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

Employee Communication Surveys: Seven Tips For Successful Design and Implementation

Organization Communication Problems?

So, your organization is suffering from poor communication practices. John complains that his boss never tells him anything. Sally is expected to come up with sales targets without being briefed on this year's company strategy.

Where do you start in improving ineffective communication between people? A good first step in fixing communication problems in any organization is to survey employees. Even if there are no obvious problems, surveys can help get an organization to the next level of performance.

What are the benefits you would expect to see in conducting a communication survey and acting on the results? Well, you could experience some of the following:

* improved employee satisfaction
* lower turnover
* reduced absenteeism
* less political infighting
* greater levels of manager-worker trust
* reduced defect rates
* higher customer satisfaction

A well-run survey can give your organization these benefits. However, a poorly conducted survey can have the opposite effect. Surveys badly planned, rolled out and followed up can actually increase employee cynicism and resistance to change. It may also worsen employee turnover and absenteeism. And this impacts on customer satisfaction and your bottom line.

Communication Survey Tips

So, what do you need to consider before rolling out your survey? Here are seven useful tips to get you heading in the right direction.

Question types

Include in your survey questions requiring limited tick-the-box responses, such as Yes/No and Strongly Agree/Agree/Disagree/Strongly Disagree. Including these questions will allow you to perform quantitative analyses that you can use to compare results between different demographics and to use as a benchmark for future surveys.

However, just as importantly, allow provision for free form comments. Everything that people will want to say will not fit into your pre-packaged boxes. A good idea is to run Focus Groups with a random sample of survey respondents after the survey forms have been collected and analyzed. These discussion groups are invaluable in performing a sanity check on your results so far and in teasing out issues that have surfaced in the written survey.

Anonymity

Guarantee absolute anonymity for the people completing the survey and make this clear in the survey instructions. Some employees will either not complete the survey or give sanitized answers if they believe that their identity will be disclosed with their answers and comments.

Sample size

Should you survey the whole organization/department or a select group? Preferably, survey all employees as this gives everyone a sense of being listened to. If the organization/department is excessively large or budget is tight, draw a random sample from each of the demographic groups that you will be reporting on.

If your selection is not random, the survey results will not be representative and you will lose credibility with your client managers and employees. If a demographic group comprises 50 people or less, you will need to survey 100 percent of the people within that group.

Mode of delivery

If the people completing the survey are small in number and at the one location, then hardcopy distribution will not be a problem. As the number of respondents increase and the locations become more dispersed, give more consideration to the need for electronic distribution. Think about putting the survey on a local intranet or internet web server.

To make filling out the form easy for people, have it so that the form can be completed online. If this is not possible, either send the form by email or put it on an accessible server from which people can download it. If your survey respondents are not comfortable with technology, then be wary of online options and provide plenty of employee support if you decide to go down that road.

Inducements and Reminders

Survey participation rates are typically ten percent or less. You can dramatically improve on this completion rate by conducting some simple follow up. As you get closer to the survey cut-off date (of course, you will have publicized that date with your survey), send out an email reminder or have someone call the respondents personally. Advertising a prize to go to the first to complete the surveys will also increase the participation rate.

Distribute results

Once the results are in and analyzed, distribute your findings first to your client managers and then to employees. Withholding results from employees will only breed cynicism and distrust and make your next survey all that more difficult to get a satisfactory response rate.

Break down your results into meaningful groups, such as by department or by region. The reporting groupings need to be small enough that people can identify with the group enough for a meaningful action plan to be developed.

Be prepared for some kickback from defensive managers. Frank employee feedback is both confronting and jarring, especially for those managers not used to it. Use your best facilitation skills to deliver the key messages. If you are in a politically charged environment, use a professional facilitator to perform this sensitive task.

Follow up and Rewards

A survey conducted with no plan for action is not only a waste of resources but will leave employees asking why they bothered to feedback to managers how they felt. Work with each manager to construct an action plan that they agree with. Remember, it is the manager that will be implementing the plan, not you. Get back with each manager three or six months later to review how they are progressing with their plan and report the results to the organization. As you see communication practices improve across the organization, make sure that managers get rewarded.

