The Psychological Levers that Move Your Audience to YES – In Just 7 Minutes with Matt Champagne

Resources/Links:

• To learn more about what you can put in your survey to create impact, click here: http://matthewchampagne.com/MTI

Summary

Do you want to deliver surveys that create an impact and push your audience to say YES?

To ensure that your survey creates an impact not only on your business but also on your audience, it is important to get clear of your actions and make sure your audience feels wanted through three important things. You can’t just ignore or assume.

Dr. Matt Champagne is a scientist, author, and serial entrepreneur. He was named Technology Visionary by SURVEY Magazine for his pioneering work merging psychology and technology to create unique customer feedback solutions.

Listen to Matt’s expert insights on how you can maximize the potential and impact of your surveys through the secret psychological levers that get you that YES with less stress.

Check out these episode highlights:

• 01:33 – Matt’s ideal client: An ideal client comes from many industries, but typically, it’s a small business owner, or it’s a head of a larger organization or department, but they have a survey. It’s an important survey.
• 02:13 – The problem he helps solve: It’s three problems. I always tell folks, I saw three problems which are the problems of surveys. One is that you haven’t generated a lot of participation.
• 04:00 – Clients’ common mistakes before consulting Matt: They’ll like to try to give incentives that don’t solve the problem. They’ll try to go to a more complex survey tool, which just adds complexity.
• 05:27 – Matt’s Valuable Free Action (VFA): We talked about the nine principles of feedback. But if I had to pick one of those principles that you could do quickly, and for free, it would be principle five, which is called, “closing the loop”. And this rests on the psychology that people only want three things.
• 07:12 – Matt’s Valuable Free Resource (VFR): To learn more about what you can put in your survey to create impact, click here: http://matthewchampagne.com/MTI
• 07:50 – Q: How do AI and ChatGPT intersect with surveys? A: My prediction is it’s going to be a huge mess to start.

Tweetable Takeaways from this Episode:

“People only want three things-- they want to know their voice was heard, that they made a difference, and how they compare to others.” -Matt Champagne Share on X

Transcript
(Note, this was transcribed using a transcription software and may not reflect the exact words used in the podcast)

Tom Poland 00:10
Greetings, everyone, and a warm welcome to another edition of Marketing the Invisible. I’m Tom Poland beaming out from the sunshine coast, very sunny indeed, here in Australia joined today by Dr. Matt Champagne. Matt, good day from Down Under, and a very warm- welcome back! You’re the Boomerang that has come back to Australia because I think we’ve interviewed. This is maybe even the third time.

Matt Champagne 00:30
It is the third time. Thanks for having me back, Tom!

Tom Poland 00:33
This is the first time we’ve had a third-timer, and there’s a reason for that, Matt, and everyone who’s listening, I should say. Because Matt’s the guy who is a marketer, wrapped up in science because he is actually a scientist. He’s also an author and a serial entrepreneur. He was named- get this- Technology Visionary by SURVEY magazine for his pioneering work merging psychology and technology to create unique customer feedback solutions. And Matt and I have worked together. I’ve invited him back not because there are any affiliate commissions involved because there are not, but because his stuff is, I would have to say it’s unique, and it’s effective. So listen up because we’re going to rock your world on the psychological levers that move your audience to YES! Matt, our seven minutes start now. Question number one, sir, I think you know how this goes, who’s your ideal client?

Matt Champagne 01:33
An ideal client comes from many industries, but typically, it’s a small business owner, or it’s a head of a larger organization or department, but they have a survey. It’s an important survey. They and their team have spent lots of time and money building the questions, gathering the data, and analyzing the reports. And my typical client is sitting there with the results wondering, “Well, was this worth it? Am I learning what I need to learn about my customers, clients, members, and attendees? Are these really deep insights? Or do we just like, hear some responses from some people?” So if you’re that person, we should probably talk.

Tom Poland 02:10
Alright, so tell us first a bit more about the problem you solve.

Matt Champagne 02:13
Well, it’s three problems. I always tell folks, I saw three problems, which are the problems of survey. One is that you haven’t generated a lot of participation, and you wonder whether the people filling it out are just the really angry people, and the really happy people, or are you hearing from the people in the middle, which is the majority– that’s a problem. Survey fatigue is another problem. I had read that the typical person is asked for their feedback 65 times a week. And I thought that was kind of odd until I countered back like, you go to a website, you talk to customer support, you go to a restaurant, you go to the grocery store, there’s a survey.

Tom Poland 02:48
The husband would say “Would you like some feedback?” Yeah.

Matt Champagne 02:50
Exactly! So we’re asked 65 times a week. When you ask people, “How many surveys have you filled out?” And really have them think about it. It’s usually about two or three. So most surveys are ignored. And so you’re probably one of them. You’re probably one of the surveys that people are ignoring, given the odds. And third question is just the insights. Are there clear actions that you’re learning to take from the data, or you’re getting some results from some people, and they’re trying to figure out what to do? Those are three big problems that I saw.

