Monday, August 26, 2013

Focusline Online Surveys: A Cautionary Tale


Avoid encounters that could lead to your being bumped off survey site


As an avid online survey taker I am very aware of the pitfalls that sometimes open up – often unexpectedly (and unjustifiably) – when you take online surveys. Here’s a cautionary tale that occurred to me recently.
Focusline is one of the better online survey sites. It offers a plethora of surveys to take almost every day and you can accumulate rewards (which you can transfer to cash or get prizes) fairly quickly. I’ve highly recommended it in the past and continue to do so.
However, like other survey sites, Focusline can get quite sneaky. Recently, I’d accumulated enough reward points, $50, to take a cash payout. But, when I proceeded to the reward site I was unable to complete my cash out transaction. Repeated emails to the company proved fruitless. I was getting pretty upset about this when I finally received a response that said my account had been suspended because I had been tagged for taking surveys to rapidly.
Speed Kills
Now, being dinged for speeding through surveys is not a new experience. I’ve often preached that moving rapidly through surveys is the only way you’ll every make a decent amount of money doing online surveys – although never enough to make it anywhere near your sole source of income. Accordingly, I’m fairly careful about this and I’ve taken several precautions – such as opening two windows simultaneously and doing surveys from two sites at the same time – something you should do as well.
I’m pretty sure my speeding through surveys was not something I’d been doing on Focusline, but whether I had or not is not the issue as far as I’m concerned.
Survey companies, I’ve found, do a number of things that are annoying and border on unfair (e.g. not rewarding you for surveys you complete, taking a percentage out of your rewards for their “expenses” and more). But, in this case what was particularly annoying is that 1) there was no warning that there was a problem, 2) the money I was legitimately due was taken, and 3) the confiscation and the closing of my account only came when I was near cashing out my accumulated rewards (if I was truly speeding along, why no cut-off when I had only a few cents or dollars accumulated instead of being at my cash out threshold?).
Be Cautious, But Fast
So, the lesson here is to be cautious. Fortunately, in pleading my case I was reinstated. Does that mean I’m going to slow down or do anything differently? Not a chance. I’m not wedded to any one survey site and there are plenty out there that I could spend my time on and get rewarded for. Well, perhaps I’ll take a half second longer, but that’s the limit of the changes I’ll make.
The online survey businesses would love to hold your attention for long periods of time in order to market their wares to you. If you’ve got oodles of time on your hand, great. But, if you value your time and you realize that the rewards are meager anyway, I’d say follow my advice and proceed with all due haste through your survey experiences. I’ve got other tips on survey taking and you can read more at http://surveysheriff.blogspot.com/.

Saturday, August 17, 2013

NiceQuest: A Foreign-Based Survey Site


Online survey sites can emanate from anywhere in the world. Here’s one


You may be an online survey aficionado, like me, and you don’t often know – let alone care – where the survey originates. But, just for the record, survey sites can be based in almost any country in the world. And while it is not too common for you to receive a survey invitation from a site that is based in another country with a different language than your own – occasionally it does happen.
Take for example a survey I recently received from a company called Nicequest (nicequest.com). The survey itself was much like any other. But, when I followed the survey link to find out more about the company that hosted the survey I found myself on a website that was in Spanish. Fortunately, I used the translation option using Google Translate and the full site appeared in English.
Foreign Based Survey Company
Once I had the site translated I was able to see that the company specializes in surveys in Latin America, Spain and Portugal (it seems to have offices in all three locations). So, why did the survey land in my inbox? I’m not sure if it was in error or intentional. Either way I earned points for completing the survey (which I received via a survey portal – I think it was Toluna), so I didn’t really care where it originated.
Nicequest seems to host other survey panels (Panelnetquest and Survey Manager are two listed on the site). The company has been around since 2001.
So, is taking a foreign-based survey a problem? Probably not since many surveys you’ll receive from any number of survey portals originate in foreign countries and/or may be from survey companies that are outside your particular geographic location.
Of course, most surveys are data collection entities and taking surveys inherently means someone is trying to collect information about you. If that’s a problem for you then you probably should not be taking online surveys at all. And, as I’ve written before, you should take precautions (don’t reveal to much information – e.g. if a site asks for your Social Security Number, that’s a big no-no.). Likewise I take other precautions (e.g. a birth date may not be exact, etc.) and so should you.

