Normally, I wouldn’t have even given the issue another thought. But, as I was sorting through our endless pile of junk mail (argh!), I noticed one of those fancy envelopes touting a “tampering with mail is a federal offense” message and a window that enables you to see the moola inside. I opened the envelope (goal 1 accomplished), briefly took a look at the contents - survey, tear sheets, etc. and decided that I’d take a few minutes to fill it out (goal 2 accomplished).

I pushed back my sleeves and started on the first page which consisted of 11 questions, even went as far as to get input from my husband, Panos. Then opened the leaflet to the next page and found myself confronted with question number 12 - which consisted of 27 parts. Were they serious? Turns out there were 35 questions in total (62+ counting the 27 parts of number 12) and an additional blank sheet to “add any additional comments” that I might have. Move over GMAT… here comes the Fortune Magazine Survey.

The pay day? $2.00.

Let’s do a little quick math… I’ll estimate Fortune Magazine’s circulation at around a million households. Assuming they surveyed about 1% or 10,000 folks and expected a 2% return they’d end up with 200+/- responses and another 8,000 people, like me, frustrated at the lack of value they assigned to my time.

Here’s a thought: rather than sending TONS of surveys out at $5.00-ish a pop (figure $2.00 cash plus printing, shipping and processing – maybe another $3.00?) they could have sent me, and 9,999 other folks, an email noting that the online survey would take about 20 minutes and that they’d pay me $25 for my time. For 200 responses they would have paid $5,250 (200 x $25 + $250 bucks for an intern to PayPal responders the cash*) vs. $50,000 (10,000 x $5) and would have had the opportunity to reach 10,000 subscribers with the message “We understand your time is valuable and we appreciate you input…” as well as collect the information they wanted.

Needless to say I did not complete the survey (goal 3 - failed miserably). Instead, I wrote a little note from Grace, my dog, to Justin, my dog walker, enclosed the $2.00 and suggested he put it towards a cup of coffee to warm up – we had just gotten about 10 inches of snow. Fortune Magazine, my dog walker thanks you!

* Might even have been able to charge PayPal for the “free” advertising…

With 2007 coming to a close, I figured I better get my first post up prior 2008 or I might be lumped into the “New Years Resolution” bloggers category. Ugh.

So, here goes. Enjoy (or not).