Many business owners and managers know Constant Contact for its easy-to-use email marketing software and service. A lot of the newsletters and updates that I receive from other small businesses go out through Constant Contact. (We use Constant Contact for our weekly radio show newsletter, too.)
Just this week Constant Contact introduced a new service, an online survey tool. You can use it for conducting online surveys, including composing survey questions, gathering responses, and preparing reports of the survey responses.
One of the things that caught my attention is that Constant Contact has created 40 survey templates. A big barrier to conducting surveys is that unless you are a market researcher by trade, you probably don’t know where to start. I know that every time I’m creating a survey, I start out trying to compose 8 or 10 simple questions and two hours later I’m still at it. (What do you ask? How do you phrase the questions? Multiple choice or write-in answers? How many multiple choices? And so on.)
Having ready-made survey templates can cut down your time considerably. Even if you adjust the templates and change some of the questions, you’ll still be much further ahead.
Here is one such survey created by Constant Contact, called the Small Biz 7 survey. These are seven questions they suggest every small business should use to evaluate how well they know their customers:
1. How would you rate your overall satisfaction with us?
* Very satisfied
* Satisfied
* Neutral
* Dissatisfied
* Very dissatisfied2. How likely are you to recommend our products/service to others?
* Very likely
* Likely
* Neutral
* Unlikely
* Very unlikely3. When was the last time you purchased a product or service from us?
* Within the last month
* Between one month and 3 months
* Between 3 and 6 months
* Between 6 months and one year
* More than one year
* Never4. Please rate us on the following:
(Excellent, Good, Fair, Poor)* Customer service/support
* Quality of products/service
* Sales staff
* Price/value5. How likely are you to continue doing business with us?
* Very likely
* Likely
* Neutral
* Unlikely
* Very unlikely6. How long have you used our products/service?
* Fewer than 6 months
* Between 6 months and 1 year
* Between one year and 3 years
* Between 3 and 5 years
* More than 5 years
* Have not used7. Please suggest how we can improve our products/services to better serve you.
Go here for more about the Constant Contact Survey tool.