Birds of a Feather Flock Together - Cool Benefits of Twitter

We can all find others with similar interests as ourselves. We just need to ask the right questions. The problem comes in finding where others gather and then to find the ones actually listening.

I have been hearing a lot of buzz lately about the benefits of Twitter, a new technology for sharing short(140 characters or less)comments(tweets). Twitter is growing exponentially. For example, in the last seven days there have been close to 2 million tweets posted to the Twitter cloud. These tweets express the momentary interests of the twitters tweeting. Some are silly. Some of them are expressions of frustration or requests for assistance. Many are short reviews of products and services including short URL links to blogs or company websites.

By using advanced twitter search criteria, you can filter these tweets to display only those that contain words related to your particular interest. This is exactly what a lot of companies are doing. They use specific search keywords to effectively listen for specific tweets that include their company name or products. Then they respond directly to these tweeters with an introduction to begin a new client relationship and offer assistance.

This very thing just happened to me today when I posted that I had sent out an email newsletter using Constant Contact. Within 3 minutes I had received a reply to my tweet from none other than Constant Contact informing me that they noticed I was using their product and offering me any assistance I may need via Twitter. How cool is that?

Since discovering this new paradigm for relationship building around a common interest, I have been creating twitter feeds based on what I do in the OMR and web survey business and adding these feeds to my Google reader so I can easily follow anyone who tweets based on keywords that apply to our business. When I see relevant posts, I can respond by offering our company's assistance in areas of form design, or printing, etc.

If you happen to be on Twitter and have any related interest in web and OMR form design, printing, scanning and reporting, please follow me. My Twitter username is bubblepeeps. I will follow you back. It would be beneficial for us to form a flock around the topic of OMR Scantron type forms and processes. I will be looking forward to seeing you on Twitter soon!

Is NCS data form the same as Scantron data form?

Scantron Form is the most widely recognized term to describe Optical Mark Read (OMR) machine-readable forms. NCS data forms are basically the same thing. In fact, NCS was recently purchased by Scantron. Scantron and NCS is to OMR what Coke is to cola and Kleenex is to tissue. The Scantron Form is commonly used in the education establishment for testing, conference course evaluations, surveys and other data collection projects. But it need not be limited to education applications. Because OMR is still considered the most cost-effective and reliable method for getting data off of paper into meaningful reports, it remains the time-proven standard against which alternate data collection systems are compared.

NCS forms (also referred to as Scantron forms) have a unique appearance but the process of designing, printing and processing this form is still the same. It follows critical criteria for positioning, printing and scanning in order to capture the data accurately. All the steps in the process involve specialized software and hardware. Scantron provides both, but so do many other good companies. In fact, there are other sources of OMR products and services that are actually better and more affordable.

Scantron gets a good deal when their name is attached to a generic product like an OMR form. But the customer may or may not get such a good deal by the association. It's important to note that there are other options to investigate. The generic association doesn't make it the best. Biggest maybe. But not necessarily the best. Scantron/NCS produces some great scanners. We use them and sell them. But we also use a variety of other software not produced by NCS that works better in our estimation. So don't be easily influenced by the big names. Do your research. Ask around for advice from those who have had experience with many different products and services. Good things often come in smaller packages.

Survey Systems launches OMR blog

September 12, 2008, Survey Systems, Inc. launched a new blog called SURVEY SYSTEMATICS.
This first blog entry comes more in the way of a press release to announce it's creation, drawing some attention from those in the OMR crowd. "What is OMR?" you ask.

OMR stands for Optical Mark Recognition. It's not like you have to know what it is to have ever used it. You probably have filled in those funny looking survey forms with the rectangular marks down one side of the sheet and the little bubbles that you color in to indicate your answers to given questions. I remember randomly filling in those bubbles on something called the Iowa Basic Skills Tests when I was young. ;-)

OMR is a technology used for data collection from paper based surveys and evaluations. It requires very precise designing and printing procedures and specialized scanning equipment for accurate data collection. This is not an inexpensive or simple process. You will need the knowledge, experience and equipment for the detailed tasks in preparing a course, instructor or satisfaction evaluation form or survey. Hopefully many will come to this site to learn about all the unique processes and issues related to OMR form design, printing, scanning and reporting. We will also review the various kinds of OMR software, scanners and services.

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