Handling Paid Survey Sites

“Get paid $100,000 a year for completing surveys!”
Paid survey sites – how to handle them

By now we have all seen offers like the one above, and as market research professionals we cringe at the thought of respondents becoming research robots who mindlessly answer questions for money. But to unaware consumers, paid survey sites offer a “legitimate” way to make extra money while providing feedback to companies who want to improve their products and services.

Paid survey sites such as sellyouropinion.com and surveyscout.com offer respondents a list/report/database of research companies who use an online form containing demographic, household and purchasing questions to build their databases and respondent panels.

The problems start with the $19.95-49.95 “fees” these survey sites charge for providing the list/report/database -- respondents are being duped into paying to join market research panels. Almost all paid survey sites encourage members to join all 250-450+ research companies’ panels on their list so their members can have the chance to participate in hundreds of surveys, focus groups and mystery shops. Some sites even offer software to “help you fill out your surveys up to 300% faster.” In essence, these sites teach people how to be professional respondents.

Nauseous yet? So what can we do?

Because these sites are legal as long as they deliver the list/report/database consumers are paying for, market research professionals have to be proactive in protecting the integrity of their databases by using some of the following practices:

• Add a “how did you hear about us” field on your online form, and track the responses
• Decide if you will accept respondents from paid survey sites into your database at all or conditionally
• Consider adding information on your panel web page urging respondents to request their money back if they paid for a list/report/database of companies
• Meticulously maintain your database, checking for duplicate household records
• Implement strict past participation exclusions for all studies
• Contact paid survey sites and ask them to remove your company from their list/report/database
• Report any paid survey site using a pyramid scheme to build members to the FTC – https://rn.ftc.gov/dod/wsolcq$.startup?z_org_code=PU01

Bottom line -- the Internet can be a great way to build a database/panel as long as market research professionals work to educate respondents and take measures to handle unscrupulous sites such as those mentioned above. Good luck!