to provide feedback without gift, you’re more likely to elicit unbiased results though.
February 1st, 2011 at 4:16 pm
As Chris H. suggested, I will do so without expectation of a “prize” when it’s a business I am a customer of or care about its success. However, if it’s for a business, product or something I don’t necessarily care about (yet), I may be more enticed to take MY time to respond if I might get something out of it in return.
Of course, for you — I will answer blog posts like this for free.
February 1st, 2011 at 4:20 pm
I think incentives and prizes are a great thing as long as follow-up is going on.
My daughter gets prizes and incentives for being an angel at school. I love it when I get bonuses from clients that I didn’t even ask for because we did so well on something. Surprises are great, and having something to work toward is great.
There’s nothing wrong with it. .. imho.
Congratulations to LaTonya!
February 1st, 2011 at 4:23 pm
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Daniel Herndon, Career Locator . Career Locator said: Survey Contest Winner: Today we announce the winner of our 2010 Productivity Series Survey Contest! So, without … http://bit.ly/gOGbeb [...]
February 1st, 2011 at 4:23 pm
I worked in retail for 10 years and know that all things being equal, the ones that are MOST likely to give feedback are the ones that typically have a bad experience. While you want to know about those for the sake of improving your business, it doesn’t give you a representative sampling of your customer base. Since we know that a bad experience is about 8 times more likely to elicit feedback, you need something to even the odds a little.
February 1st, 2011 at 4:23 pm
This is a very interesting topic, because I get offers of freebies many times each year in the work that I do, from tickets to free food to gift baskets. From Day One, though, we’ve had a written policy in our LLC charter that prohibits us from accepting any gifts of any kind, so that it will not influence us in any way or lead to favoritism in our event listings.
Even though we’ve never accepted a freebie from any venue found on our Web site, I can recite a list of every offer that has been made. Why? Those offers are in my head, whether or not we accepted them. Does that mean that psychologically we give preferential treatment to those companies who have offered such goodies? I certainly hope not.
But I can’t help but think that if an individual actually completed a restaurant survey, for example, and subsequently won a prize, that the result would certainly be advantageous for the donor in terms of word-of-mouth publicity, if nothing else. That’s an intangible, of course, but I would think that the recipient would certainly be grateful.
On the flip side, I’ve noticed that these surveys delve deeper and deeper into your personal business, sometimes even asking for your annual income, which frankly is none of their business. I’ve abandoned completing some surveys because of the nature of the personal questions asked, some of which were REQUIRED fields in particular surveys. Sometimes I’ve also balked at completing certain surveys simply because name and e-mail address were required fields. I understand that you have to have a name and a means of contact to notify the winner, but in a lot of cases it just seems like a marketing tool to build a database of e-mail addresses.
February 1st, 2011 at 4:24 pm
From my observations, I find the historical incentive programs only work for physical items and goods. I have not seen a successful coupon/groupon/discount/incentive program that matched or exceeded to rate of return for similar campaigns for hard goods. In the services industry, I have only seen ‘successful’ surveys as an after the fact or follow-up contact to ensure customer satisfaction with the service, qualities and value. However, if someone wishes to prove me wrong on this, please contact me, I’m sure we can work something out, using my brand/business as a test.
February 1st, 2011 at 4:29 pm
In this new economy, giving something for “Free” is key and it is how you master that tool will be a factor in your success in 2011 and beyond. I am working on some ideas to give away on several of my sites to build my email list, etc etc.
But, if the value or there is no follow-up behind the “free” don’t bother
Dave
February 1st, 2011 at 4:34 pm
Interesting question. I don’t think that offering a prize for survey completion is necessarily a problem. Depending on what kind of survey you’re conducting, it can even be necessary.
For instance, if you’re conducting a survey of your current customers or clients, they’ll probably be fairly likely to answer it, which reduces the need for a prize. However, if you’re trying to get a general survey from people who are not necessarily your customers, then a small prize can give a nice bump to your response rate. The prize that you gave, a $50 gift card, seems appropriate.
Disclaimer: While I do have some experience in survey creation, I make no claims about being an expert pollster.
February 1st, 2011 at 5:00 pm
I’ve been completing surveys and doing mystery type stuff for years. Most of the surveys I complete don’t have a guaranteed reward for them but there’s the idea that if I complete them it might pay off. For instance today I completed a couple of surveys for my last trip to Meijer with a chance to win $1000. Do I think it will happen, not waiting for it to, but would be great if it did.
I do believe that customer and general audience feedback is important and people should be willing to share their opinions without the promise of any type of reward. But there needs to be a balance to the understanding that feedback is important and therefore does have a value to the business requesting it.
Businesses and organizations need to make it easier to request and obtain feedback. If offering a reward to encourage that feedback helps get the information and data that’s needed, then I don’t see any problem with it at all.
February 1st, 2011 at 5:57 pm
Looking at it from a pure business perspective you have to have a measureable result to make it “a good idea”. Putting out incentives because you THINK it attracts business / makes people happy / etc… is different than actually measuring the impact the incentive is having. If you can measure it, then it becomes a simple math equation to figure out if it is a good idea for your business.
Now from a personal perspective…if you just like giving things away to make people happy then I think they are great! : )
February 1st, 2011 at 6:00 pm
Personally, I’m not too keen on the chance to win a prize. I would much rather complete a survey if I know there is a guaranteed ROI. For example, I’d be less likely to fill out a survey for a chance to win $500 as opposed to a survey where I will get 20% off my next order or a free menu item for completing the survey.
February 1st, 2011 at 6:08 pm
When a survey is foisted upon me by a waiter or waitress, I almost never fill out the survey, even when there is a chance for a prize. Its too pushy.
One drawback of winning a prize for filling out a survey is that the comments skew in a positive direction. I’ve caught myself being “too nice” when filling out a survey where I might win something.
February 1st, 2011 at 8:15 pm
This is a tough one. Those who study scientific research probably have a more educated answer about the validity of the data when you offer incentives, but that’s not what we’re discussing. I have mixed emotions. As others have said, I think it might skew the responses to include those who aren’t necessarily within your target audience because they just want to win a prize. I don’t know this to be true, but I think it could cause people to answer in a more positive tone if they knew they were trying to win something. Who would want to meet or interact with the company offering the prize after they had just talked about how terrible their product was, or that they had a bad experience…kind of awkward.
If you’re purely looking for a subjective focus group, with a variety of responses to help you build your cache of thoughts and perspectives, then I doubt it can hurt anything.
February 1st, 2011 at 8:16 pm
If you are a business and want your name in front of all my connections, the best way to accomplish this is to tell me that I have a shot at winning something. I LOVE contests. I am a huge competitor. I think that a lot of people are as well. If you have your marketing materials in order with a very concise message, you will catch the attention of myself and anyone else that is directed to vote or participate in your contest and you will have the opportunity to guide us into doing what you want us to do.. That may be downloading an app or whitepaper, signing up for your newsletter, following you on Twitter or Facebook, or sharing a deal with our network. All of which will either keep your message in front of us consistently or put your brand in front of an audience that may not have been aware of you beforehand.
Provide value, make it fun, and host regular contests to keep people coming back, and you will have a great chance at keeping me and my network engaged and growing loyalty to your brand.