By following the above tips, you're sure to get the most benefit from your employee communication survey. The key is to leave room for free form comments on the survey form whilst guaranteeing that participants will not be identified in the results. Make the survey accessible and follow up to ensure that a sufficient number of people respond. You can maximize your response rate by offering rewards. After analyzing the results, distribute to all employees. A survey report ignored is a survey wasted, so develop an action plan and follow up with managers.

Vicki Heath is the Director of Business Performance Pty Ltd, a company providing practical online information and resources. Her company's guides, tools and templates assist organizations engage and develop people, manage organizational change and improve project delivery. Visit her at www.businessperform.com to download a ready-to-go Organization Communication Assessment Survey

14 Tips for Writing an Effective Online Survey

14 Tips for Writing an Effective Online Survey

By Dana Fine, Senior Instructional Designer, SyberWorks, Inc.

Developing a useful, well-written online survey that extracts the information you need from your users can be a challenge. In this article, I will review 14 tips for creating a useful online survey.

1) Write a brief, concise survey. Start with a mental framework that focuses on only what is essential to know. Ask questions only if the answers will give you the data you need and can use. If a question is not important enough to include in your report on the survey's findings, then remove the question. Try to envision each question as its own specific theory that you are testing.

In addition, research has shown that people skim and skip on the web because it is difficult to read lots of heavily condensed text on a computer screen. Most users do not want to scroll through a long page of text, so your online survey completion rate will be higher if the survey is short and succinct.

2) Try to begin the survey with interesting questions. Interesting questions will inspire the respondent to keep reading and complete the survey.

3) Develop questions with answers in the proper format for your purposes. For example, if you believe your students need more time to complete the questions in your lesson, ask, "How long did it take you to complete the unit and accompanying questions?" with various time intervals as possible answers. This is better than asking, "Do you need more time to finish the unit and accompanying questions?" with yes or no as possible responses.

4) Plan ahead of time how you and your company will analyze the information before you send out the final version of the survey. This may affect your questions and format when you realize that the statistical analysis you need to perform cannot be done with these particular question results.

5) Use the simplest language possible and respect the respondent's dignity when constructing questions. Your survey respondents will undoubtedly come from many different groups, and more often than not, are less expert in the field than you are.

6) Use neutral language. The online survey is being developed to find out what your audience thinks and is not a forum for you to air your perceptions or opinions.

7) Relax your grammar a bit so your questions do not sound too formal. For instance, the word "who" is often acceptable when "whom" is technically correct.

8) Be sure to ask only one question at a time and put them in a logical order. Questions like "If you scored less than 70% on the test and you have taken the test another time previous to this, what do you think would help you receive an 80% or above the next time you take the test?" will be difficult for respondents to answer and even more challenging for you to interpret.

9) Avoid double negatives, difficult concepts, and specific recall questions. Respondents are easily perplexed when trying to interpret the meaning of a question that uses double negatives. Respondents can also become quickly overwhelmed and lose detail of events or circumstances that are farther back in time. Most importantly, if the survey is too complex and/or difficult to fill out, respondents won't complete it!

10) Try to use more closed-ended questions, with no more than one or two open-ended questions. Respondents usually have a better understanding of closed-ended questions because they are more straightforward and offer responses they can choose from.

Open-ended questions require a written response. An excessive number of open-ended questions can wear down the respondent and reduce the quality of the answers they provide.

11) Scaled response questions should have answers that are at balanced, comparable intervals. For example, offering choices of excellent, very good, good, and terrible would cause you to miss important information in between the values of good and terrible.

12) Whenever possible, responses should be developed as discrete amounts instead of general statements of quantities, with specific options from which to choose. It's better to ask, "How many times a month do you go to the movies?" "0", "1 to 3 times a month", "3 to 5 times a month or more", instead of "How often do you go to movies?" "almost never", "one and a while", "I am there at least once a week", etc.

