Online Survey - Paid or Free?

Online Survey - Paid or Free?

Let me begin this article by saying it is possible to complete an online survey and get paid for your opinion. It is a fact that thousands of work from home entrepreneurs are getting paid big time for completing surveys, participating in focus groups, and even to preview movie trailers!

Why would companies pay you for giving your opinion? Because they need your opinion as part of their market research to determine which products to sell and to what markets. It also helps them to improve their products to existing markets in order to improve their profit margin.

Now believe you me, the companies that pay you to complete an online survey are already making money, they just understand that doing a survey to find out what people like or dislike can make them even more profitable.

Here is where you and I come in; we fill out the online survey and get paid, we're happy and the company providing the survey gets the information they need. Win-Win! Don't you love it! (Especially the we get paid part)

The question now is how do I access these surveys and begin to make money? In order to receive offers to do an online survey or to participate in an online focus group you must be signed up and have a profile with each company. If you fit the right profile you will receive offers from them in your email.

There are hundreds of companies available but how do you find them, and how can you be sure you are not wasting your time? You must sign up with a service that will provide you with access to these companies or you will be spinning your wheels. You have 2 basic alternatives:

1. Free Online Paid Survey Websites

There are plenty of these sites available on the web that can be located by doing a google search. The problem with many of these sites is that they provide you with access to a database of companies that may or may not be updated. Furthermore they usually come with little or no support and guidance on how to maximize your profitability; after all you get what you pay for.

2. Online Survey Websites (fee based)

These sites charge a fee to access their compiled database of online survey companies. This is usually a one time fee of 30-35 dollars that covers access to a compiled and updated database, tips and or tutorials on how to turn your online survey venture into a profitable home business, and bonuses that are usually worth more than the access fee!

One of the top sites I have found providing this service can be found here at the below address:

http://www.singlesource4ebooks.com/online-survey.htm

They even provide you with an instant $25.00 survey upon joining their site just to get you started! I highly recommend you take a look at what they have to offer.

So there you have it, one mans opinion. Now you can do your own due diligence and check out which method will benefit you most. One thing is for sure; online surveys can be a profitable home business that will provide a very nice part time or full time income. Here's to our success.

Vincent Adams is a home business entrepreneur who specializes in creative programs for building online wealth. He started the blog, Online--Survey.Blogspot.com to provide information and tips on profiting from online surveys. He can be contacted through his survey blog or at vincent@singlesource4ebooks.com

Reactivate Lapsed Donors With A Direct Mail Fundraising Survey.

A proven way to reactivate lapsed donors is to ask them why they have stopped giving.

You can do this with a survey that you enclose in your mailing. Or you can leave space on the reply device for a few questions. According to Stephen Hitchcock, in his book, Open Immediately! Straight Talk on Direct Mail Fundraising, asking lapsed donors why they are no longer giving will generate some useful answers, and a sizeable percentage of the donors will mail back a gift.

You can use this new information to prevent other donors from lapsing. Review again the reasons that donors stop giving, found earlier in this handbook, to think up the kinds of questions you can ask in your survey to elicit each donor's reason for dropping support.

If you prefer, make the survey entirely qualitative, and ask questions that require original answers and not a simple checking off of a box on the survey form.

Whichever method of survey you employ, use the survey questions to discover the otherwise unknown--why your donors lapsed. Maybe the fault lies with you. Maybe it lies with the donor. Maybe the economy is at fault. You will never know unless you ask.

One advantage of a survey, if worded well, is that the questions themselves inspire the donor again to support your cause. Let's say, for example, that your organization lobbies the federal government to ban handguns. Your donors, even the ones who lapse, are people concerned about handgun violence to some degree. In your survey, you could include questions like these:

1. True of False? An average of five children are killed each day in gun-related accidents and suicides.

2. True of False? 40% of American households with children have guns.

3. True of False? A gun in the home is 22 times more likely to be used in an unintentional shooting, than to be used to injure or kill in self-defense.

As you can imagine, these survey questions are likely to provoke the same anger among decent, concerned lapsed donors that moved them to mail you their first and successive gifts. Survey questions like this prompt lapsed donors to contemplate your work again, thing again about who you help, and ponder the need you meet, and the role that the lapsed donor has in making the world a better place by giving again.

