1. Promote the survey through your networks

Around 30% of our survey participants hear about the survey through email or social media. You can encourage participation in the survey by sending emails to your networks, posting about the survey on social media or your website, or by including articles in newsletters or local media.

If you do promote the survey, please let us know so we can include you in our list of survey supporters! We can also provide you with suggested wordings and materials for promoting the survey.

2. Fund distribution of flyers and survey packs

Distributing flyers and survey packs by mail is the most effective way of encouraging someone to complete the survey. Survey supporters who fund the cost of printing and posting flyers and surveys can ensure the survey will capture enough responses to enable analysis of responses from their community or group.

3. Commission specific questions to include in the survey

You can commission specific questions that gather information you need for your community or group. Our only restrictions on commissioning questions are that (i) all content needs to be relevant to understanding and improving quality of life and wellbeing in regional Australia, and (ii) we only accept funding if the funder agrees that the data can be made publicly available.

In past years the survey has included questions about recreation in lakes and rivers, the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, resilience of farmers, access to telecommunications, and the needs of carers living in rural and regional areas. These questions have all been used to develop special reports examining these issues.

4. Commission customised analysis and reports

You can also commission customised analysis and reports that use Regional Wellbeing Survey data, or to combine survey data with other data such as data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics Census of Population and Housing.

Our team includes specialists in analysing quality of life in rural communities, resilience of people and communities, social determinants of health and wellbeing, socio-economic impacts of challenging times (for example, drought and industry downturns), natural resource management, and the socio-economic impacts of specific industries in regional areas, among others.

5. Commission specific surveys and projects

We regularly conduct smaller surveys of specific groups of people and often combine them with focus groups and interviews to get an in-depth understanding of particular issues in rural and regional communities.