“Surveys are expensive, time-consuming and they lead to nothing.” Sounds familiar? Then your boss needs some convincing before you can finally conduct your own online survey. Luckily, we have just what you need. Here are 5 great unexpected online surveys advantages your superior probably never saw coming.

1) Online surveys have High Return on Investment

Money makes the world go round, right? Well, that’s precisely what’s keeping your boss from venturing into market research. It has earned a reputation of being expensive and not very profitable – in no small portion thanks to a number of big shot market research companies that simply fail to deliver.

So why not take matters into your own hands and conduct your own market research? The technology is readily available to create, distribute and process an entire online survey yourself – no professional hand needed!

What’s even better, online surveys make it easy to create a closed feedback loop on a large scale. Let’s say one of your customers indicates in a survey they had an awful product experience. It’s possible to have the survey software send an automatic notification to a sales manager who will then contact that person before he tries his luck elsewhere. In other words, online surveys provide you with a tangible tool to control churn rate. Don’t let your dissatisfied customers simply walk away from your business but stop them right at the gate!

Also, surveys can effectively help you identify new business opportunities. When a lot of your respondents consistently complain about a missing product feature or service, it’s probably a good idea to oblige. The result? A lot of happy customers who will gladly do business with you, spreading the word willingly as they do.

2) Get in touch with your customers

In essence, a survey is a means to start a dialogue between your company and your customer base. The important message here, however, is that it doesn’t stop with the survey. In fact, that’s just the beginning. You want to know if your company is doing OK? Kindly ask your customers in an online survey and they will provide direct feedback you can get your hands on.

3) Identify your USP’s

Sure, surveys are great to help you find your company’s weaknesses but they’re also a great help in identifying your strong suits. Is one of your workers consistently getting great scores in surveys? Is your support team awarded straight A’s in your latest customer satisfaction report? Let them know!

It’s imperative to give feedback to your employees, negative AND positive! Identifying what you’re really good at as a company helps you define your unique selling proposition, which you can then implement in your marketing strategy.

4) No more “gut feeling” – let the data do the talking

Does your product manager act on gut feeling when coming up with new functions or attributes for your product line? Then it might be a good idea to urge him to take a more calculated approach next time … Thanks to surveys you don’t have to guess anymore as to what your customers want – you’ll know … How? Because you asked them!

So next time your survey respondents complain about unacceptable support waiting times, you’ll know what to spend your money on.

5) Setting up an online survey is really easy (it really is!*)

No, you don’t need to be a tech wizard to successfully set up an online survey. Our tool is as intuitive as it is rich. You don’t even have to come up with your own questions if you don’t want to. Simply start from a survey template created by one of our market research professionals and hit send. Pretty soon afterwards, your first results will appear in your real-time reports making analysis very easy.

*We’re not the only ones saying this. Check out this review!