How Much Can You Really Make With Online Paid Surveys
If you have been online for any amount of time, you have likely seen the ads or received emails telling you how much money you can easily make by taking online paid surveys. It is particularly attractive to beginning web marketers because it seems so simple. Just sign up for online surveys and watch the money roll in. How simple is it really and how much can you make?
If you start your search for online paid survey companies, you will find some that will charge you $30 to $60 to get a list of companies that are running surveys. Then you have to contact these companies and register before actually taking a survey. This can be tedious, and not all the companies on the list will have a survey that you qualify for. So this approach not only costs you money, but it can take time before you see a paycheck.
You will also find that only a small percent of the companies on the list will be valid and useful. With some diligence, you can find the same companies that are running surveys for free. So paying for a list may save a little time, but if you are starting out and want to do it on a limited budget, there are better ways.
Survey companies online reward you for your work. It can be either in the form of cash, or points system or lucky draws. There are some companies who pay their customer cash for their time. You can get paid $1 to $20 or even more for every online survey you complete. There are some great survey sites like Ciao Surveys, American Consumer Opinion Panel which you can access. You can get 1 to 4 surveys every month and this number varies with each survey site.
If you don’t mind a points system, check out companies like Global Test Market, Mysurvey and Opinion Post. Check their conversion rate of points to reward and make sure they have items that you would like. You don’t want to spend a lot of time earning points when you cannot find anything you want to redeem them for.
Other companies will enter you into a sweepstake or lucky draw for completing a survey. This is probably the least preferred way to “get paid”, as you may get nothing for your time. But if you participate in a combination of cash, points and sweepstake survey companies, you will be making some cash and entering a sweepstake can add some fun too. Companies that offer sweepstakes include Synovate, NOP World and Nielsen Netratings.
People in the US and Canada have more opportunity to earn money with paid online surveys. That’s because there are more companies doing surveys in those countries, so there are more surveys available.
The bottom line is that doing paid online surveys is a legitimate way to make some money. But like the saying goes, don’t quit your day job. You probably won’t make enough to replace your full time job. But you can earn yourself some extra spending cash each month, and that isn’t bad for just letting others know your opinions.