13) Name your survey and write a brief introduction. Providing a survey name and a brief introduction are good ways to give your respondents some background and a frame of reference. It also prepares them for what is to come.

14) Craft a well-written subject line for the email you send with the survey to capture your respondents' attention.

While not exhaustive, the points listed above are enough to get you started in the right direction. In summary, a well-written online survey has higher completion rates and is an effective method for gathering information.

www.syberworks.com

Dana Fine is a Senior Instructional Designer at SyberWorks, Inc http://www.syberworks.com. SyberWorks is a custom e-Learning solutions company that specializes in Learning Management Systems, e-Learning solutions, and custom online course development. Dana is also a frequent contributor to the Online Training Content Journal

Are Paid Surveys For Real?

Do you prefer Frosted Flakes or Raisin Bran? What kind of car do you think you'll buy next? Can you name 10 brands of beer?

If you think it might be fun to answer questions like the ones above, you're a good candidate to take paid surveys.

While some people still find it hard to believe, it's absolutely true that companies are willing to pay you to take surveys. Why? It's simple; your opinions matter.

For example, before a company releases (or even makes) a product, they need to know if it's a good idea. After all, they don't want to incur the huge costs of creating and marketing something that won't sell. So they hire a market research company to survey people (like you) and find out what they think.

Similarly, some companies just want to identify trends or discover ways of improving existing products. Do you prefer their product or one of their competitor's? Why? Is it cost? Is it quality? Something else? If you could change their product to make it better, what would you tweak? All of that information is incredibly valuable to a company. And they're willing to pay for it.

That's where you come in.

All you need to do is join a market research panel. The more panels you join, the more paid surveys you'll get. The good news: there are a lot of panels online and they're all free to join. The bad news: there are a lot of panels online.

Finding the best companies to join is difficult. But you have a few options.

1) Do it yourself.

You can search online for market research companies, ask friends who may have experience taking paid surveys, etc. This can be pretty time consuming. Another difficulty may be trying to decipher which market research companies send frequent surveys or which ones pay the most. Why take the time to join a company if they're defunct, rarely send surveys, or pay minuscule amounts for your time? You'll either never receive any paid surveys or those that you do get won't be worth taking.

2) Pay a web site.

There are many web sites which claim to have extensive lists of companies that will pay to take surveys. Most of these sites charge people $35 - $50 to gain access to their list. If you go this route, make sure the list only contains active companies (so you don't waste time on companies that no longer exist) and gives details about which ones are the best to join. It's also a good idea to verify the site offers a money-back satisfaction guarantee. If you're not happy with the list or promises of riches that never materialize (some of the sites make pretty lofty claims about possible income), don't be shy about asking for a refund.

3) Visit a free web site.

If you don't want to shell out the cash, finding a web site that offers a list for free is your best option. You probably won't find a list as large as the pay sites offer but you should be able to discover at least a dozen quality companies worth joining. For most people, that's more than enough to keep them busy.

Whatever path you take on your way to becoming a paid survey expert, it's important to remember one thing: taking paid surveys is a hobby, not a job. Keep that in mind and you'll always enjoy it.

The author is the webmaster of http://www.GetPaidGuides.com, a directory of honest companies that reward people for doing things online - like taking surveys, accepting offers, and reading email

How To Make Money With Online Surveys

If you?re got some spare time and you?d like to make some money without much work, online surveys are just the thing for you. With a computer and a little advice, you?ll be all set to make some extra cash for you and your family.

Be realistic

You first have to realize that when you take online surveys, you won?t be paid thousands of dollars. In fact, the people that do take online surveys regularly will usually say that the best way to make more money is to take more surveys.

You?ll need to sign up for a few different online survey sites in order to have a constant stream of surveys to complete.

Watching out for scams

When you do see ads to take online surveys that supposedly pay thousands of dollars, you can be certain that these aren?t legitimate claims.