? 2006 Sharpe Copy Inc. You may reprint this article online and in print provided the links remain live and the content remains unaltered (including the "About the Author" message).

Alan Sharpe is a professional fundraising letter writer, instructor, coach, author and newsletter publisher who helps non-profit organizations to raise funds, build relationships and retain loyal donors using cost-effective, compelling, creative fundraising letters. Sign up for free weekly tips like this at http://www.RaiserSharpe.com

Does Size matter? - How many questions is too many in your online survey?

Surveys are all about collecting information. To get the right information you need to ask the right questions. While 'the right questions' is covered elsewhere, here I am going to discuss the number of questions as an aspect of design.

As with most things the answer is "it depends". However with online surveys a good rule is the fewer the better. How many times have we seen a great focussed survey get a poor response because every person in the approval chain has decided to add another question? The logic being that seeing we are asking people questions I would like to add just one more. This inevitably will be somewhat off topic and with each additional item the integrity of the survey dies a little death.

Rule 1 - Focus the survey! As soon as you wander, even slightly, the respondents will start to question why they are responding at all. I must say the most successful surveys are the 'front of mind' type topics with up to ten questions. The questions follow a logical progression to help the user think about the answers in a logical way. For example you may ask about? 1. what they thought the process was like before 2. did they feel involved in the problem identification process 3. did they feel all problems were identified 4. did the upgrade plan make sense to them 5. was there sufficient communications during the upgrade 6. did the new system live up to what they expected 7. What could have been done better Can you see how the questions followed a rational order, in this case time/process based?

Rule 2 - 10 minutes is an inconvenience, 15 minutes is an investment. When you ask users to respond to a survey you are asking them to spend some of their hard earned time for you. - What are they getting in return? For many surveys it is little if anything. Most people will spend up to 10 minutes out of charity. Anything over this and they will be expecting something in return. It may be as basic at a raffle ticket or as complex as a detailed analysis of their response against a broader population of respondents. Either way it needs to have value to them and be clear at the outset.

This brings me to my next point: No matter how long your survey is, there must be an introduction that states what is expected of the respondent and what they are going to get in return. This is usually put as how long the survey is expected to take (don't lie!) and what if anything they can expect in return. Eg. "?will take approximately 10 minutes and will help lead us to devise a system that works to your best interests."

Rule 3 - Trapped users don't care. We have all done these sorts of surveys, where you start and it seems to go on and on. You get lost as the questions seem to repeat and you are getting no closer to the end. In frustration you then start selecting the mid range response without really reading the question. Not I! I hear you saying. Can I tell you that statistics imply that this starts to happen to some extent after the first ten questions! With only limited investment users can quickly turn to prisoners looking for a way out ignoring you hard thought questions.

I want to make a last note here. A short survey is five questions of a multiple choice type, say radio button or checkbox. A long survey is only 20 questions. Think about why your respondents are investing the time. If you have come to the lower limit of your questions and you are still well over twenty, you might consider putting the more critical ones towards the front.

If you have any topics you would like covered please mail me at SteveWrightMail@gmail.com and I will include them in my growing list.

cheers Steve

Hi, after years of designing survyes I am collecting together some of the key lessons. http://surveysurvival.2leadership.com

Survey Determines Which MLM Companies Have Most Loyalty from Distributors...and Which is Actually the Best and Why

Hi, I am Gary Konigsberg of Los Angeles. I wanted to confirm that my chosen multilevel marketing opportunity was indeed the best of all the competitor internet and offline-based multilevel marketing opportunities before I gave it a full go at building it. So I decided to go to the top mlm online forums and survey the people there as to which companies had captured their loyalty and why.

I left the door open to be corrected in case anything truly exceptional came across his plate. The results of his postings at the top mlm forums can be found at the website in the resource box below. After taking a good look, I didn't find anything more exceptional near my "plate" than my healthy coffee opportunity.

After getting many answers in different locations I ams now more confident than ever that his healthy coffee business is the best home based business ever.

It seems that the most popular at these forums are Success University and Usana. They are great programs I am sure but they don't have the numerous advantages offered by healthy coffee. Most notably, their market is smaller and the response that you get when you try to promote the programs to people is one of unfamiliarity. So you have to do a lot of enlightenment. Whereas the market for the Healthy Coffee biz has the following advantages.

