Survey

[Alan Taylor]

As has been suggested on the general forum and having now read BSAC talk of August 2003 here goes.IMHO the survey should go to ALL members in the same way ALL members are asked to vote it is a club for ALL members not just for a chosen 1000? you may only get a similar reponse to request for a vote but I think the Club can afford to to take that chance with my membership fee. Personally I have never missed a vote so would welcome the chance to respond to a survey but if my phone number dosn't 'come up' what then? or don't have the time when called on the phone will i miss out? This is a members club, survey the members. Stick an insert in DIVE? BSAC talk is aimed at Branch Sec who might not, through there busy schedules, pass on all relevant info to ther branch members.

Keep on BSAC Divin'
Alan
BSAC member A0045931

[Keith Lawrence(BSAC)]

As has been suggested on the general forum and having now read BSAC talk of August 2003 here goes?. Stick an insert in DIVE? BSAC talk is aimed at Branch Sec who might not, through there busy schedules, pass on all relevant info to their branch members.

Let?s get the BSAC Talk bit out of the way first. It is =NOT= aimed at MS?s, it is for EVERYONE. It is supposed to be pinned on your notice board, in fact we had a ?Pin It ? don?t bin it? campaign running in BSAC Talk for some time. So don?t blame the BSAC if you haven?t seen it, I?ve been to several clubs where it is on their notice board.

IMHO the survey should go to ALL members in the same way ALL members are asked to vote it is a club for ALL members not just for a chosen 1000? you may only get a similar response to request for a vote but I think the Club can afford to take that chance with my membership fee. Personally I have never missed a vote so would welcome the chance to respond to a survey but if my phone number doesn?t 'come up' what then? or don't have the time when called on the phone will I miss out? This is a members club, survey the members. Stick an insert in DIVE?

Why haven?t we surveyed all members? The answer to that is two fold :

First of all there is the cost. We are divers and office staff, we?re not market research experts (although there is that expertise on Council). To formulate the questions, collect the data and analyse the answers we have engaged a professional market research company. We could not realistically afford to go through this exercise with all of our members. To keep the cost down we already have HQ doing part of the work, we haven?t outsourced it all. So the answer to your first point is that we can?t afford to survey all members, we (Council) have to make a value judgement as to how much we can realistically allocate to this. If we wanted it done properly we had to restrict the numbers, it?s as simple as that.

Your dedication to diving Alan is obvious, unfortunately you are in the minority when you say things like ?Personally I have never missed a vote??, you are in a minority of about 1 in 30 IIRC. So even if we did put an insert into Dive (which costs BTW, we have to print it, get it packed?) I very much doubt whether the response rate would get anywhere near even 1 in 20.

We took the view that the money that would be spent on wasted questionnaires would be better spent on targeting and survey value ? I can guarantee that we would waste at least 90% of the cost of a Dive insert. Then of course there?s data collection, an expensive task. By using telephone and web surveys we are not landed with a huge data collection exercise, it?s done as it comes in. So taking things on balance I feel that we?re going the right way about this, I believe that the team dealing with this did consider your suggestions though.

So we?re doing a mixture. There is the random element but there is also the elective element which you have taken advantage of, by doing it that way we hope to get as many people as possible who want to take part involved but not completely skewing the results by self selection (Vic?s point). Having said that an insert in Dive is purely self selection!


Anyway, you?re talking to the wrong guy here ? I?m just giving you my slant on things (I saw all of the papers, it was a Council matter because of the cost and the importance) and I?m only the Council geek after all :-) But I know that HQ and others constantly monitor the forums, I see that Mary has already responded, I?ll just chip in with my perception of the situation if needed.

Kind Regards

Keith L

[Andy Nye]

Why haven?t we surveyed all members? The answer to that is two fold :

First of all there is the cost. We are divers and office staff, we?re not market research experts (although there is that expertise on Council). To formulate the questions, collect the data and analyse the answers we have engaged a professional market research company. We could not realistically afford to go through this exercise with all of our members. To keep the cost down we already have HQ doing part of the work, we haven?t outsourced it all. So the answer to your first point is that we can?t afford to survey all members, we (Council) have to make a value judgement as to how much we can realistically allocate to this. If we wanted it done properly we had to restrict the numbers, it?s as simple as that.

