The ASK Method uses a variety of surveys and quizzes to obtain information from its target audience. This information is then put to use in many different ways to positively engage with potential customers through content that appeals to their specific wants, and essentially converts interest into sales.
One of the most used surveys you might come across when implementing the ASK Method into your business is the Deep Dive Survey. It is designed to obtain open ended feedback and should be run when you are launching your business, introducing a new product or entering a new market.
How to start your Deep Dive Survey
Your survey has one main purpose, which is to find out what your potential customers secretly want. Most people do not really know what they want and what could solve their problems, so you need to use this survey to figure out their unspoken needs, desires and challenges.
Ryan Levesque, creator of the ASK Method, formulated a template question to obtain this information. The question: ‘What is your single biggest challenge, issue or struggle right now with XYZ?’ This question can be manipulated to fit any type of business and still receive useful feedback.
This question can be part of a series of questions, some multiple choice and others open ended. However, you should make sure this question is placed strategically in the whole survey so that if an individual does not complete the survey, they would have answered this question.
What to watch out for in your Deep Dive Survey
The questions in your survey should rather be asking potential customers what they don’t want instead of what they do want. Their answers will give you an outsider’s awareness into their lives and ultimately want they need to make their lives better.
This survey is meant to obtain open ended feedback. Do not make your questions too specific in this survey as you risk skewing the data. A specific question cuts off the audience members it does not apply to. These people will end up not completing your survey and you could miss out on receiving valuable data. It may also encourage audience members to pretend to have specific problems to appease the survey. This fake data could lead to many business mistakes in the future.
Remember, not all of the responses will be of equal length and depth. As a rule, the answers that have the most depth of passion provide more viable information than the responses you see the most often. The most common responses could be due to a temporary fad, which will not sustain your business.
How to analysis and use the information from your Deep Dive Survey
The answers to your main question and the rest of the survey will tell you what specific groups of people, sub-segments or buckets, exist in that market. For example, in the fitness market, there might be three groups, group A wants to lose weight, group B wants to gain muscle, and group C wants to tone their muscle. You will need to decide what buckets apply to your business and product, and who you will begin to target in the future. It would be impossible to cater for all the groups that may come out of the survey, therefore you will have to be selective and most likely rely on the information given by the larger buckets.
Once you know you buckets, you will want to start engaging with and marketing to them. Look at the natural customer language that has been used in the responses and echo that language in the content you send out to the different buckets. For example, if you have received responses that use a phrase such as “I’m a poster child for…” use the same phrase in your email subject lines or sales letter. This will immediately get your audience’s attention, make them more likely to read that email or letter, and it is more likely they will buy your product.