World's second largest traded commodity second only to oil Our coffee tastes better than oil. :) Actually it tastes great. All the other nutritional juice companies and such offer great health benefits from their product but they are all competing for a share of that same market. Our market is pretty much everyone you meet. And there is no sales resistance. People are delighted to find out that there is coffee that is good for them. How good? Our coffee has less caf than decaf, It gives a nice energy boost that lasts throughout the day, not just until the next cup and without the jitters. Also promotes better sleep and... balances the ph of the body so that all systems and organs of the body get optimized. Our compensation and bonuses plan is great and you can be a business associate for $100. And we have had over half a billion in North American sales in our first year alone. We have been overseas for 10 years. We are launching a set and forget system in one week's time so anyone can make money whether they are pro marketers or not."

I invite all who are seeking a fun and lucrative home based business with real benefit to all to help make a better world through healthy coffee. He further invites current business associates of other home based business companies to match up their present home based business against what they currently have. Take an honest look and be willing to make a change if anything better comes along. Such as healthy coffee!

Of course the real story here is that there is now such a thing as healthy coffee. With many Americans poisoning themselves with caffeine loaded coffee 2-5 times/day (one top chain has 300 mgs of caffeine in a single cup!) this is exciting news indeed! What makes this coffee healthy is an herb that has been used in Oriental medicine for 4000 years! Known as the King of the Herbs or Reishi (latin name ganoderma lucidurm) this amazing coffee has less caffeine than decaffeinated but still gives a great energy lift - one that lasts a whole day, not just until your next cup but without the jitters! It also has many tests showing it is beneficial to all conditions, systems and organs of the body... circulatory, digestive, elimination, respiratory, nerve systems all benefit, results have been obtained in treating high blood pressure, high and low blood sugar, prostate, liver and even mental health conditions. It normalizes the entire system and optimizes performance across all areas of biological function. It even detoxifies and promotes a good night's sleep. This is why it has been known as the king of the herbs for 4000 years in the Orient. So this is exciting news for one and all.

To join me in my quest to make a better world through healthy coffee visit the site in the resource box below where you will also find out the incredible health benefits that this healthy coffee does offer.

Garko is on a mission to make the world better through healthy coffee! Join him! http://myfavorite-mlm.com

Interesting Opinions On Cigars From Recent Survey

According to a recent survey by the ASC (alt.smokers.cigars) the following results were obtained from a recent online survey of cigar smokers:

86% of cigar smokers report that they do not inhale.

The average number of cigars smoked per week is 6.74 at and average price of $4.34

The best individual cigars were the Romeo y Julieta Churchill(Cuba) with 8 votes, the Cohiba Esplendido(Cuba) and Montecristo(Cuba) each with 7 votes, and rounding out the top five were the AF Flor Fina and the AF Hemmingway Signature both from the Dominican Republic with 5 votes each

The best cigar brands overall were A. Fuente from Dominican Republic with 15 votes, A. Fuente Hemmingway(DR) with 12 votes, the always popular and internationally known Cohiba from Cuba with 12 votes, Excalibur by HdM of Honduras, and in 5th La Gloria Cubana from the United States.

The worst cigars were Phillies, Swisher Sweets, Habana Golds, White Owl, Te-Amo, Dutch Masters, Hav-A-Tampa, El Producto, Garcia y Vega, H Upmann, Hoyo/Excalibur, and King Edward.

According to the survey the 10 most popular cigar smoking celebrities are George Burns in first place, followed by David Letterman in second, then Arnold Schwarzenegger in third, Groucho Marx fourth, Rush Limbaugh fifth, Tom Selleck sixth, Bill Cosby seventh, Jack Nicholson eighth, Winston Churchill ninth, and the character Cosmo Kramer from Seinfeld tenth.

The favorite cutting methods were the guillotine, Bulls Eye, and the V-Cut respectively.

The two most popular methods of lighting the cigar were the butane lighter at 51% and wooden matches at 33%.

According to those surveyed 47% said that they smoked a wide variety of cigars while 38% reported smoking their favorites and testers.

Most reported their reason for smoking cigars was relaxation, followed by "makes me light headed" and enjoyment of smoking.

The length of time the responders had been smoking cigars ranged from newcomer to over 40 years with the average being 7.2 years.

49% of those surveyed said they bought both boxes and singles, 34% bought only single cigars and 17% bought only boxes.