**** Can i suggest this good cost cutting exercise ****

Bsac send 30 copies of the survey to 1000 branches ( this being the 1000 figure mentioned )with a end result survey sheet that helps Bsac with it results it needs to find. = Costs of 1000 postage & 30,000 printed sheets.

30 members complete the survey,giving the complete paper back to it's branch sec. = members ae satisfied and gets forms completed.

Branch sec then sends all papers to it's next numbered branch,ie branch 1 sends to branch 2....... branch 999 sends to branch 1000, branch 1000 sends to branch 1 so that the data can be analysed and results marked one on survey sheet, = branch costs 2 postage stamps.

Bsac hq, then gets 1000 completed surveys to act upon from information from 30,000 divers.

Simple.

Andy.

ex Bsac member, but is thinking of rejoining if it's act is cleaned up .

[Alan Taylor]

Why haven?t we surveyed all members? The answer to that is two fold :

First of all there is the cost. We are divers and office staff, we?re not market research experts (although there is that expertise on Council). To formulate the questions, collect the data and analyse the answers we have engaged a professional market research company. We could not realistically afford to go through this exercise with all of our members. To keep the cost down we already have HQ doing part of the work, we haven?t outsourced it all. So the answer to your first point is that we can?t afford to survey all members, we (Council) have to make a value judgement as to how much we can realistically allocate to this. If we wanted it done properly we had to restrict the numbers, it?s as simple as that.

**** Can i suggest this good cost cutting exercise ****

Bsac send 30 copies of the survey to 1000 branches ( this being the 1000 figure mentioned )with a end result survey sheet that helps Bsac with it results it needs to find. = Costs of 1000 postage & 30,000 printed sheets.

30 members complete the survey,giving the complete paper back to it's branch sec. = members ae satisfied and gets forms completed.

Branch sec then sends all papers to it's next numbered branch,ie branch 1 sends to branch 2....... branch 999 sends to branch 1000, branch 1000 sends to branch 1 so that the data can be analysed and results marked one on survey sheet, = branch costs 2 postage stamps.

Bsac hq, then gets 1000 completed surveys to act upon from information from 30,000 divers.

Simple.

Andy.

ex Bsac member, but is thinking of rejoining if it's act is cleaned up .
Come back soon

Alan

[Keith Lawrence(BSAC)]

An interesting thought Andy! With the exception of the chain (one break and you loose the lot) I see no real difference to the suggestion that it's put into Dive. Your return rate would still be very low, there is no way on this planet that you would ever get 50+%.

Several options were considered, we've gone with the random + elective and the survey is actually underway right now. If people want to take part they only have to ask, which is why we put it into BSAC Talk. But thankyou for the comments.

Regards

Keith L

[John Kendall]

An interesting thought Andy! With the exception of the chain (one break and you loose the lot) I see no real difference to the suggestion that it's put into Dive. Your return rate would still be very low, there is no way on this planet that you would ever get 50+%.

Several options were considered, we've gone with the random + elective and the survey is actually underway right now. If people want to take part they only have to ask, which is why we put it into BSAC Talk. But thankyou for the comments.


Is there anyway that the survey could be on the web as well? That strikes me as a cheap way of getting another couple of hundred responses. I would be happy to fill in a web form with the questions, but would not be happy to spend 30mins on the phone to someone, particularly not during office hours.

Just a thought.

John

[Keith Lawrence(BSAC)]

Is there anyway that the survey could be on the web as well? That strikes me as a cheap way of getting another couple of hundred responses. I would be happy to fill in a web form with the questions, but would not be happy to spend 30mins on the phone to someone, particularly not during office hours.

There is a web element John but it's being done by invitation. Web based surveys are notoriously open to abuse, misuse and packing by vested interests, there is also the issue of validation of participants. That's why we've gone the way that we have with the private/invitation web element.

Regards

Keith L

[John Kendall]

:=Is there anyway that the survey could be on the web as well? That strikes me as a cheap way of getting another couple of hundred responses. I would be happy to fill in a web form with the questions, but would not be happy to spend 30mins on the phone to someone, particularly not during office hours.

There is a web element John but it's being done by invitation. Web based surveys are notoriously open to abuse, misuse and packing by vested interests, there is also the issue of validation of participants. That's why we've gone the way that we have with the private/invitation web element.

So do we contact Mary if we wish to be added to that list then?

Thanks
John

[Keith Lawrence(BSAC)]

So do we contact Mary if we wish to be added to that list then?

See link, see also BSAC Talk

K