In order to make money with online surveys, you will need to file your information with reputable companies. These are easy to find by looking for the company information to see if they give you ways to contact them. Those companies that seem to be hiding from you usually have a reason.

And if the company tells you that you need to pay money in order to make money, then go to another web site. You shouldn?t have to pay to earn extra money.

Market research

One of the best ways to make some extra money or earn some free products is to participate in market research surveys. These tend to come from the big name companies that want to know what their customers think. You?ll answer questions about their products and give suggestions about ways that they could improve.

In many cases, you can be rewarded with free products or cash payments.

Focus groups

Another way to make money online is to become a part of a focus group. This is an invitation from a company to set with other customers and discuss a particular product or service. You can also do these online in the form of chat rooms and message boards.

You are usually compensated for the time or the amount of information that you give to the company about the product.

Following the rules

The most simple advice for making money for doing online surveys is to make sure that you?re completing the surveys in their entirety as well as giving your correct contact information.

What many people don?t realize is that you may need to confirm your email address before you will receive new surveys to do. Check your email after you first register with an online survey web site to see if there are any other steps that you need to follow.

And check your junk email box too, as this important email may have landed in there.

Online surveys are a great way to make a little extra money when you have a little extra time on your hands. And you don?t have to get dressed up to do it.

Daphne Cameron is an online marketer and owner of http://www.online-paid-surveys-info.info and http://www.best-paid-surveys.info where you can find useful tips on making money with surveys.

The Importance Of French Property Surveys

In general, when people buy property in this part of France, they do not tend to have structural surveys done. This is very different to buying a property in the UK where nobody buys a property without having a survey.

In the UK, a bank or building society will insist upon a valuation survey to make sure that the property in question is suitable collateral for the amount of the loan. In France, the lending source doesn't always require a survey. A lot of emphasis is put on "Honour" over here. So if you tell the bank that the house is worth 150,000?, why should they think otherwise?

If you do want to get a Languedoc property survey done you can either have a friendly builder take a quick look, or you can have a formal survey done by a qualified surveyor. Languedoc Property Finders always work with companies who have RICS (Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors) qualified surveyors to survey your house for you. Weather you want a full written report, a bullet point report , a simple verbal report or a combination of these they can tailor a survey to suit your requirements.

They will obviously look out for obvious things such as damp, the condition of the roof and any structural defects but they should also be able to advise you on whether the property is prone to flooding and any other information about the local area which could affect the future value or sale of your property.

With my experience of selling property in both France and the UK I can't emphasis enough the importance of having a survey done on any property which you are buying. It would be like marrying someone without dating first!

We have heard of people buying their dream holiday home and it turns into one disaster after another. We have also all seen the programs on TV which highlight both the ignorance and to a degree the laziness of many holiday home owners who seem to arrive in France with there heart and head no longer connected.

To give you an example of the costs of the surveys we have just arranged a survey for some clients who were purchasing a ?150,000 house. The survey cost ?900, at first this seems a lot but it only represents just over 0.5% of the value of the property, this in my opinion is money well spent.

Gary Ingram is a partner at Languedoc Property Finders are a personal property search company based in South West France. <br /> Visit our website: Languedoc Property Finders or call us on 0044 207 193 9341

Making Customer Satisfaction Surveys Work

 

Why bother?

Good customer service is the life blood of any business. Although new customers are important good customer service will help generate customer loyalty and repeat business. With each satisfied customer your business is likely to win many more customers through recommendations and remember, if you are not taking care of your customers, your competition will.

A Customer Satisfaction survey will help you not only identify problem areas but will also demonstrate to your customers that you care and are proactive in looking for ways to improve the service that you provide.

Where to start?

Objective - Before you start compiling your survey you should first consider what the objectives of the survey are, in that way you will remain focused and find it easier to decide what questions to ask.