44% of the surveyed cigar smokers bought their cigars locally while 42% bought locally and mail order, and 14% through mail order only.

Of those with a humidor they had an average of 162 cigars in the humidor and at an average total value of $250 with most of the cigars coming from Dominica, Honduras, Cuba, and Nicaragua.

According to the survey 88% said they would smoke Cuban cigars on a regular basis if it were not for the United States ban and their opinion about Fidel Castro was pretty even with 53% saying that they had no opinion about him and 45% being Anti-Castro. 43% said they thought the Cuban Embargo would be lifted by 2009.

Gregg Hall is a business consultant and author for many online and offline businesses and lives in Navarre Florida with his 16 year old son. Get great quality cigars at http://www.cubancigarsplus.com

StellarSurvey.com - New effective market research option that won't take a toll on your budget

StellarSurvey.com - New effective market research option that won't take a toll on your budget

StellarSurvey.com http://www.stellarsurvey.com, announced today the launch of a new web based survey tool that utilizes a powerful, user friendly interface for creating and managing surveys over internet.

"As far as we know, SurveySurvey.com is the cheapest option available on the market today. With StellarSurvey.com, people will discover the most affordable and convenient way to create and manage their surveys," said Julia Kornilova, president and co-founder of StellarSurvey.com.

A free account includes all the basic features of StellarSurvey.com and allows you to create surveys and collect up to 100 responses per month. This option is great for anyone who doesn't need professional features, or just wants to see how easy it is to use StellarSurvey.com.

A professional subscription is only $9.95 per month (or only $94.95 a year) which is twice as cheap as SurveyMonkey.com and five times cheaper than Zoomerang.com.

Even with this bargain price, StellarSurvey.com doesn't cut back on features. Professional subscription with StellarSurvey.com includes a wealth of advanced features, such as an unlimited number of surveys, logic to skip questions based on earlier answers, custom themes that enable you to create your own look and feel, result sharing and analysis. To see more features of StellarSurvey.com, go to http://www.stellarsurvey.com/pricing.aspx.

StellarSurvey.com is based fully on the most reliable latest technology that includes ASP.NET 2.0 and SQL Server 2005, explains Kornilova. "Combining the greatest talents on our team and the latest technologies available today enabled us to develop the strongest survey engine on the market."

"The mission of StellarSurvey.com is simple - provide you with the most affordable, powerful, and easy to use tool to create web surveys," said Julia Kornilova. "Everyone who sees the wealth of features StellarSurvey has to offer will be immediately impressed."

President and Co-Founder of StellarSurvey.com

The Secrets To Finding A Good Online Survey Company

When you are looking at making money from taking online paid surveys, following tips can help -

Look for Testimonials - Often survey makers put incorrect information in Testimonials. Read testimonials carefully; look for hard facts about the survey. A few surveys give contact information about their satisfied customers. Try contacting one. If the mail bounces or it is an incorrect contact number, then one can assume that the paid survey is nothing but a scam.

Documented Proof - Some paid surveys show document images on their sites. These documents are proof of a survey taker getting paid or getting his/her reward. Read the document to verify that it is authentic.

Guarantees - If a paid survey is guaranteeing you something, do read the conditions, which go with the guarantee. Look for fine prints to ensure that you satisfy all the criteria to get paid or rewarded for taking the survey.

Legal Issues - Read the disclaimers, terms & conditions at the bottom of the page, often written in small unreadable fonts. Ascertain what are the legal implications, if any, for you if you get paid or win the reward for taking the survey.

Proxy ? Fraud site owners often host their paid surveys on proxy sites thereby concealing their identity.

Setup a dedicated email exclusively for taking online surveys. Keep checking the email box regularly. Keep the inbox clear of any unwanted or fake paid survey mails. At times, email websites block mails from paid survey. Ensure that the mails are not blocked.

If you are new to the world of paid surveys and if you need to pay to register to one of the survey websites, research the web to find reputable survey sites. For instance a good survey site would enable you to pay or receive money-using Pay pal. Also start registering with only one or two of such sites.

Fill the surveys honestly and take interest. Your responses could help you make more money.

Never send cash to any site.

Never depend on paid surveys as the only source of livelihood.

Finally, remember there is nothing like a Free Lunch.

