Paid Online Surveys

Are They Right For You?

Discover Valuable Information and Tips About Paid Online Surveys

If you have visited some of the paid online survey sites, you will find many are long on promises but short on some of the details. Things I learned after signing up to take online surveys (over 2 1/2 years ago) were not spelled out in any site I visited. Such as ...

What types of online surveys you can really expect to receive
How many online surveys you can receive on a daily or weekly basis
How long it will take you to complete a typical paid online survey
How much you can really earn by taking paid online surveys
How you will get paid or rewarded after completing surveys
Your responsilities/obligations when you receive online surveys

You can read the responses to each of these questions below. This information should help you determine if paid online surveys are just the opportunity you have been looking for.

What Types of Online Surveys You Can Really Expect To Receive

Below you will find listed some of the paid online surveys I was invited to participate in over about an eight-week period. How many can you find that would interest you?

Food Survey

Health Studies

Beverages
Snack Foods
Consumer Products
Pet Care
Credit Cards
Political Views
Lawn Care
Powersports (ATVs, Jet Skis, Snow Mobiles, Motorcycles, etc.)
Automotive Survey
Non-prescription Health Care Products
Hotels
Consumer Electronics
Travel and Outdoor Recreation
Media Behavior
Home Improvement
Shopping Survey
Frozen Foods
Public Opinion
Tax Preparation
Rejuvenation Survey
Cell Phones
Video and Photo Survey
Candy
Futuristic Technologies
New Automobiles
Computers
Eye Care
Vacation Survey

As you can see, the online surveys you can receive cover a lot of ground. Most of these are interesting and fun to take but some I avoid. More on that later.

How Many Online Surveys You Can Receive On a Daily Or Weekly Basis

This all depends on how many marketing research companies (the people that generate online surveys) you sign up with and how much information you provide them about yourself. I started with just a few companies and added more until I was getting 2-3 surveys a day or about 15-20 a week. You can choose more or less as your time permits.

NOTE: I highly recommend you set up an E-mail address devoted to receiving paid online surveys. If your Internet Service Provider (ISP) allows you more E-mail addresses than you are currently using, have them set up another ID that you use just for surveys. If not, you can sign up for a free E-mail ID from Yahoo which is what I do.

So how do you find these marketing research companies so you can sign up?There is an easy way for you to do this or a time-consuming, not-so-easy way.

There are hundreds of marketing research companies that will allow you to sign up and begin receiving surveys. Some of these companies are very good, some not-so-good and others are just plain a waste of time. You want to concentrate on the very good ones so as to maximize your earnings. Your two main options are:

Option #1: You can search the Internet for marketing research companies, read thru their information and try to determine if they are good for you or not. You will find them but it can be a real hit and miss game for you; or

Option #2: You can sign up with one or more Research Company Providers - organizations that have done the research for you and compiled large data bases of the good marketing research companies for you to contact directly. There is a small one-time fee but whether you want to pay it or not depends on how much value you place on your time. Let me just say it would take you months to even come close to gathering the information contained in the majority of these data bases.

I chose option # 2. I wanted to start receiving lots of surveys in the shortest possible time.

How Long It Will Take You To Complete A Typical Paid Online Survey

You can expect the average paid online survey to take you about 15-20 minutes. Some surveys will have a percentage completed or a little bar indicator at the top which tells you how far you have progressed (and how much is yet to go). These are my favorite and all surveys should have this "feature" but many do not. If you assume no more than 20 minutes in length you will be right most of the time.

There are some surveys where you have to fill in the blanks which will require you to stop and think. On these, how fast you can think and provide answers will determine how much time it will take you to complete. The worst ones will ask something like "write down every kind of peanut butter you can think of" or "list all of the credit card companies you have seen advertised on TV in the last week". Depending on how much the completed survey is worth, I will give it a fair try but if the survey keeps up in that mode I will get out of it.

Here is one bit of information that other sites don't mention. You won't be able to participate in all of the surveys you receive. You may start a survey by entering basic information such as your gender, age and zip code and be rejected from taking the survey. You don't match the profile the survey is looking for. Even more disappointing are the nice paying surveys you click on and are told the survey has been closed. They already have enough respondents. You have to expect that with some paid online surveys.