Analysis - In addition to the objective consider also how you will analyse the answers having completed the survey. Keep in mind that closed questions (where the respondent is asked to choose from a limited number of responses) are easier to analyse than open questions (where the respondent can reply in anyway they want). Much will depend on the volume of respondents, the higher the volume the more important it is to have an easy method of analysing the results.

Opportunity Keep in mind that as well as obtaining valuable market research data customer surveys are also a good way to publicise aspects of your service that your customers may not be aware of. After you have drafted your survey read through the survey from a market research view point and check that you are asking the right questions in the right way and that with the feedback information you will be able to make informed decisions. Then, read through the survey from a marketing view point, check that you have phrased each question so that every opportunity has been taken to promote your business? The ideal question will perform the following three functions:-

Market research provide valuable feedback to help you improve your customer satisfaction levels and in turn your business

Marketing promote aspects of your business

Information/Education advertise a service that you provide that your customers may not have been unaware of

For example:-

Do you find the in-store baby changing facilities useful?

By asking this question not only will the store receive good feedback on the facility they provide but they will also advertise their baby changing facilities and promote themselves as a family friendly store beyond those customers who have a specific need for the facility provided.

Warts and all to benefit most from a customer survey you need to be prepared to dig deep and accept the worst. A customer satisfaction survey should be designed to highlight problems so that they can be addressed; regular customer satisfaction will prevent complacency and will also give early warning on where your competitors initiatives may be loosing you business.

What to ask?

Although each business is likely to have specific and unique factors that are important in providing good customer services there are common areas that are relevant to all businesses be they a physical store, Internet based or a service industry. The following are some key areas to providing good customer service.

Communication - Do you make it easy for the customer to communicate with you? When a customer telephones is the phone answered promptly; are enquiries about products or services properly handled? A good business will make every effort to ensure that whatever the customers query it is resolved by the right person, quickly, politely and fairly. If a problem is not resolvable immediately do you promise to respond in a given time period and do you deliver on your promise? Use a customer satisfaction survey to confirm that all your staff are perceived by your customers as being helpful, courteous and knowledgeable.

Location Do your customers find it easy to visit you, if a physical store, is it conveniently located with good access?

Making it pleasant, making it easy - For a virtual business it is important to ensure that your website is aesthetically pleasing and easy to use. Physical store or website, is the store properly laid out, can your customers find what they need and is there sufficient information and help on hand to explain how a particular product works?

The right quality products Not only should you measure the quality of the service that you provide but you should check that the products and services that you market are what the customer wants and closely match their expectations.

Value for money Cheap or expensive is not always a good measure, value of money is. Do your customers equate your business with value for money, if not, why not?

Speed and attention No matter what the business, the majority of customers will want to be dealt with quickly but attentively. Are you doing everything you can to avoid delays? Good businesses will try to treat each customer as an individual, does yours? Attention is one thing but this has to be hand- in-hand with a quick and satisfactory resolution of the query.

Demographics and Specific issues Take the opportunity to profile your customers, for example where do they live and what is their age group? The more you try to understand your customers the better you will be able to target your business. Within the survey allow customers to highlight specific problems and provide contact details.

What next?

Having completed the survey analyse the results.

Trends Look for common and specific areas where the service is failing. Ask yourself if the criticism is valid and is there anything that can be done to resolve or minimise the problem?

Training Are the staff properly trained and do they have sufficient knowledge? Where staff training programmes have been implemented have they had a positive impact on the business?

Follow-up If a customer who has completed a survey has raised a specific issue ensure that they are contacted and their complaint addressed. Dont loose an opportunity to resolve a problem and keep a customer.

Continuously Monitor - Make-changes and then measure by issuing further surveys.

The following sample customer satisfaction survey for a store demonstrates some of the areas discussed please visit:-

http://www.surveygalaxy.com/surPublishes.asp?survey_id=1140

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

martin.day@surveygalaxy.com

The Truth About Paid Online Surveys - A Question and Answer Session

With thousands of people trying to find a way to make some extra money online everyday, paid online survey sites are popping up everywhere. With so many out there (some good, some - well, not so good) it's hard to determine what to believe. In an attempt to clarify the ins and outs, and the myths and realities of paid online surveys, I've composed a series of questions and answers to help you sort everything out. We'll start with the basics and then get into the nitty gritty.

