Welcome to CompariZone

Where you obtain benchmarked feedback from your clients and customers

CompariZone is the result of joint-venture research by The Marketing Coach and Vitality Research.

We did some research before developing this research tool (well we would, wouldn't we?).

What we found was that business owners — especially small businesses, professional services firms, and independent consultants — wanted an affordable means of obtaining feedback from clients and customers.

But they wanted more.

They wanted help in getting the research right, and guidance to make the best use of it to improve service levels and profitability. They also wanted to know where their business stood in relation to others.

CompariZone has been developed to meet all those needs.

Here's what you get:

1. Research of client and customer perceptions for less than the cost of doing it yourself.

2. The same professionalism and attention to detail we give customised research projects, at less than a quarter of the cost.

3. Expert assistance to ensure your research targets the real issues for your business.

4. Advice and guidance to get the most from your research (a process which begins even before the research is done).

5. A "comparison zone" where you can measure your client or customer feedback against the feedback other businesses obtain (without breaching anyone's confidentiality).

Want proof on each of these 5 points? Check out the following:

Is DIY research really all that cheap?

Of course you can do the research yourself. Our research showed many business owners do.

It also found business owners and managers involved in DIY research spent an average 42 hours on each survey. Using a $60 an hour chargeout rate to represent the minimum cost of lost income or opportunity, we calculated DIY research costs the average small business $2520, excluding external costs.

How can professional research be so affordable?

If you have used professional research services, you will know that a custom-designed on-line survey costs $6,000 to $10,000 (or more) to commission from a professional market research company.

This would not include benchmarking your ratings against other businesses.

CompariZone is less than a quarter of this cost. We achieve this by offering research and advisory services as a package and by grouping together those businesses who wish to use the package.

Because we don't "reinvent the wheel" by developing separate research projects for each client, we can make the process more cost-effective.

You use a similar questionnaire to other businesses (with a range of optional add-ons). All the steps — set-up, surveying, analysis of results, reporting, developing strategies and delivering advice — follow the same pattern. You benefit from the economies of scale.

Getting your research right

Even if DIY research cost nothing, it would have no value if it did not target the real issues or was structured in such a way that it did not provide reliable, relevant, and actionable results.

Doing it right with research is as essential as it is with legal and financial matters. If we're wise, we don't represent ourselves or prepare our own annual accounts!

External expertise and advice is not included with DIY research. It comes standard with CompariZone.

Help to get the most from your research

Sadly, many businesses which pay for research don't get all they could from it. Both The Marketing Coach and Vitality Research believe you deserve better.

We believe research is a beginning, not an end in itself. In fact, we're so strong on this that we've made coaching part of the standard package.

With us, you'll find you are preparing to make use of your customer/client feedback before the research is even begun. If there are other issues which we think also need your attention, we'll be talking about them too.

What's the point of benchmarking?

Say 90% of your clients or customers gave you a 6-out-of-10 ranking for service. That sounds like an excellent score. But without benchmarking you have no way of knowing whether your results are in the top 10% or bottom 10% of businesses.

CompariZone includes your customer/client feedback in a database of research results obtained for other businesses. The benchmarking process allows us to compare your results with other businesses — confidentially of course.

Why CompariZone is better

CompariZone uses email and web research techniques to achieve higher response rates, lower data capture costs, and faster turn-around.

Compared to traditional telephone or mail-out surveys, there are a range of benefits:

c By including the survey link in an email despatch we can direct the survey efficiently and quickly to all participants. This is convenient for participants as they can complete the survey in their own time.

c From our extensive experience in New Zealand business markets the response rate is likely to be very good (certainly much better than mailing out a paper survey form for participants to post back to you)

c On-line surveys are a very fast method. Participants typically complete the survey on the day they receive the email invitation or the day after. Usually we allow a week to complete the survey.

c As soon as the survey concludes, the results are ready to analyse in more depth.

c We can personalise the email messages to the individuals involved (e.g. Dear John...)

c We can monitor individual responses and send thankyou messages to those who have responded and reminder messages to those who have not.

c On-line surveys are the most cost-effective method to survey customers. It costs just as much to survey 10 people as 1000!

