The Five-Minute Profile Checklist: Get Invited to Surveys That Fit You
Your profile is how a survey site guesses which surveys you'll qualify for. A thin profile means more guessing, and more guessing means more "sorry, you don't qualify." Five minutes spent on it now saves a lot of wasted starts later.
Why your profile matters so much
When a client asks for "dog owners aged 35 to 54 who shop online weekly," the survey site looks at its members' profiles to decide who gets the invitation. If you've never said you have a dog, you won't see that survey at all. If you said so two years ago and the dog is no longer with you, you'll get the invite, start it and fail the screener.
Many sites also use your profile to skip questions they already know the answer to, so a complete profile can mean shorter screeners as well as better matches.
The checklist
Work through these in order. The first three come up in almost every survey.
- Basics. Age, gender, country and postcode or ZIP code. Location is used constantly, so update it as soon as you move.
- Household. Who lives with you, how many children and their ages, and pets. Parent and pet-owner surveys are common and targeted closely.
- Work. Whether you're employed, your job title, industry and company size, and whether you help decide what your workplace buys. Business surveys are less frequent but often pay more, and they're targeted almost entirely on these fields.
- Money and home. Household income range, whether you own or rent, and recent large purchases.
- Vehicles. What you drive, and whether you plan to buy a car soon.
- Technology. Your phone, computer, internet provider and the streaming services you use.
- Shopping and media. Where you shop, how often, and what you read, watch and listen to.
- Health. Only what you're comfortable sharing. You can usually skip this section. You'll miss some health surveys, but that's your call.
Keep it honest
It's tempting to add things that might make you look like a more "interesting" survey taker. It doesn't work. Say you own a boat and you'll be sent boat surveys, which will ask questions you can't answer, and the screener or a later consistency check will remove you. Do that often enough and the site may stop trusting your answers altogether.
Honest profiles also make the research useful, which is the reason companies pay for surveys in the first place.
When to update it
| When this happens | Update these sections |
|---|---|
| You move | Basics, Money and home, Technology (internet provider) |
| You change jobs or stop working | Work, Money and home |
| Someone joins or leaves your household | Household |
| You buy a car, phone or major appliance | Vehicles, Technology, Money and home |
| Nothing has changed in three months | Skim everything once, and answer any new profile questions the site has added |
What about privacy?
Profile answers are used to match you with surveys. A reputable site explains in its privacy policy how it uses and shares that data, and lets you skip questions you'd rather not answer. If a site asks for bank passwords, card numbers or copies of ID just to fill in a profile, stop and check whether it's legitimate.
This is part of a 4-part guide on survey screen-outs. The main article covers all five reasons you get screened out.