Question: Is this for real? Why would someone pay me to take online surveys?

Answer: Yes, this is for real. There are literally hundreds of legitimate market research companies out there who offer incentives for your opinion. Companies have come to these firms to get public opinions on their products or services and are willing to pay them to find out what you think. They then pass some of that payment onto you.

Question: What are the surveys about?

Answer: Just about anything that you can think of. You may be asked to review a movie trailer for a new movie, what kind of peanut butter you like, what restaurants you frequent, you name it. From barbeque grills to medical questions to appliances to what you had for dinner last night. There are sites for specific age groups, professions, hobbies and interests. The surveys are generally very interesting and these companies are looking for your opinion on how to shape their products.

Question: How does it work?

Answer: Each company works a bit differently, but here are the basics of online surveys. You will sign-up for a paid survey site. You will enter some basic demographic information (age, gender, etc), and when they have a survey available in which they are looking for someone who fits your profile, they will send you an invitation to take a survey. The invitation will usually contain a link directly to the survey and the incentive they are offering for you to take the survey. Just click on the link and take the survey to qualify for the reward.

Question: What kinds of incentives are offered?

Answer: The incentives vary for each site, but generally the incentives take the following forms: cash, gift certificates (Amazon gift certificates being the most popular), merchandise (DVDs, small appliances, electronic gadgets, cookware, etc), and charity donations. Each survey site will offer one or several of the above incentives for your participation in their surveys. Some will offer these straight out, for example "get paid $5.00 to take this survey", some offer these in the form of a drawing and others have a point system in which accumulated points can be "cashed in" for the items above.

Question: Will you get spammed by signing up for paid survey sites?

Answer: No, but you do have to be careful. There are some sites out there that are simply advertising firms posing as paid online survey sites. Here's my advise on how to tell the difference. First, if they offer you a chance at a fantastic prize for signing up, such as a car or a boat, I would be a bit weary and do some more research before you sign-up. Second, if the survey to sign-up for the site consists of a lot of questions as to whether or not you want more information on other products, walk away, you're certain to get spammed. Just remember that a legitimate market research firm will not endorse a product or service, they are supposed to be unbiased. Third, read the privacy policy if you have any concerns. The majority of the sites out there are legitimate and will only email you if there is a survey available or if there is important information they need to notify you of.

Question: Should you pay for a database of paid survey sites?

Answer: No. There are several reasons why you shouldn't pay a dime to take online surveys. First, with a little effort you'll be able to find all of the sites yourself - free. There are a lot of free sites that have pretty good lists and also a few really good free sites out there that have comprehensive free paid survey directories with hundreds of listings. Secondly, market research firms are actually prohibited from charging people to participate in surveys and frown upon anyone who does.

Question: Can I get rich just by taking online surveys?

Answer: I've had so many people ask me if there are going to be able to retire by taking online surveys. Well, that's just not going to happen. Where it is possible to make a decent amount of money by making referrals or by running a survey related website, you're just not going to be making a full-time salary by simply taking surveys. There are a lot of sites out there advertising that you can make thousands of dollars per week or make $45 dollars and hour for taking online surveys (you can actually make $45 dollars an hour for a particular survey, but you won't always make that much and it may only be a 10 minute survey).

Question: How much can I make?

Answer: That's really hard to say. It really depends on a number of factors. How many sites did you sign-up with? How often do you take the surveys you are invited to take? What is your demographic? Etc But I won't just leave you hanging at that. I would say, if you sign-up for a number of survey sites, take the majority of the surveys you are invited to and are not limited in life experience, you could make perhaps $1,000 to $2,000 a year in cash or something equivalent. Mostly you will get smaller payments ($1.00 to $10.00) for a survey but I've seen them pay as much as $200. Treat this as extra cash, not a career. You can easily make enough to take the family out for dinner, buy a few extras, get a few nice things for around the house or save it all for your Christmas shopping.

