We offer 2 types of participant recruitment:
In-app through an order form — you can set basic demographic information when ordering
Custom recruitment order through our customer success team — you can set more rigid criteria to get the participants you need.
In this article you’ll find a rundown of both recruitment options, how to use them and what to keep in mind before you order participants for your studies.
Use our in-app recruitment service
Participant recruitment options can be very effective if you want fast, pain-free responses with minimal effort. You can access our recruitment service through your account or on the Recruit tab in your study.
After you've launched your study, scroll down to the 'Recruit participants for your study' section in the Recruit tab. Under 'In-app recruitment' click the Order participants button. When you click here, you'll be asked for screening criteria so you can customize your participants and only pay for what you ask for:
Please note, the number of participants is capped at 20,000. If you reach 20,000 participants, your study will be automatically closed.
Custom recruitment orders
If you can't find your ideal participants using the criteria available within our recruitment calculator, reach out to our team to place a custom recruitment order. This is where we put together a tailored recruitment package to directly target your ideal participants. Whether you need stay at home parents who use iPhones or senior executives who carpool to work, we can help you find the people you need.
What you need to know about using our participant recruitment service
We recruit participants remotely from all around the world, and cannot guarantee that everyone will take your study seriously, nor that they’ll give you answers you expect. Most responses will be great. A few might not be.
We can guarantee, however, that participants who may have given poor responses will be replaced at no charge.
This can happen in two ways:
If a participant doesn't complete your study correctly, their response will be flagged in-app and you can then choose to replace that participant. You can replace up to 90% of your participants within 30 days.
If a participant skips all questions or sorts cards in a particular way, they will be automatically replaced (i.e. their response won't even make it into your participant results).
Take a look at our article on replacing participants in-app for more detailed information.
Rules for recruiting participants
Study must be live
Your study must be live before you can recruit participants so that they can receive a live study link. You'll see the option to order participants on your Studies dashboard:
Participants will be anonymous
Participants recruited via our service will not be asked for an email address or other identifier. Any other participants you invite will still be required to enter an email address or other identifier if set.
We ask that you don't ask for identifying information in pre- and post-study questions (names, emails, location, and so on). These questions will stop your order from being processed.
We make sure that your study meets these requirements before we send it to our participants.
Studies must be customized to match the language for your participants
If you’re recruiting participants from other countries through our recruitment service, the language of your study needs to match the language of the country your participants are from. You can change the language of your study on the Set up tab when designing your study. Any headings and buttons in your study will be automatically translated to the language you selected.
You will still need to write your own pre- and post-study questions, tasks and instructions, as the default text is in English.
Use 'Preview' to see exactly which parts of your study are in the language you select.
Participants will not need a password
If set, participants you order through our recruitment service will not be required to enter a password. Any other participants you recruit yourself will still be required to enter the password you choose.
Participants will not be redirected
If you set a redirect URL on your study, recruited participants will not be redirected on completion. They will see the ‘Thank You’ page instead. Any other participants you invite will be redirected.
OptimalSort card limits
Due to participation time limits from our recruiting partner, closed card sorts may have up to 90 cards and open card sorts may have up to 60 cards.
Getting more participants than you paid for?
At times, we provide extra participants to cover for any potential responses that for any reason don't meet our standards. You won't be charged for these participants.
For example, you might pay for 50 participants, and see that 67 participants have completed your task. In this case, you will only pay for the initial 50 participants you ordered.