You know the internet is full of opportunities. In this digital world, you can do anything you want at your own convenience. With a computer and the internet, you have no constraints on location or time whatsoever.
Making passive income online is one of such great opportunity. You could create an income stream in your free time or even when you are bored.
One such opportunity is taking surveys online.
How does it work?
It is simple. Follow these steps
Step 1: You sign up for a survey site and list all your interest area or go through their questionnaire.
Step 2: Then they would start sending survey based on your inputs.
Step 3: You take the surveys and they would either pay you cash or points that can be redeemed for cash or gift cards.
Who is it for?
These survey sites are for anyone.
It could be
- Teenagers
- Stay at home people
- or anyone has some spare time
How do you know if an online survey site is legitimate?
Many times you come across many of these ads and offers and only on signup you realize that it is a spam and tried to gather your personal information.
Here some of the guidelines to tell whether a site is legitimate or not.
Free
A survey site should be free to sign up, you are there to make money and if the site charges you then it doesn’t make sense.
Spam Ads
Be careful when you signup through ads, many of such ads are not legitimate. Unless you have heard about it earlier don’t click the ads.
Get you to give your personal information
Be cautious of the site that requests more information than basic details. Most of the site would like to know your personal preference and interest. But if they are asking for your SSN and credit card then something is not correct.
Unreasonable promises
Some site will promise the whole world to you. They claim you can replace your full-time income or many other things.
Understand these sites are survey sites and its totally passive income, you can never make a living out of it.
Google to see any spam report
In the case of doubt quickly Google to see any spam reports or complaints about that business.
Why do companies pay to take a survey?
Understanding the business model is important to take the decision on whether to invest time or not.
The companies and organization often need to survey common people to collect data to take critical decisions. They use these sites to collect that information for them.
Market research
One area the surveys are used is for market research. You might have heard about many research data saying so much % of households use such and such products. This kind of data is derived from these surveys.
People demographics
To identify the patterns in the people demographics. Like people who earn more than 10k has a car in their house.
Product to market fit
Companies also use these surveys to test a product out in the market even before they launched. Brands use these surveys to look for patterns and identify whether people would buy their products or not.
Reports for the public interest
Sometimes organization also conduct surveys to identify public interest. People thoughts on certain cause and so on.
How many surveys can I take?
Once you sign up the sites would send you an invitation on the surveys as they become available.
You can choose to take a survey.
The surveys are sent to you based on your
- Demographics – You location, ethnicity, gender and so on
- Interests – Your expressed interested on certain topic
- Behavior with taking surveys – The data based on your previous surveys.
How much time should you commit to?
It’s totally up to you, you can choose to take a survey or not.
No contract or obligation to take all the surveys. Based on your convenience and preference you can take surveys.
Most of the survey could take 10 mins or less. Depending on the topic some could take longer too.
Here are the once I picked that I found good.
- Survey Junkie
- American Consumer Opinion
- Survey Club
- Clear Voice Surveys
- Product Report Card
- Pinecone Research
- YouGov
- PanelBuck
- Harris Poll Online
- Opinion Outpost
- Prize Rebel
- PaidSurveys
- SaySo4Profit
- ProOpinion
- VIP Voice
These are survey sites who could change their terms or business model depending on the market trends. So do your own research and see if it meets your needs before signing up.
Conclusion
Taking online surveys are not going to make you rich. These are just some options if you have any spare time. They bring you some passive income and often you would also find some surveys entertaining.