How CompariZone works

Using CompariZone is a simple step-by-step process:

1. We conduct an initial half-hour telephone consultation with you to clarify and confirm your requirements. This covers what you hope to achieve from the survey, any questions you have about the survey, and the start of planning to make the best use of the results.

2. Your survey details and the cost are confirmed to you by email.

3. You make a commissioning payment equivalent to half of the total cost of the package (the balance is payable prior to the research results being reported to you). We provide facilities for direct credit and payment by credit card (an additional charge applies to the latter).

4. You provide your email list to us – including first name, surname, and email address. We guarantee this list will be kept private and confidential, and will not be used for any purpose other than the survey. The Privacy Act allows businesses to provide customer lists to third parties for research purposes. There is no limit to the number of customers you can survey when you use CompariZone. Including several contacts from one large customer may be appropriate.

We send an email from you to the customers on your list to introduce the survey and us. This email is in your name and you approve the text of the message before it is distributed.

A second email from us is sent the next day with a link to the survey and an opt-out link. Customers are given a deadline of one week to complete the survey. In practice, most people respond the day they receive the survey or the day after.

The day before the survey deadline a personalised reminder message is sent to those who have not responded.

Participants click on the survey link and complete the survey in their own time. Their individual responses are anonymous unless they give permission to waive confidentiality

The day after the survey deadline we send another email to all those who have responded, thanking them for their participation. All these emails are personalised (Dear John).

The survey includes a mix of rating and open-ended questions. The standard ratings questions enable us to build up a benchmarking database. Filter questions are asked to make sure people can skip those which are not relevant.

Reporting will use standard templates featuring colour coding and graphs to highlight your strengths and weaknesses versus the benchmark results. A verbatim comments report listing all open-ended comments is also provided.

Independent comment from The Marketing Coach will accompany your results, including recommendations for you to action.

The process concludes with another half-hour telephone coaching session to discuss the results, what they mean, and strategic directions for you to consider.

Further support is available through Individual Coaching with The Marketing Coach, if required.

CompariZone pricing and options

Once the database is established for comparison purposes, CompariZone will require an investment of $1995 plus GST (more affordable than other research and even more cost-effective than doing it yourself!). Optional extras will also be available.

However, to build the database of customer service results as quickly as possible, CompariZone is being offered for a limited time at a $500 discount ($1495 plus GST). Benchmarking your results will be free of charge and other optional extras have been cut by 50% during this introductory period

The introductory offer will only apply until the benchmarking database has been established. CompariZone will then revert to full pricing.

Introductory Offer (add GST to all prices)

An online survey with an email link sent to your customers, conducted by Vitality Research with coaching support from The Marketing Coach. Introductory offer $1495 (will be $1,995)

Optional Extras

A. Benchmarking against the total database free (will be +$200)

B. Comparison with last year’s results - not yet available (will be +$100)

C. Analysis by customer type - up to three types reported on (eg. reporting by Region, by size of customer etc) +$100 (will be +$200)

D. Attributed comments - customers give permission for their comments and identity to be reported to you (a separate question is asked to cover this) +$100 (will be +$200)

E. Benchmarking by Business Sector - not yet available (will be +$200)

F. Postal surveys - you post survey forms to your customers who mail their completed forms to us for data entry (can be used in conjunction with email/web option) +$3.50 per completed form (e.g. 100 forms = $350)

G. Telephone surveys POA

Order CompariZone now

To order CompariZone, please complete the form below and click Send.

Once we receive your order, we will have a half-hour telephone discussion with you to discuss your needs and answer any questions you have before you commit to doing the survey. On this call we will go through the standard questions in the questionnaire with you and establish if you need to add extra customised questions to cover your business situation.