Professional survey taker
/ prəˈfɛʃənəl ˈsɜːrveɪ ˈteɪkər /
Noun
A person who approaches online surveys primarily to earn money or rewards, often by providing inauthentic or manipulated responses. This behavior undermines the reliability and validity of research data.
The challenge in research today isn’t a lack of data. It's whether we’re collecting the right data. With so many tools at our fingertips, it’s now easier than ever to gather responses quickly. But fast doesn’t mean accurate, and more data doesn’t automatically produce better insights.
Purchasing third-party sample is now as simple as adding items to an online cart. But what are you really getting when you rely on them blindly? Often, the answer is uncertainty. Studies show that up to 40 percent of third-party sample data can be unreliable, due to factors such as inattentive respondents, bots, and participants deliberately providing false answers to earn money. People know there is cash to be made from survey completes, and many are taking full advantage of it, becoming what has been coined “professional survey takers.” Social media is filled with tips and tricks for maximizing rewards, and AI has made it even easier for those participants to deploy bots that churn out responses at scale.
Yet despite these risks, 61% of companies still rely on third-party data as a cornerstone for research and marketing. But it’s nearly impossible to stay competitive when your decisions aren’t grounded in insights from your actual customers. The time you think you’re saving by defaulting to third-party sample as your primary research source often comes back to haunt you. Teams end up spending twice as long re-recruiting participants, re-running surveys, and re-analyzing data, only to implement changes that could have been avoided with reliable customer input from the start. Ensuring quality participants from the very start can dramatically improve the success of your research so invest in the right people first based on your goals, then build your plan from there.
Can We Still Trust Third-party Sample?
Third-party sample isn’t the enemy! In fact, it can be very valuable when used strategically, for example, when entering new markets, validating existing customer feedback, or testing product ideas with broader audiences. But it should never be the foundation of your insights program. The core of strong research is always real customer feedback. Building and engaging a vetted community gives you access to participants who genuinely care about your brand and can provide richer, more reliable data. With the right tools, this process is not only manageable, it’s scalable.
So What’s The Solution? Talk to Your Real Customers.
The most reliable insights come from vetted participants who genuinely care about improving your product and brand. These customers provide rich, actionable feedback that you can trust. Building a community of them gives you on-demand access to insights, and with today’s technology, managing and engaging that audience has never been easier.
Many assume this kind of customer data is difficult or time-consuming to access, but that’s no longer the case. At Alida, we’ve seen companies of every size, whether a single researcher or a team of twenty, identify the right customers, collect meaningful insights, and deliver actionable results across their organizations in days, not months.
Take Wendy’s as an example. The American fast-food leader uses the Alida platform to confidently validate and de-risk product launches through ongoing feedback from a dedicated customer community. Highly profiled members allow Wendy’s to segment participants by demographics, purchase history, and more, enabling them to uncover nuanced product appeal across a variety of different buyer groups. Alida’s recruitment tools also allow them to run focus groups quickly. “We can now have a face-to-face conversation from anywhere and set it up in days instead of a three-to-four-week process,” a vision Wendy’s calls “always-on qualitative research.”
Competitive businesses know that good decisions come from good data, and good data starts with the right people. With so many research solutions available today, there’s no reason to settle for unreliable data. Choose a provider who will be your partner in building a customer community and can also provide the option for third-party sample when needed, all in a single platform…they exist! (Visit alida.com to learn more.)