How Much You Can Really Earn By Taking Paid Online Surveys

I want to be perfectly honest with you. There are some surveys that will only offer you $1.00 or $2.00 for completing them. Most of these you can just ignore unless the topic is of interest to you and you want to give them your input. By signing up with the "right" marketing research companies, you can expect to receive surveys that pay you $5, $10 and more.

You can also sign up with high-end marketing research companies to increase your earnings. One company I signed up with is an advisory board that pays me a cash award of from $10 to $300 depending on the length of the survey. These are usually sent after completing a short screening questionnaire to see if I qualify. If not, I still get included in a drawing for cash awards. I would have had a hard time finding this company without the help of a Research Company Provider and their large and useful database.

How You Will Get Paid Or Rewarded After Completing Online Surveys

There a number of ways you can get rewarded for completing a paid online survey. Some will send you a check or send payment directly to your PayPal account. Others will enter your name in cash prize drawings or let you earn points you can redeem for products or cash.
Some research companies will "pay" you with gift certificates or music downloads.

The good news is the marketing research companies will tell you up-front what type of payment(s) you can expect. If you like what you see, you can proceed to sign up with the company (or agree to take the survey) or decline.

Are you ready to test the waters? If so, I have a "freebie" for you. This one won't make you rich but it will give you a view of one research company's mode of operation. Go ahead and click on Gozing Surveys (will open in a new window) and click on "How It Works". When you are done looking, come back here.

Now that you have seen the Gozing Survey rules, you get an idea of how marketing survey companies work and what information you can review to see if you want to sign up or not. I have received a lot of surveys from Gozing but they almost all tended to be low paying (for the time spent) and I didn't care to wait up to eight weeks to get paid. You can find better and quicker paying ones by signing up with a marketing researching consolidator.

Your Responsibilities/Obligations When You Receive An Online Survey

Here is the beauty of paid online surveys - You Are In Control! If you sign up with a Research Company Provider, you will have access to their database of hundreds of companies. You can sign up with one or two of them, 50 of them or all of them and the low signup price stays the same.

If you get a paid online survey that doesn't interest you, get rid of it! If it is taking too much of your time, get rid of it! If it asks questions that you don't want to answer, get rid of it! I seldom take surveys on health. I don't need to answer if I use an adult diaper (I don't) or if I suffer from acid reflux (I do) and some of the banking/credit card surveys I pass on too.

You get to draw your own "line in the sand" and decide what is on limits and off limits for you. If you don't want to take a survey that was sent to you, no one is going to pester you about it. No one knocking on your door. No strange cars parked by your driveway. You may get a gentle reminder but that's about it. How is that for being in control!!!

Paid Online Surveys - Are They Right For You?

This article started out by asking you this very question. You are now in possession of my advice, tips and experiences with paid online surveys. Hopefully you visited the marketing research company Gozing so you could see for yourself what a typical company is all about.

There is money to be made with paid online surveys. But, like I said earlier, you have to put in some up-front work by signing up with the marketing research companies that appeal to you. When given the chance, you will also want to provide these companies additional information about yourself. This has the benefit of "qualifying" the surveys you receive to be more suited to you based on your age, shopping habits, hobbies, etc.

Are you ready to be a player in the Paid Online Survey game?

If you are ready to take the next step to investigating this money-making opportunity, let's start with my #1 choice of Research Company Providers.

Survey Scout

Before I provide you with the link, let me say this is the only Research Company Provider I have ever used and have had a good experience with them. I looked at several others before deciding on Survey Scout and it has turned out better than expected.

When you click on Survey Scout's link below, you can read up on what a top Research Company Provider offers you. If you like what you see and sign up using the link below, I have a special bonus for you.

When you sign up with a bunch of marketing research companies, you will end up with a number of ID and password combinations to these companies which can be hard to keep track of. YOUR BONUS: For signing up through my link to Survey Scout, I will share with you free software which lets you keep track of your multiple IDs and passwords securely - even if the computer you use is shared with others. I have been using this sofware for 6+ months and it has been a lifesaver. You will find it useful too and, again, it is free!

Are you ready to visit Survey Scout's site? Okay, here is the link to click on...

Survey Scout
Keep in mind ... if you are looking for an easy way to make money while staying home, this is probably it. No set hours, no special qualifications, no boss to report to.

If you decide paid online surveys are not for you, I respect your decision. Assuming you are looking for ways to bring in extra money to pay bills and improve your life, what other easy money-making opportunities have you found?