Tom Poland 03:21
Yeah. And folks, like anything, this is a science. You know that was that Mark Twain, quote– “It’s not the things we don’t know that hurt us, it’s the things we think we know that just ain’t so.” IIt’s a little knowledge that can be dangerous. So you might want to listen up to what Matt’s going to share about– how to run surveys to get people to respond, but also get people moving in the direction, potentially, of a purchase. So we’ve talked about the ideal client and the problem. You’ve outlined some symptoms there as well. Let’s maybe move on to the mistakes that people make. You get a new client on board, what are some of the typical things they tell you that they tried that you sort of smile and go, “Well, that was never going to work”?

Matt Champagne 04:00
Yeah, I usually pin them down, because I’ll tell them, “Hey, can I see your survey? Can I see your results?” I reviewed and critiqued about 9000 surveys over the last 30 years, and what I would love somebody to do when I asked for their survey, I’d love for them to say, “Here you go, Doc! We are so proud of this effort. We’re asking all the right questions in the right way. We’re getting a huge response rate. We have such confidence in these results. We know exactly what to do.” But nobody ever says that. They say, “Oh, here’s our survey. But, it’s kind of a draft. And we know there are some questions we can work.” So, they know there’s something wrong and so they try to sink money into it. That’s one of the common mistakes. They’ll like to try to give incentives which don’t solve the problem. They’ll try to go to a more complex survey tool, which just adds complexity. There are a lot of things they can do that don’t work. But the biggest mistake I think of all is just ignoring it. I hear that all the time, like, “Well, it’s just surveys. This is what happened. You get some responses from some people.” That’s not how to get people to YES, you need to know exactly what’s going on like an x-ray into their head. And you can do that when you ask the right questions in the right way at the right time. You can learn what their needs and wants and expectations are.

Tom Poland 05:11
Well, maybe let’s get into that, and unpack that a little bit, just in the form of a top tip. So question five is, what’s the top tip that you can give folks that’ll get them started in the right direction? It’s just a step or two. It may not solve the whole issue, but it might be a good idea for them to do this one thing.

Matt Champagne 05:27
Yeah, you and I know– we talked about the nine principles of feedback. And it’s something I’ve worked on for years. And there’s a lot of psychology and math involved. But if I had to pick one of those principles that you could do quickly, and for free, it would be principle five, which is called, “closing the loop”. And this rests on the psychology that people only want three things– they want to know their voice was heard, that they made a difference, they made an impact, and that how they compare to others. And so you do that with principle five. You quickly close the loop. You share results. So when you respond to my survey, I say, “Hey, Tom. Thanks for your results! Hey, 58% of people said the same thing you did. Oh, and these other professionals, here are the top five things they’re doing to move their business.” And people are just blown away. They’re like, “Wow! That’s the big ‘what’s in it’ for me. You’ve shown me that my voice was heard. You’re showing me how I compare it to others. And you’re showing that what I had to say made an impact on your business. It made a difference.”

Tom Poland 06:22
That’s really true! What are those three things again, Matt? It’s worth repeating, I think. The three things people want?

Matt Champagne 06:27
You need to prove their voice was heard, truly heard. Not just say, “Hey, we heard your voice”, but show them the results. You need to show them that they made a difference, made an impact, show them how their results were used, and show them how they compare to others. And that’s why polling and quick polls on the internet always work because we get the immediate answer to see our results.

Tom Poland 06:46
Yeah, click here and you’re in the 75% that said, “Yes, he should be fired from being president” or whatever. Okay, let’s not go there, Tom. Thank you for that! A lot of truth and a lot of richness in what you’re hearing, folks. And we’re going through this real quick but might be an opportunity to replay this one because I think there’s a bit to digest. Question six is a valuable free resource. Where can people go online to find out more, and get more valuable information about this?

Matt Champagne 07:12
Yeah, everything’s on a single page. It’s called surveyconversations.com. That’s the name of the technique, Survey Conversations, but then put /MTI for Marketing the Invisible and we put on that page the five practices you should put in play for your surveys. You can download lessons from my book, The Survey Playbook. You can set up Strategy Session. That’s the best place to start.

Tom Poland 07:33
Perfect! So, folks, it’s surveyconversations, plural, .com/MTI, which is the acronym for the show, Marketing the Invisible. Thanks for that, Matt! Last question, sir. We got a whopping 21 seconds left. What’s the one question I should have asked you but didn’t?

Matt Champagne 07:50
The question everyone’s asking– how do AI and chatGPT intersect with surveys? My prediction is it’s going to be a huge mess to start. We’ve been having a lot of fun with ChatGPT, asking it to write instructions and survey questions. So it goes out and gets all the mess. All the annoying questions that we hate puts a survey together. And then people are like, “Wow, this is a terrible survey.” I said, “Yeah because that’s what’s out there.” It will be better in a few years, just not now.

Tom Poland 8:13
It’ll be fun watching! Matt, thanks so much for your time and insights again. Cheers!

Matt Champagne 08:18
Oh, you’re welcome, Tom.

Tom Poland 09:36
Thanks for checking out our Marketing The Invisible podcast. If you like what we’re doing here please head over to iTunes to subscribe, rate us, and leave us a review. It’s very much appreciated. And if you want to generate five fresh leads in just five hours then check out www.fivehourchallenge.com.