If you’re looking for an easy side hustle these days, consider answering surveys online. You can learn about Reward XP and other similar websites that show the extent of the benefits of taking an internet survey. Nevertheless, there are certain tricks to nail to reap this little venture’s rewards, not to mention a bit of luck is also required.
Now that you know taking online surveys can get you paid, you probably want to figure out how it’s done. Generally, it requires you to do nothing more than sign up, fill out a profile, and tell a company what you think about its products, services, ads, and more.
Today we’ll answer what most might consider the more important questions concerning this whole online survey business. How much does it pay? How much work will it entail? Can you get scammed doing it? Read on so you can decide for yourself if taking part in internet surveys is really worth your time.
Why Do They Pay You for Answering Surveys?
“They” refers to the companies that put out surveys to acquire valuable consumer feedback. Based on that, it does make sense for some business organizations to pay for your opinion. These are usually the businesses that don’t have a specific department running consumer surveys and affiliate themselves with survey firms to handle the job for them.
You’re probably asking: “What could companies possibly get from people answering their surveys?” They’re certainly getting a lot because consumer feedback helps companies make some last-minute improvements on their products before their release to the market. As a result, a business can offer something they know from ample evidence that most of their target audience would pay to own or experience.
How Online Surveys Work
We’ve touched on this briefly previously, but let’s now get into detail about how to answer an online survey. More often than not, it usually involves the following steps:
Step #1: Find a Company Putting Out Surveys
There are tons of legitimate organizations you should be qualified to sign up with. Feel free to pick as many as you like.
Step #2: Fill Out Your Profile
For each business you take surveys for, you need a separate profile. Make sure to fill these pages out completely. The information on your profile tells a company if you fit the particular demographic they are targeting or not. If, after the profile assessment, they conclude that you do, you get sent a survey.
Should your incomplete profile page prevent a company from determining accurately which demographic you belong to, there’s a good chance you won’t find a message with a link to a survey in your inbox.
Step #3: Acquire Surveys
Generally, companies will provide notifications on available surveys via email. While you can take some of them right away, others might require you to undergo further target demographic assessment by having you answer pre-survey questions. This could add a few minutes to the total time you spend taking a survey.
There are also times when you get sent a product in the mail to review instead of being directed immediately to a survey page.
Step #4: Take Surveys
You’ll be presented with some questions, so answer them. Sometimes, they can be as simple as multiple-choice questions; other times, they can be specific questions that require sentence-form answers.
Step #5: Get Rewards
Now for our favorite part: claiming the rewards. Note that rewards claiming can vary significantly from one company to another. Some companies award points that you can redeem for products, services, or cash, while others wire cash immediately to your account. A few would even include your name in a sweepstakes draw.
Types of Payment for Online Surveys
What is very important to talk about in greater detail here, something that was touched on just above is what kinds of “payment” you can get for doing online surveys. Generally speaking, these rewards or payments fall into four main categories.
1. Points – The first type of reward that you might get for completing online surveys are points. These points system can take many different forms. Some points systems allow you to trade points for cash rewards, some allow you to trade points for products, and some systems may allow you to use those points for discounts, or even for entry into draws and sweepstakes.
2. Discounts – The second type of reward or payment that you may get from online surveys are simple discounts on products. Depending on who the survey is being carried out by, the completion of one may lead to various discounts on products, or even some free products too.
3. Gift Cards – One very common form of payment for online surveys is the gift card. Gift cards are of course great if you are interested in the products being sold. That said, if you want some more versatility, look for surveys that provide multi-use gift cards, such as ones that can be used at various locations.
4. Cash – As far as most people are concerned, the best form of payment that you can get from an online survey is cash, or in other words, real payment. This will often come in the form of PayPal payments, or something similar (nobody is going to send physical cash to your mailbox). Just watch out for the surveys that force you to build up a certain amount of money before it can be withdrawn.
How Much Does Taking Online Surveys Earn You?
Let’s get this out of the way: answering surveys online is not considered a real livelihood. That means you’re unlikely to make a fortune from it. However, it could make you enough extra money for little investments, mini-vacations, and even pay off some debt.
Monetarily, you could be awarded as much as $20 for every survey you complete. Though rewards usually fall between $1 and $5 most of the time. Still, should you be able to finish a couple of surveys a day, that could translate to quite a bit of money in a month’s time.
Then, some companies don’t hand out cash rewards. These businesses usually mail you certain products for free, so you can review them. Not bad at all, especially if you’re interested in what they have to offer.
It’s Okay to Answer Surveys, but Be Careful
While it’s been established that legitimate survey firms exist, that doesn’t mean no one won’t try to scam you in this type of market. There are “companies” that would actually try to sell the information on your profile for profit.
So, really, the most important step before signing up to do a survey is to verify that a company won’t be selling your personal information. That means checking the privacy policy section in their contracts. If it seems this section is non-existent or states that your information can be shared, definitely reconsider signing up with that company.
