Improve Communication with Your Audience

Calling all publishers, editors, writers and freelance journalists. It is the time to breathe more life into your copy. Turn your articles into living pieces that spark measurable debate and that allows you to engage with your readers mind and soul - we’re talking revolution.

As it was in the beginning

Publishers have for many years relied on letters to get feedback from their readers and although email has opened up this method of communication it is still time consuming and difficult to monitor and process, and for the more popular articles, it is either a case of only a fraction of the received correspondence ever being used, or where online comments have been allowed, well written and good comments can be buried under poorly written and abusive comments.

As well as being an overhead for the publisher, to most people it is an unrewarding medium in terms of the amount of effort required and response received, just consider the number of letters that go unpublished and unread.

As it is now

The Internet has brought new channels of communication and has opened up opportunities that allow us to challenge traditional methods. The Internet is now a mature technology, no longer the preserve of technical geeks but a technology that has been embraced by a global population, young and old allowing us now to re-evaluate the way things are done. Newspapers, trade journals, periodicals and ezines now have the opportunity to change the mental process.

When people read an article they often would like to comment, and historically this has required them to feel strongly enough to put pen to paper; or with the creation of the Internet send an email or write a comment. Sure emails are easier but it still takes time to craft an email and time for the majority, is what they haven’t got.

The letters page, or a list of comments, although interesting, are often only a snapshot of views, or an endless unmanaged list of comments; a well crafted and well written letter on any given subject may hold the view of the majority, or the minority, but due to its free text form it is difficult, or near impossible, to measure.

As it should be

Now consider the advantages of linking articles to online surveys where as a publisher you will have the ability to obtain valuable readership feedback in a form that can be properly measured. Just as important as you communicating with your readers is providing your readers with a channel to communicate with you; a method where they know it will count.

Want a snapshot of opinion? Did they like that article? Did your readers agree with what was said or do they take the opposite view?

Now it’s easy

In the past surveys would have taken considerable effort to design and publish and altogether was a process too long winded and therefore reserved for the niche and bigger topics.

However, using a hosted survey site surveys and questionnaires can be created and published via the Internet by anyone who has a pulse. Professional looking surveys and questionnaires created in minutes that make the perfect complement to articles that prompt opinion and debate.

The advantages over letters, e-mails and comments are that with online surveys all the feedback gathered is properly managed and easily measured with sites like Survey Galaxy providing you with real time polls and charts that you can either keep to yourself or share with your readers.

It can be complementary

By linking each article to an online survey it will not only extend the life of the article, as people have a channel to express their views, but it will involve your readers in the discussion and in a way where they know their opinion will be counted.

You think people will still want to send an email? - not a problem - just include the facility within the survey and get the best of both worlds.

It’s fast, low cost, and easy to do; it will engage and empower the reader, provide excellent feedback and having established a dialogue you then have the opportunity to link to other related articles.

Take the opportunity to register your view of this article here:- Readership Feedback Survey

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