If you’re still using paper surveys to collect feedback, it’s time to switch to the online version. Why? Online surveys are easy to create, design, and implement. All you need to do is sign up for a free account at BooRoo.com and you’re practically good to go.

If that’s not enough to convince you, here’s one more reason why paper surveys are not the way to go: Response Rate. A "successful" direct marketing (mailed out) piece gets a 2% response rate. Yes, you read it correctly – 2% is considered to be a huge success. Imagine if that were the response rate for every survey you mailed out, took the time and expense to copy, fold, seal and stamp. Is that really worth your valuable time and money?

What about customer satisfaction surveys? How inspiring is it for your team to know that part of their paycheck hinges on the results of customer satisfaction surveys and yet only 2% of those customers will respond? In this day and age when snail mail must combat all the other junk mail sent out, email must swim upstream through the spam filter and people want things faster, quicker and instantly – why would you use an antiquated format like paper surveys?

True, if you’re in a classroom setting or a meeting – then handing out and collecting a paper survey is a breeze. Though will it always be? How many of you even see churches using twitter tweets within a service to respond and communicate with the audience?

Imagine having just gathered feedback from a hundred respondents. You’ve spent the past couple of days distributing and retrieving the hundred sheets of paper. Now, comes the daunting task of compilation. Manually compiling the results to me is like trying to create fire by rubbing two sticks together — it’s a good skill to know, in a pinch, yet when you have other faster, more efficient and effective way – why would you?

Imagine again – you’re now on your way to your favorite coffee shop to take a look at what you’ve got when all of a sudden, it starts to rain! Or, someone carelessly bumps into the edge of your pile thus reorganizing everything that you’ve separated or sorted? Or some random kids run and bump the table, so off go your papers? Or you were able to make it safely to the coffee shop, but inadvertently spill your latte on the surveys?

The bottom line is, when paper surveys and water (or your latte) meet, you can say goodbye to all your precious information. Of course, the above scenarios will never happen with online surveys. And even if you accidentally spill coffee on your laptop or get it wet in the rain, your surveys will still be safe.

Isn’t it time you upgraded from paper surveys to (waterproof) online surveys?