10%-15% is the typical lift in response rate that occurs when incentives are used with surveys according to PeoplePulse. That’s a big difference, especially if you are with a market research company and surveys are an important part of your business. And PeoplePlus is not the only company to report better response rates when survey incentives are used. Here are 5 studies that prove survey incentives boost response rates big time!
- “Incentives can increase survey response rates dramatically. Our experience has shown that offering a worthwhile incentive can entice up to 50% of the people who would not normally complete the survey, to finish it and send it in. This applies to both paper and pencil surveys and ones that are presented on the Internet.” – John Towler, a Psychologist and Senior Partner of Creative Organizational Design
- “… vouchers seem to be the most effective incentive in long questionnaires, while prize draws are more efficient in short surveys. A follow-up study revealed that prize draws with small prizes, but a higher chance of winning are most effective in increasing the response rate.” – A study of Response Rates and Response Quality of Internet-based Surveys by Maastricht University in the Netherlands
- “As an incentive our client offered one license of their software package for everyday the survey was online that would be raffled off to 7 lucky respondents. This was very effective and yielded over a 20% response rate.” – Jonathan Nye – Research Info
- “Response rates vary widely for different types of surveys. Customer satisfaction surveys and market research surveys often have response rates in the 10% – 30% range. Employee surveys typically have a response rate of 25% – 60%. Regardless of the type of survey you are conducting, you can have a major effect on the number of respondents who complete your survey when an incentive is added” – CustomInsight
- In a study conducted by e-Rewards Market Research, two random samples invited 4,000 peoples each to complete a survey based on either a sweepstakes drawing of $2,500 or $2 in cash for each completed survey. It was a one-minute survey about books and music. Within 7 days, there was a 19.3% response rate for the $2 sample and 12.2% for the $2500 sweepstakes sample. This was 10%-15% higher than response rate without a survey incentive. – PeoplePulse
If your challenge is to boost response rates, when your company designs its next online survey, that’s where Virtual Incentives and Virtual Visa® Reward Card comes in. What could be more appealing to respondents than the ability to immediately use a reward online wherever Visa® is accepted? They even have the option of depositing their reward directly to their bank accounts. An incentive that offers that kind of instant gratification, choice and control can increase both response rates and regard for your company. Do these studies prove how survey incentives boost response rates? Could a Virtual Visa® Reward Card be the answer? Do you want to learn more for the next time your company executes a survey?