Beware of "Paid Surveys"

Can I really get paid up to $100 an hour
to sit around in my pajamas taking surveys?

Let me state the truth very plainly: No!

How's that for honesty? The real truth is that no, you will not get paid $100 an hour for this kind of work. The real numbers are quite a bit lower. That's the truth that no one else is telling you.

But there is a way to get paid $75 to $100 an hour doing this kind of work. No joke. It's really kinda like a secret. I'll tell you in a minute.

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Update -- July 29th, 2010 : I just found a way to do this for FREE! The websites below charge $34.95 for their service, but I just found a GREAT site that GIVES their survey company list away for FREE. Go here: SurveyMoneyMachine.com. It really is absolutely free. I signed up and found all the same survey sites as the paying services below. Taking surveys for money has been around for a long time, but finally, someone's giving the information away for free. In fact, as of today I recommend you don't even bother looking at the sites we review below. All you need is SurveyMoneyMachine.

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First, let me tell you what you can expect from paid survey sites. They all cost pretty much the same to join--between 35 and 39 dollars. What you get is an extensive list of marketing research companies that really do want to know what you think about certain products. And yes, they are willing to pay you.

Here's the real truth about paid survey sites: 1. Do I really get paid for taking surveys? Yes, you do get paid. That is an absolute. If you take a $10 survey, you get paid $10. By contract and by law, they HAVE to pay you. 2. Can I get paid 25 dollars per survey? No, don't expect $25 per survey. After you have proven yourself with some of the survey companies, you will start getting $25 surveys. You have to show to them that you are reliable and a good observer. It's also affected by your demographics. Moms are some of the highest sought-after opinions. 3. How much can I expect to get paid? I hate to say "It depends" because that's such a weak answer, but the truth is that it does. The good news is that it mostly depends on you. Your opinions are highly valued by the market research companies. They honestly can't find enough people to survey about their clients' products, so they are willing to pay for your opinion. The key is that they are looking for certain people, of certain ages, with certain interests in certain parts of the world. So you will not be a match for some of the surveys. The way you work this to your benefit is by signing up with several survey companies -- it's a free registration process. The more research companies you sign with, the more surveys you will match for. 4. So can I expect to make even a $1000 a month? Actually, yes, that is a very achievable number. Surveys paying $10 are easy to come by and just doing 3 or 4 of those a day puts you over $1000 per month. Here's the cool part: there is a way that you can at least double that amount if you want to. Keep reading. 5. I've heard that some of the survey companies only register you for drawings. Is that true? Yes. Some market research companies only reward their survey takers with a registration for a drawing for an iPod or an iPhone or an LCD TV, or something like that. But this is actually good news! Here's a little known secret about that: when most survey takers see that they are only going to get entered into a drawing (i.e. no cash), they don't take those surveys! That means that the odds of winning for those who do enter go WAY up! You could enter into drawings every day for prizes that very few people are competing for. After you win a few items, you might start doing "paid" surveys only to get the prizes. Not a lot of people are doing this so far. It's a huge untapped resource people just don't know about yet.

Here it is: Focus Groups.

You should become a member of one of the services below for this benefit alone! Do you know what a Focus Group is? Very simply, it is a group of people who are brought together to discuss a particular item for an hour or so. The item could be a TV show, a new kind of potato chip, an electric toothbrush, GM trucks, a new refrigerator, you name it. I get invited to focus groups ALL the time. They usually last about an hour and the LEAST amount of money that has ever been offered is $75. They're usually $100 or more. You come together and talk about your experiences with the product, possible ideas about how to improve it, and then as you walk out, they hand you a nice $100 check! I'm serious. It's that easy. The great part about it is that it's fun too!

Sometimes it's just a phone interview. Just the other day I was offered $100 for a 45 minute phone interview!

Focus Groups is the beautiful little secret about signing up for paid surveys. Here's how to do it. On any of the survey services listed below, sign up for the companies that do Focus Groups. There are Focus Groups happening all over the world. Even in the smaller communities. Once you start getting emails for Focus Groups, show up on time and be helpful with your evaluations. You will soon find that you are very much in demand by the Focus Group companies and your email will fill up with high paying Focus Group opportunities. Also, the more you do these, the more value YOU have as an evaluator. Eventually you get invited to "elite" groups where you will get paid even more--AND you get a LOT more invitations!

How does an extra $2,000 per month sound?

Honestly, an extra $2,000 a month is not difficult. Here's how you do it: Take three $10 surveys a day (about a 30 minute investment), then do 3 focus groups or phone interviews a week (a lot of these are done on Saturdays or in the evenings). The surveys for money would pull in $900 a month and the Focus Groups would pull in $1200 a month. That's $2100 per month in your spare time.

There is no end to the surveys that can be taken, so if you want to do more than 3 a day, go for it!

Here's what Sundee Allgood wrote to tell me recently: Scott, Just wanted to let you know that I signed up with Survey Scout on Friday. They were having a promotion to enroll for only $35, and I have already received $13. And that is only signing up for 3 of the survey sites in their list. Thanks for the information and I will keep you posted on my success. I always knew that my opinion mattered, I just can't believe that I am getting paid for it! -- Sundee Allgood, NYC

Sign up for one of the services listed below. My favorite is Survey Money Machine because it's free, but if you insist on paying, I also like Survey Scout and Make Money Taking Surveys.

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