Saturday, August 10, 2013

Brainjuicer: A Quirky Online Survey, Research Company


This survey/marketing company is strange and they like it that way


If you participate in online surveys, every once in a while you’ll find a survey conducted by something called Brainjuicer. I have and I can’t say it’s been very enjoyable (long surveys, and other requirements that are a turn off for me), but that’s just me. You may find their survey offers fun and interesting. But what, or who, is Brainjuicer?
Like most survey generating companies, Brainjuicer is a market research organization. It was founded in the United Kingdom in 1999 by its head honcho (or Chief Juicer as he likes to call himself) John Kearon. It boasts a client list that includes the likes of Nestle, Kraft and Nike.
Like many marketing agencies Brainjuicer touts itself as “translating a generation of breakthroughs in psychology, behavioral economics and social sciences.” What marketing agency doesn’t wrap itself in some kind of ‘special’ ability to seek out data from the masses it surveys? It’s pretty much the same, no matter how they phrase it.

Quirky Company

The quirkiness of Brainjuicer is evident when you go to its website at brainjuicer.com/html/stream/home. It makes you feel like you have entered the lair of a mad scientist. It’s so quirky (Flash-based) that the company offers you the preference of going to its alternate site which is a little less, er , energetic, shall we say? Both sites offer the same information.
I don’t see Brainjuicer surveys very often, but when I do I tend to pass on them. They usually mandate that I close other open applications or do something else to accommodate taking their surveys, something I find annoying. Their surveys are usually quite long and I don’t think the points/rewards offered are worth the time it takes to do the surveys. But, that’s the case with a number of survey sites. But, Brainjuicer’s quirkiness sometimes comes through in the way their surveys frame questions. There’s also an intangible element that I can’t quite put my finger on, but the entire experience of taking their surveys turns me off. I just don’t feel like taking the time to take their surveys.
You may feel differently, and that’s ok. But I think the purpose of online surveys is to make it a simple and enjoyable experience for the survey taker and Brainjuicer just doesn’t do that very well, in my view. But, I’ll leave it up to you to decide.

Saturday, August 3, 2013

Myopinionnow is Not an Online Survey Site Worth Bothering with


If you are a devotee of online surveys here’s a review of a site you might want to skip


For those who are fans of online survey sites and just love doing surveys irrespective of the rewards, then any online survey site is fun. But, for the rest of us – which I suspect is most people – there are rewards to be had and the more the better.
Unfortunately MyOpinionNow.com is not a survey site that’s going to earn you much of anything anytime soon.
Based in New Jersey, MON boasts that it “is as straightforward as it sounds: Give your opinions in fun online surveys and earn cash online. There's nothing to lose.” Sadly, there’s not much to gain either. In more than a year of membership I doubt that I’ve received more than a half dozen surveys to take. What’s worse the points I’ve earned are so meager as to be meaningless.
Points Are Very Hard To Earn
Even more disturbing about MON is that even if I had received two or three times the number of surveys and completed them successfully, the accumulation of points wouldn’t have resulted in anything more than the most meager of rewards.
MON’s “Reward Points Program” earnings depend on the length of the survey. So, it won’t matter if you have completed dozens of surveys, the rewards could be infinitesimal if they aren’t long enough and there’s no explanation of what length means. If I take a two hour survey will I earn more? How much more? There’s no way to know. And while points “are redeemable for cash,” you have to accumulate 20,000 points to be able to cash out. This is in spite of MON’s claim that “unlike many other survey websites, which force you to choose from unappealing merchandise prizes,” MON offers something better. Hardly. And what does 20,000 points get you? A meager $20. Levels increase by 20,000 and the payment goes up accordingly. But, in more than a year of diligently completing all the surveys offered, I’ve yet to get farther than 2500 points.
MON also offers bonuses for referring friends to their program. If you value your friendship I’d suggest you not even think about referring a friend. You’re worst enemy? Maybe.
As far as I’m concerned MyOpinionNow deserves a letter grade of F-.