The Survey Way of Life

Paid online survey panels:  The good, the bad, and the ugly. 

While searching for the riches that come with online surveys, we often have to fail with trial and error before we find the survey websites that consistently meet our demands. 

Lets face it, the reason we do online surveys is for the money. Whether it be to help out with monthly bills or save it up for something nice, it's all about how many dollars we can get.

Using free survey directories will give you plenty of options to try out as you go along, so stick with these. They routinely update their sites with new websites and try to keep you up to date on any changes with existing sites.

The Good.

Focus Line- This site does have a higher payout threshold of $25, but it really doesn't take that long to meet it. You get a few offers per day to try and qualify for and the money does add up quickly. Be sure to have a PayPal account, because they don't send out checks!

Palm Research - Not your typical online survey website site. What this site is, is a survey portal, meaning they draw surveys from numerous other survey websites and link them to their website. These surveys only pay cash, $1 on average, and you get many chances to qualify. You only need $10 to cash out and once you do, you'll be paid 45 days after the end of the month you get there. This site also pays by Paypal and they do it quickly.

Opinion Outpost- Maybe not the best of the good sites, but it's up there. They have a low payout of $5 and they send a lot of surveys your way. They're very strict about users following their guidelines and won't hesitate to disable an account, so read up and make sure you know what not to do.

The Mediocre.

Socratic Forum - It seems like they only send out one or two surveys a month and they're usually looking for distinct characteristics to meet their quota that many people don't match. Their surveys usually pay $3, sometimes $5, and you can cash out for a check once you hit $10. It takes a very long time to get your check in the mail, however, so don't cash out if you really need their money for something important.

GlobalTestMarket - They used to be better but recently opted 

Lightspeed Panel - The average survey pays 75 points and you need at least 575 to get a $5 Paypal cashout. If you have a technical error with their surveys, happens more often than other sites, don't expect any reply from customer service.

The Ugly.

TestSpin - They send out tons of surveys every month but don't count on qualifying for very many. There are also a good portion they don't give you credit for if you do. Customer service is also non-existent.

Toluna - Wow! This site had always been a little rigid in qualifying for their surveys, but since they merged with Greenfieldonline and went to a point system with an extremely high cashout, it's almost impossible to qualify.

Survey Savvy - They do send out surveys a few times a week, but I hardly ever qualify for them. I would guesstimate my average at 1 out of 25.

Take each of these submissions with a grain of salt as they are but one person's opinion. Feel free to try each and all out for yourself and make up your mind as to what is good, bad and ugly.

Are paid surveys a scam?

Sept. 06, 2010

Online surveys often have a stigma of being a scam. Run an Internet search for online surveys and you will get hundreds of pages of pages worth of survey websites promising $5-$75 per survey and $175 for focus groups.

Sounds good, doesn't it? Anyone would love the opportunity to make up to, what many sites claim, $400 per week, with nothing but an internet connection and a few hours of spare time. 

Click on one of the links and you find out  there's a monthly fee or you have to buy something to get a dollar or two. What's the point of paying $29.95 a month to be sent surveys, with the possibility that you may not even make that back by months end?

So yes, most online survey websites are a scam and you probably won't make any money on them. Or you'll pay a monthly fee only to not make much money at all.

There are, however, a large number of legitimate online survey websites that are overlooked because of the perception that they are scams like the others. 

The trick is to find them. Some directory sites are dedicated to listing these legitimate sites to make it easy for others to find them without searching to the end of the internet, only to be disappointed.

Each one of these sites has listings for actual market research companies that really do pay people for their time and opinions. Simply click on one of the links, fill out the profile questionnaires and wait for the email invitations and phone calls to flood in! 

In most cases, the surveys will pay $1-$5, sometimes more, and the focus groups range from $35-$150. The focus groups can also pay more depending on how in-depth they need to go, or how quickly they need to get a project done.

Many of the legitimate sites are moving to paying panelists by using Paypal. But a lot still pay with Amazon.com gift cards, debit cards, checks or prizes. They set attainable minimum payouts, usually $10-$25, and payment is received anywhere from 4-8 weeks. 

Don't get discouraged if you don't qualify for a lot of surveys. The purpose of them is to target a specific section of the consumer populace and get their opinions on certain products, product ideas or services.

They can't accept everyone, that's why that ask you to fill out personal profiles. This way, you don't get your inbox filled with surveys that you'll never be accepted for and therefore, waste your time for nothing. 

If you sign up for as many survey sites as possible, your chances of qualifying are enhanced greatly. Once you get going with these, you can reasonably make $150-$200 a month. 

Sometimes, you will be selected to test products at home and get to keep them when the study is done. This is usually on top of whatever the study paid.

You will never be asked to pay for anything by the directory sites listed above or their affiliates. Not a bad thing to do for some extra cash and it's all free! 

Grammar use in writing an effective mystery shop report.

Aug. 4, 2010

One of the reasons many mystery shop reports get rejected is because of poor spelling, puncuation and grammar use.

If these aren't your strong points, you may not get credit for your shops and won't be considered for future ones.Knowing your weaknesses beforehand, you should take the time to ask someone for help when writing your reports.

If you have no one, take the time to use a thesaurus and dictionary. Or, use information websites like eHow or Helium and find articles on how to write reports for mystery shops. 

Don't be ashamed if spelling isn't one of your talents. There are many, many people out there who aren't strong spellers. One idea you can do when writing your mystery shop report is to type it out on Microsoft Word first. With this program, it allows you to check for spelling and grammatical errors while you are typing.

