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Such advertisements are usually put up by paid survey database companies likeSurveyscout. They charge you for giving access to a database of market researchcompanies, often in the range of $30 to $60. They typically have 400 to 500 surveycompanies in their database.
Is it worth paying these companies to get access to such a database? Whateverinformation you get from these companies, you can get for free on the internet onmany free online survey sites. Secondly, these survey database companies do not sendany surveys by themselves, and you have to join each market research company intheir database individually to get any surveys. In addition, most of the surveycompanies in their databases are good for nothing. Only about 40 to 50 surveycompanies are really worth joining.
What does this mean? If you are planning to try online surveys, you never have topay anyone. You can get the list of the best survey companies for free on theinternet. You can join them and get started.
Now let us take a closer look at on the rewards offered by paid online surveys.Survey companies can be divided into those which reward you with cash for eachsurvey, those that give you points which can be redeemed for cash, and those whichenter you into sweepstakes or prize draws.
Survey companies that pay cash give $1 to $20 or more per online survey depending onmany factors. This group includes many of the best survey sites like AmericanConsumer Opinion Panel, Surveysavvy, Ciao Surveys, Greenfield online(Gozing) andPinecone Research. You can expect to get 1 to 4 surveys per month from each site.
Surveys that reward you with points let you accumulate reward points which you canlater redeem for cash or gifts. Some of the most reputed market research companieslike Globaltestmarket, Opinion Outpost, NFO Mysurvey and Lightspeed Research rewardyou in this way.
Yet other companies enter you into draws for cash or gifts as reward for takingsurveys. Although many people don't like this form of reward system, your chances ofgetting the prize are quite good as the pool to select the prize winners is usuallysmall. Some good survey companies that follow this reward system are Synovate, NPDResearch, NOP World (Surveys.com), ECN Research and Nielsen Netratings.
Another important factor which determines how much you can earn from online surveysis your profile, particularly your country. Generally residents of the USA andCanada can expect to make more money from paid surveys, as there are more marketresearch companies operating in these countries. Also they get more frequentsurveys. However, participants from other countries can also hope to make some goodextra money from paid online surveys.
All said and done, the maximum earnings an average person can expect from doing paidsurveys are not more than $200 to $300 per month. This can be a good source of extraincome for some people. But the claims that paid surveys can make you rich orreplace your real job are largely unfounded. Hence, it is always best to stay withfree paid surveys.