Question: So, is it worth it?

Answer: Yes, I think so. Whereas, it's not going to make you filthy rich, it's certainly an easy and fun way to make a few extra bucks. I find the surveys to be enjoyable to participate in and for the time spent, the compensation is pretty good.

That wraps up this question and answer session. Hopefully this article has shed some light on the world of paid online surveys. If you cut through the hype and know what to look for, online surveys can be an enjoyable way to make some extra money. You'll get to see new products before they come out, give your opinion on how to make existing products better and get paid to do so. Not too bad for a few minutes of your time.

Chris Ohlson is the owner of Free Paid Surveys.net, http://www.freepaidsurveys.net

With a comprehensive listing of over 300 paid online survey sites and dedicated to providing straight-forward and honest information on paid online surveys.

webmaster@freepaidsurveys.net

Online Surveys: Scam or Pay Day?

 I recently read an article proclaiming all online survey databases to be scams.

I think many of these complaints betray the sad state of "get rich quickism" that pervades many people online.

The thinking goes "Bill Gates made billions with a computer, so I should just be able to turn mine on and get money to gush out."

I don't believe in luck, but "Good luck" if you believe that's really possible, nothing I say will make sense.

On the other hand, perhaps these facts will help you make REAL money through online surveys.

1) It's true, you'll never get rich doing online surveys. By rich I mean $100,000 or more per year. But really, only 1 ro 2% of the population reaches that income level doing ANYTHING. Some doctors don't even earn that much after expenses and malpractice insurance.

But many stay and home moms or dads don't NEED to earn that much.

Think of it this way mom... how much do you bring home from work?

How much do your have to pay to support your working habit? That is... extra child care costs, lunches out, gasoline, wardrobe expense, the extra cost of eating dinner out because you had to work late and couldn't cook.

And what's the emotional loss to your children or being raised by a stranger?

Unfortunately, many find that the actual profits from mom working outside the home (or working a second job if she's a single mom) are slim indeed.

So you don't NEED to earn a million bucks to replace that.

If you can earn $4 for a 10 minute survey, that's the equivalent of $24 per hour! From home, at your computer. (Or at work on a break...) Some earn much more per hour of course but let's be realistic.

If you really need to earn only $100 extra per week, that's 30 surveys or less. (I can already hear the next objection coming...)

2) But you can't get 30 surveys per week!

Oh really? How many survey firms did you register with? Did you know that one disabled woman who HAD to earn extra money in a low stress job earned (on average) $2,500 to $4,700 monthly? Just by surveys and focus groups?

It's true. She kept on registering with many, many survey firms until she reached the point where she was getting enough surveys every day to generate the income she needed.

That's where having the RIGHT database comes in ...if you join a database with 400+ survey firms listed, you'll more likely reach your goal.

3) But I can find them myself... why pay? I'm sure you can find them yourself. I looked for 6 months off and on to find a "get paid to drive" program. But the cost of my time even at minimum wage was more than the cost of the database. I did cheat though and get the list for free when I paid to join a survey database. If it will take you more than 7 hours to find 450 survey companies, I suggest you just pay $34.95 to join a real database.

The best ones give you "drive for free" and "mystery shopping" listings for free too!

4) By far the most complaints come from those who don't treat this (or anything) like a BUSINESS. If you work at this systematically and persistently. You can create a second income stream to improve your life and lifestyle.

Happy surveying.

For more information visit:

http://www.1sthowtoworkathome.com/Surveys

http://www.1sthowtoworkathome.com/CompareSurveys

Chuck Huckaby http://1stHowToWorkAtHome.com
It's your Demolish Debt and Escape the Rat Race Portal. There's so much information there, it's like getting a f r e e ebook on every page.