At Patternmakers, we use incentives for participants who take part in our research projects. This page explains why we use incentives and what we consider in designing appropriate incentives.
What are incentives?
Incentives can take a number of forms, such as cash, a gift card or gift such as movie tickets. In line with industry practice, incentives are usually given to all participants who attend focus groups. For surveys, usual industry practice is to run a Prize Draw, whereby all respondents have a chance to win a prize.
We govern our use of incentives by the Australian Market and Social Research Society (AMSRS), and relevant State/Territory guidelines on prize draws.
Why we use incentives?
At Patternmakers we use incentives for two reasons.
Firstly, they are used to motivate participation and ensure the best possible response rate in surveys and attendance for focus groups. Administering research processes involves significant investment of time and money, and we want to make sure we maximise participation and hear from as many people as possible.
Secondly, we use incentives to motivate people who aren’t engaged with the subject organisation for the research topic. Research has shown that using incentives helps reduce bias by motivating a broad range of people to participate.
In our experience, a lack of incentive for participants results in poor levels of attendance, and skewed participation, leading to inefficiencies in our overall research project. Not using incentives can affect the robustness of the data collected.
As a research agency, it is our job to ensure we achieve target response rates for the highest level of rigour possible. When working with clients, we will always negotiate the nature of the incentive to align with the organisation’s model.
How do cash incentives work?
If you have signed up to participate in a focus group with a cash incentive, the incentive will be paid on the day, at the conclusion of the group.
The facilitator will distribute the incentives to all participants present on the night. If you cannot make it on the day, unfortunately we cannot pay the incentive.
How do Prize Draws work?
If you have completed a survey with a prize draw, you will be asked to provide your name and contact details at the end of the survey. These details are confidential and will not be connected with your survey responses, unless you give your explicit permission.
At the end of the survey, you will also be able to read the terms of the draw, including what date the prize will be drawn and how the winner will be contacted.
We select the winner using a random number generator. The winner is then contacted by email. If we do not hear back from with winner within two weeks, we will select another winner.
You can read more about the AMSRS Guideline on Incentives for Participation in Market and Social Research here:
About the Author
Tandi Palmer Williams
Managing Director
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