Online survey incentives - Guaranteed rewards
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Posted by: Todd Hollander in Respondent Incentives
Incentives offered to everyone who completes the survey are known as “one-to-one rewards” or “direct incentives.” Here are the pros and cons for this type of incentive.
Pros
The argument in favor of this type of incentive is that it increases the response rate because every respondent is rewarded for participating. When surveying professionals (doctors, attorneys, etc.), a fairly high cash reward for each respondent is generally the norm.
Cons
For consumer surveys, many projects lack a sufficient budget to offer an incentive that actually appeals to potential respondents. In the U.S., the average budget for a consumer incentive is approximately one dollar. Thus, the preponderance of stress balls, golf tees, etc.
Another problem with one-to-one incentives is the lack of an effective method for making small cash payments to large numbers of people. Many panel providers have worked around this problem by creating their own micropayment systems, usually based on respondents collecting points that can be exchanged for cash or merchandise.
The requirement to ship the incentive to each respondent significantly reduces the list of possible incentive items because only very lightweight items can be affordably mailed to respondents. As a rule, if the total cost for a one-to-one incentive (product cost plus shipping cost) exceeds one dollar, this approach generally loses its cost advantage.
Many experts caution against using incentives for some kinds of research, particularly projects in which respondents can be self-referred. For example, if a Web site has a banner inviting all visitors to take part in a survey and guaranteeing them a prize for participating, it runs the risk of attracting “professional respondents” (people who complete the survey just to win the reward). The responses of such respondents are often dishonest.
A final consideration with one-to-one incentives is that it can be important to take preventative measures to safeguard the budget from an unexpectedly high response rate. If the survey programming includes a limit on the number of interviews that will be completed, the survey is closed to respondents as soon as the quota is achieved.
The bottom line: one-to-one incentives can be effective at increasing response rates, particularly among high-income respondents. For consumer surveys, however, this type of incentive can be less effective.
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