How to recruit participants for a Qualtrics survey

Before you start

You need a finished Qualtrics survey, a lab account on a participant platform with funds added, and a draft study with your survey link. Write down how long the survey really takes: you'll use it to set fair pay.

1. Save participant IDs as embedded data

Participants arrive at your survey with their IDs added to the link. Qualtrics only keeps them if you tell it to. In Survey flow, add a Set Embedded Data element, move it to the very top, and create three fields named exactly PARTICIPANT_ID, STUDY_ID and SESSION_ID, each set to “Value will be set from Panel or URL”.

These IDs connect each response to a submission, so you can approve work, pay bonuses and exclude people later without guessing.

2. Send participants back with a completion code

At the end of your survey flow, add an End of Survey element, choose Customize, tick Override Survey Options and choose Redirect to a URL. Paste the completion address from your study page. When participants reach it, the platform records that they finished and sends their submission to your review queue.

If your survey has several endings, such as finishing, being screened out or failing a check, give each its own completion code so each ending does the right thing.

3. Screen people out fairly

If you need people with specific characteristics that the platform can't screen on, ask your screening questions first, then use branch logic to end the survey early for people who don't qualify. Send them back with a screen-out code and pay them for the minutes they spent. Screen-outs shouldn't count as rejections against anyone.

4. Build in quality checks

Plan your checks before you collect data, and write your exclusion rules down.

• —One or two fair attention checks that tell people exactly what to answer.
• —Timing: very fast completions compared with the median are worth a closer look.
• —Open-ended questions that need a specific, personal answer, which bots and AI tools handle poorly.
• —Qualtrics' own bot detection option in the survey's security settings, if your license includes it.
• —A quality snippet in the survey header that counts pastes, tab switches and typing speed without recording answers.

5. Test before you launch

Preview the study as a participant. Check that the three IDs appear in your Qualtrics data, that every ending redirects to the right code, and that the survey works on the devices you allow. A test session costs nothing and catches nearly every setup mistake.

6. Launch and review

Set the reward from the realistic time, not the fastest one, so the hourly rate stays fair. Review submissions promptly and give a clear reason for any rejection; participants depend on that pay and many platforms let them appeal.