Whenever you search for ways to make money online, it is common to find “online surveys” mentioned in the list. But you may feel doubtful and ponder “do surveys really work?”
Taking surveys is considered by many as one of the most common and easiest ways to earn money online. However, the big question is, do we really earn money from doing online surveys? If yes, how much is it and how much work does it actually involve.
How do Surveys Really Work – For Making Money Online?
The way it works when it comes to making money online through surveys is that companies pay you either in cash, products or gift cards to answer a bunch of questions. These questions will then be used as data or in marketing purposes for the company.
If you’re considering doing surveys as an option to make money online, we will not tell you it’s the best option out there. But it does work, however, the payouts may seem a bit small for the amount of time put into it.
How Do Surveys Really Work – For Companies?
We often see articles in newspapers or online with headlines such as “7 out of 10 people…” sharing results of what they had found out. From where do such statistics come from? That’s from the surveys. All those still wondering “do surveys really work” should reconsider their thoughts because even corporate individuals rely on the surveys.
Whenever companies want to find out their customers’ preferences, needs, likes and dislikes, they use surveys to collect data. They might then send the results of those surveys to journalists to get some exposure and publicity, resulting in increased sales.
Many companies outsource their surveys to professionals. These companies have a database of people who have signed up to fill such surveys. They then contact the respondents who are the most suitable to fill the survey and offer some benefit for doing so.
Taking online surveys is a compelling task. The process is simple and usually involves the following steps:
1. Find a Company
- First things first, you need to find a company for signing up. Beware of scams though. Find a legitimate company that rewards for taking surveys and where your personal information is kept confidential.
2. Create a Profile
- Create and fill out a profile for that company. Once you do so, you would start getting emails for available surveys matching your demographics with the targeted demographic population of those surveys.
3. Match the Criterion
- Some of these surveys can be on an immediate basis. However, for others, you may require to answer a few questions to ensure if you fit their targeted audience. If you match the criterion, you can take the survey.
4. Answer Questions
- Taking the survey means that you would have to answer a few questions. Some questions would be comprised of multiple-choice questions, while some of them would be descriptive, requiring details answers.
5. Rewards
- After you have completed the survey, you earn rewards.
Can You Make Money with Survey Sites?
This is an important question to ask before signing up for survey sites. Taking surveys do bring some money, but the reward system varies for each company. Some companies give points that can be redeemed later in the form of cash or gift vouchers. Others offer products in return for surveys, while some transfer the money immediately to your PayPal account.
Following are some ways survey companies reward for taking surveys:
Monetary Rewards:
- Monetary rewards for taking surveys are usually too low, from $1 to $5 per survey. If you take many surveys in a day, then you might be able to earn some good amount. But, that is possible only if you sign up to a number of companies, and you are in a demographic that is surveyed a lot.
Free Products and Gift vouchers:
- Some companies do not give monetary benefits to taking surveys. They usually offer free products that you need to test for the survey. This definitely can be a useful means to get some free products for daily use or your household. This may help you save some money that you otherwise have to spend buying those things.
Entry into Sweepstakes Drawing:
- Some other companies will enter your name into sweepstakes drawing when you take a survey. The more surveys you take, the greater the chances of winning. This implies that you don’t need to get a reward immediately. However, if you do, there are usually some good prizes that include cash, products, and gift cards/vouchers.
Referral rewards:
- Last but not least, if you refer someone to survey companies like Swagbucks, they also offer cash, or points, or prizes, which is another way of earning a few bucks.
This implies that most of the survey sites offer incentives and rewards of some kind, but it is not necessarily in the form of cash or money. Yes, you can make money from survey sites, but it is just not as easy as people would have you believe. This is because of the following reasons:
- As I already stated, not all companies give cash rewards. Those who do reward in the form of cash, the amount per survey is really low.
- Often, people get rejected after answering a few questions since they do not fit their targeted demographic audience of the survey.
- While some reputable survey sites will reject you at the beginning of the survey so that your time is not wasted, some of them are not as reputable to let you continue. Fill in almost the entire survey before they tell you that you do not match the required demographic for it. So you give all the information, waste so much of your time and get no reward credit.
Do You Earn Money if the Surveys Work?
After getting an answer for “do surveys really work”, the next questions that may come in your mind are, if you can earn from it, how much per hour? Are there any limits? Are surveys really worth it? We hope you can relate to these questions.
Whenever you try to find out how much money you can make by taking online surveys, you come across articles with authors who claim to make hundreds of dollars a month for only a couple of hours of work per day. However, that is not the case. They might have been stating the truth regarding the money they make, but it will not possibly be a work of just a couple of hours.
Explore the Process
- It requires answering surveys for a lot more hours each day to make even a hundred dollars each week. So, how much you make mainly depends on the amount of time you spend on taking online surveys.
- Secondly, it also depends on the number of sites you join. You cannot get enough surveys fitting your demographics from just one platform. So you have to join several such sites to get enough surveys matching your profile.
- Thirdly, it also depends on your demographics. Some demographics are incredibly helpful for market research companies, while others are not so much in demand. If you fall into the first category, then it might be possible that you can make a decent amount. On the other hand, some people are not lucky to make $1 every month even though they are a member of 10 different survey platforms.
- Lastly, the money you can make also depends on the survey length of the surveys you get. Some of them are longer and might give $10 for about an hour of work while some are shorter and might offer $1 for about 5 minutes of work.
Do Surveys Really Work? – Yes, They Do!
To conclude, taking online surveys are not a quick route to riches. This means that you would require spending some severe amount of time actually to get something worthwhile. It is a decent way of earning some extra cash to pay off your debts or for some extra money to spend on holidays. If you add up the free products you get, entries into sweepstakes, and other rewards, it may be worth the effort.
However, if you are planning to make it a full-time job, it is not a wise decision to do so. If you are looking for some things you could do to make more money, with lesser hassle, then jobs such as data entry, transcribing, and other small freelance tasks can bring more money than taking surveys. We hope you’ve now got your answer to the question “do surveys really work?”