How Incentives Can Determine the Success of Market Research Studies

Online marketplaces like Amazon, Uber and Airbnb have enjoyed extraordinary growth and success over the last ten years. Their outstanding performance is a testament to the fact that they have winners on both sides of their respective marketplaces. That is, the supply and demand sides both must win for transactions to take place. The seller and buyer; the host and guest; the passenger and driver must all feel satisfied with the transaction to ensure a thriving marketplace.

The very same principles apply to the Respondent marketplace. On the demand side we have the researchers who are in demand of respondents’ time. They can ‘buy’ a research interview with an incentive, which can be thought of as a price willing to pay. On the supply side we have the respondents, who can decide if they’re willing to supply their time, experience and expertise in exchange for the advertised incentive.

Respondents are selling their time, and researchers are buying it.

The incentive amount posted by a researcher is decisive when recruiting respondents because it determines the value of a respondent’s time. Understanding how to tailor incentives is crucial to the success of your market research study.

How incentives impact recruitment campaigns

• More qualified respondents: A higher incentive will attract more respondents to take your screener survey. This means you’ll have more qualified respondents to choose from. This improves the quality and breadth of your sample, and allows you to feel confident you are talking to the right mix of people.
• Faster recruitment of qualified respondents: Choosing the right incentive will speed up the turnaround time that it takes to recruit a set of suitable respondents. This means you can go from launching the recruitment campaign to conducting the actual research, faster.

What to consider when choosing a suitable incentive

• Population size: You should have a sense as to what percentage of the population are likely be in your target audience. A niche target audience is harder to reach, and therefore, a higher incentive should be offered. Conversely, to recruit a target audience where the population size is large, the incentives can be lower
• Target audience: A higher incentive will be needed to recruit respondents whose time and expertise are in higher demand. For example, an employed professional will value their time differently to a college student.

If you’d like some guidance on how to customize incentives for your next recruitment campaign, please get in touch. We’d love to help!