Rob owns a blog and website helping people choose between paid surveys. http://www.paid-surveys-reviewed.com and my blog at http://online-paid-surveys-reviewed.blogspot.com

Why Passenger Surveys Are A Transport Operators Best Friend

Public transport operators who already use passenger surveys may not fully appreciate the multiple benefits that surveys can bring. Not only are surveys an efficient method of market research that will help identify areas of passenger dissatisfaction, they are also perfect for measuring the effects of improvements and can, at the same time, help promote new initiatives to customers using the service.

Public transport operators who already use passenger surveys may not fully appreciate the multiple benefits that surveys can bring. Not only are surveys an efficient method of market research that will help identify areas of passenger dissatisfaction, they are also perfect for measuring the effects of improvements and can, at the same time, help promote new initiatives to customers using the service.

Establishing a Starting Point

When embarking on any change management programme it is always good practice to establish a base line before any changes are made. This baseline survey can serve four purposes, it will:-

allow the proper targeting of investment
allow measurement of the effect of change
assist in the moral of those implementing change
ensure that new issues are kept separate from the original plan and budget

Targeting Investment

There are many areas of any public transport system that can cause passenger dissatisfaction all of which need to be monitored to ensure that the service being provided meets, and where possible, exceeds, performance level targets.

Issues that can be of concern to passenger include:-

- safety and security
- punctuality
- fares and ticket types
- capacity and overcrowding
- quality and design of vehicle
- cleanliness
- facilities at stations and terminals
- facilities for passengers with disabilities

Often limited resources and budgets means that investment needs to be carefully planned and properly targeted.

Passenger surveys allow operators to identify those areas that are of most concern to their customers. Through the analysis of passenger feedback the operator will be able to ensure that their improvement and investment plans are inline with passenger demands and concerns. Issues can be classified into high and low priority, as well as long and short term plans.

Some capital investment such as the building of new terminals, runways, laying new track or upgrading air traffic control or rail signalling equipment may take years to implement. However, the initial survey is also likely to identify some high profile areas that can be implemented almost immediately at a relative low cost.

Measuring Change


From having established a comprehensive programme from an initial survey the objectives for running periodic surveys are twofold.


One objective will be to ensure that the changes and initiatives that are implemented have been effective in addressing passenger issues. A second objective will be to promote and advertise the initiatives that have been implemented and also inform and educate passengers of ongoing improvements and future plans.


Passengers will always be more positive if they can see that improvements have been made and more accepting of outstanding problems if they know that those problems are being addressed.

Keeping Moral


Those implementing change can often develop a siege mentality. Change can take time to take effect and for the passengers to appreciate any improvement.

By monitoring passenger opinion and measuring the results against earlier surveys a successful change programme should see passenger issues change over time, some issues that were problems will no longer be raised.

Passengers will take time to appreciate progress and often those working on a change project will be demoralised with constant criticism from what is often a negative public. It is important that a team implementing change can see clearly the effects of their efforts.

Identifying New and Old

In any long term change management programme issues can change over time. Events can happen that make what was important, no longer important and what wasnt an issue, an issue.

The baseline survey will ensure that the passengers concerns are chronologically documented. Passengers are themselves an evolving group, individual travel arrangements change, fashion changes, life styles develop along with technology. Periodic surveys will allow changes in passenger attitudes to be monitored.

Online Surveys Make It Easy

Online surveys can reach a broad cross section of any travelling public. They are quick to design and implement and they provide feedback in a format that is ready for detailed analysis. The low cost and flexibility of online surveys allows passenger concern to be targeted at specific groups and particular concerns.

Online surveys provide operators with important market research data as well as a platform to promote and advertise their commitment to passenger satisfaction.

Passengers benefit by having an effective channel to raise issues and through periodic surveys will begin to appreciate that the operator is continually investing and improving the service.The following are links to samples of Passenger Surveys

Sample Passenger Survey for an Airline
http://www.surveygalaxy.com/surPublishes.asp?survey_id=1166

Sample Passenger Survey for a Train Operator
http://www.surveygalaxy.com/surPublishes.asp?survey_id=1170

Sample Passenger Survey for a Bus Operator
http://www.surveygalaxy.com/surPublishes.asp?survey_id=1167

 Martin Day is a Director of Survey Galaxy Ltd a web site that allows anyone to create, design and publish online surveys. For more information please visit http://www.surveygalaxy.com