Survey Advantage’s Unique Approach Highlighted in Jamestown Press Newspaper
Islander says surveying customers can help companies flourish
BY KEN SHANE
Michael Casey started doing electronic customer surveys for American Power Conversion in 1993, long before the practice was commonplace. But it wasn’t until 2006 that changes in the marketplace led him to shift the emphasis of his own company from leadership and customer service training to surveying work.
Casey was raised in Narragansett, and after graduating from Narragansett High School he got his bachelor’s degree in resource development. From there he went on to the executive MBA program at University of Rhode Island’s Alton Jones Campus.
After leaving American Power Conversion in 2000, Casey started his own company, which was originally called Progressive Leadership. In the next few years he found himself doing more and more customer survey work on behalf of clients and changed the name of his Jamestown company to Survey Advantage to reflect the shift in emphasis.
Survey Advantage is located on Douglas Street in Jamestown. It provides surveying services to clients in a variety of industries including property management, printing, marine services and hospitality. The main focus of the company is on a program called Customer Pulse. This ongoing program surveys customers (or tenants in the case of property management clients) periodically with short surveys after the client company has provided a service or product. The data is then trended over time so that the client can stay on top of it.
“If they have multiple properties or multiple branches, we’ll benchmark each one against the entire entity, and in some cases against the industry,” Casey said. “So they get a very objective view of how they’re performing.”
As an example, Casey cited a new relationship with a company with 135 locations that does sign making. Casey’s company will contact the company’s customers for feedback each time a sign goes out. “We’ll be able to give them a bird’s-eye view of how they’re doing at a corporate level, but then also down in the trenches with their local owner of a small business.”
While Survey Advantage does seek feedback on a single job, more often the surveys are batch processed wherein a client will provide files on a regular basis that contain the information for all the sales during a certain period of time. Casey’s company will then enter that information into the system and send out surveys to all of the customers at one time.
An important aspect of Casey’s work is managing the frequency of each communication. It is important that each customer is not bombarded with surveys. A time span of 90 to 120 days between survey communications is in place for repeat buyers. The concern is that too many contacts will cause the customers to stop responding. This type of frequency management plan is unique to Casey’s company.
“That’s a problem with the whole online surveying industry,” Casey said. “We’re still trying to figure out how much can we ask someone without ticking them off.”
While surveys are still conducted using paper cards, or through an Internet link provided to customers, the biggest and fastest response by far is to the email surveys. Approximately 30 percent of customers respond, which is well ahead of the other methods.
“The key to it [is that] they’re short, and for the person taking it it’s fast,” Casey said. “With paper there’s an extra step or two, and that hurts your response rate, and the time to get it back.”
Market Pulse is the name of a program employed by Survey Advantage on a project basis, rather than the ongoing work involved in Customer Pulse. Right now the company is conducting an annual survey for customers of the Fortune 500 company, Unilever. The results of these surveys are used by the client company or trade organization as a strategic planning tool.
Casey expects his company to focus more on the Customer Pulse aspect of his company in the future. “It’s an ongoing model,” he said. “It’s low cost, so we can help small business owners, which I love doing. I think anybody should be surveying their customers. You don’t have to be a Fortune 500 company.”
Casey said that it’s “very transactional,” so if there is a problem with a customer, the company can react within minutes of getting the survey.
The expanded focus on the ongoing Customer Pulse effort is due to the fact that the Market Pulse projects tend to be large, and can be overly time consuming for a two-person office like Casey’s. Casey expects to continue to ramp up the company’s efforts in the property management sector because keeping tenants happy in the present environment is more important than ever.
“There’s a huge opportunity in tenant retention,” Casey said. “If someone moves out of an apartment, it costs that property manager $3,000 to $4,000. You lose a month’s rent, and you have to paint the apartment, do maintenance on it, and market it. Sometimes you have to give a concession to get someone in there. When you add all that up, it’s expensive and it hits their bottom line.” (Link)