This way you can get all of the problems hammered out. Once done, copy and paste what you need and when you need it.You can easily transfer everything over from Word to your report form, error free! I know this may sound tedious, but read and re-read your report before you hit the submit button. Once it's sent, that's it.

Another problem area that gets reports rejected is it wasn't proofread before submission.

If you write a report and leave words out, that's like leaving the punchline out of a joke. You create work for the coordinator because now they have to re-contact you to fill in the gaps. This will cost you points on your overall score for the report; or they may scrap it for lack of information or too many grammatical errors.

It realistically will only take you another five minutes to just read your report over a couple times and make sure there are no errors.

Articulate report writing is essential for the coordinator to relay your experiences to the client. There are many other people wanting to do mystery shops. If you can't write a decent report, those other people will be accepted over you in a heartbeat.

What to do if you think you've been discovered as a mystery shopper.

Mar. 06, 2010

 You may think that you've been discovered as a mystery shopper. It could be something as subtle as a look the employee gives when you ask a question, or the way they respond. 

Getting made for a mystery shopper does happen, but don't get "out of character" for any reason. You may just be misinterpreting their body language and be a little paranoid.

Mystery shopping isn't as easy as some might think. You're basically pretending to be shopping and for some, it may be a little nerve racking because you want to do a good job.

It's very important to try and treat your mystery shop as an everyday, normal shopping experience. The only difference is you're being more observant.

Continue with the shop.

Mystery shoppers are sent in by businesses to make sure their employees are following corporate policies and the locations are being maintained. Your follow-up report hinges on you not giving yourself away. If you start to think you've been discovered, act casual and continue with your shop until all requirements are met.

You'll know what you're supposed to do when you're assigned by your coordinator, as you are given a set of instructions on what time to arrive, which location to shop and what to look for.

Each location is pre-determined and you MUST shop the one you are assigned to. If hours of the shop are flexible, you may be able to try back in a few hours. If not, just complete the shop as scheduled and notify your coordinator with an email when you get home to forewarn them, just in case.

It is imperative that you shop the location you were originally assigned to. These locations are specifically picked by the client to be shopped. Trying to go to another location is not giving the client what they are looking for and your shop will be rejected.

Don't fall to pressure.

On the rare occasion that a mystery shopper gets discovered and does continue with their shop as normal, don't let the employees pressure you into telling them who you actually are. That's the whole point, it's a mystery! Once you tell them you are, you may as well just go home and forget about ever shopping with the company that assigned you.

They need your reliable word about what you observed in order to meet the requirements set up by the client. As long as you follow those requirements and not be overly obvious, you will be okay. You may have to ask some questions to an employee you normally wouldn't, so try to be as natural as possible.

Everyone gets nervous.

Mystery shopping isn't the easiest thing in the world, but it isn't the hardest, either. Unless you have a stone-cold personality, you're going to be nervous before going on a shop.

When you get to your location, sit in your car for a few minutes, out of view from the front of the store and read over your shop instructions one more time to make sure you have a grasp of what's expected.

Being prepared will help with your confidence. Being overly nervous can be sign you're a mystery shopper.

Once you get going, everything will start to flow. Before you know it, you will have fulfilled your requirements and the shop will be complete. Even the most experienced shoppers get nervous sometimes.

Are paid online surveys real?

Mar. 18, 2010

Believe it or not, paid online surveys are real. There are ten times the amount of scam surveys compared to legitimate ones, so I can see where so many people don't believe you can make money with them.

But if you do find real paid online surveys, you can expect to make at least make a couple hundred bucks a month.Unless you are the lucky winner of a monthly or quarterly sweepstakes that most of the survey sites host, you're not going to get rich, though.

Just so you're not left scratching your head anymore, lets get into what an online survey is. Companies need to know how they're doing in terms of their customer service, business concepts and product quality.

They hire market research firms to put together a survey with specific criteria from them, to either as wide of a selection of people or narrow down to who they want.

This criteria can be as simple as inviting women between the age of 18-30 who drink coffee, or a little more specific like; men and women between the age of 18-45, who live in Tennessee and drive their personal car for work 1000 miles or more a month.

These people are then selected to answer a series of questions about a product of business concept, which averages about fifteen to twenty minutes. The average pay for a survey is between $1-$3, but can be more.

If you're looking for something on the Internet for making money, this is about the best you'll find. Unless you're very Internet savvy and can come up with the next hot website, there isn't much else. Finding the legitimate survey websites isn't that easy, though. Like I said earlier, the number of scam sites far outnumbers the legitimate ones.

Using Google or Bing mixes the results with scam and legitimate sites, so one never knows what they're going to get until spend a lot time going through them.

The best way to find real paid survey sites is to use a free survey directory. You should never pay any monthly fees for one of these, some are out there, but you get exactly the same thing with free sites.

If you're signing up with some of the sites listed in the directories and still aren't sure if they're legitimate, look for affiliations with CASRO, the BBB, or TRUSTe.

They ensure that ethical business standards are being followed and maintained. If, in the rare occasion, you have any unresolved and ongoing problems with any of the websites, you can contact the BBB to file a complaint.

Will something happen to the company that runs the website? Maybe, not right away though. But at least if there are enough complaints against them, it will definitely hurt their chances of getting new clients, or losing current ones because of their background.

Keep in mind that any extra dollar you can make doing online surveys is more than what you already had. Plus, you get to make money in the comfort of your own home!