An incentive is the payment or reward you give participants for taking part. On a multi-day board, people are asked to come back several days in a row, so when and how you pay affects who finishes and how good their answers are. Pay badly and you lose people. Pay in the wrong way and you may attract people who rush.
Why timing matters on a board
In a one-time survey, people answer once and receive their reward. On a board, you need people to stay for the whole study. If they leave on Day 2, the people who remain may differ from the ones you recruited, which can skew your findings. This is called attrition bias, and it is one reason incentive design is one of the main levers you have to keep the right people engaged.
How to size an incentive
There is no universal number. Base the amount on time and effort, the difficulty of recruiting the audience, and the local market. Specialist audiences (clinicians, high-income households, business buyers) typically need much higher incentives than general consumers. A practical method is to estimate total participant time, including setup and uploads, then apply a fair hourly rate for that audience, and add a premium for hard tasks like video. Ask your recruiter what is normal in the market so you do not under- or over-pay.
Practical guidelines
- Tease total value up front; pay meaningfully at completion
- Consider a small mid-board boost on media-heavy designs
- Never incentivize speed over honesty
- Keep support strong so ‘I couldn’t upload’ does not become unpaid labor
Teasing total value means participants know from the start what they can earn if they finish. A mid-board boost is a smaller extra reward partway through, useful when tasks like video or photo uploads take real effort. ‘Unpaid labor’ happens when someone spends time on a task, hits a technical issue, and ends up with nothing. That is unfair and bad for your reputation.
Partial payouts versus completion bonuses
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| Approach | Helps with | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| Pay only at the end | Strong pull to finish | People who struggle may feel the effort is not respected |
| Partial payments each day | Fairness for those who drop out | May reduce the push to complete |
| Completion bonus on top | Rewards staying through the last day | Can feel unfair if technical problems blocked someone |
| Mid-board boost | Keeps effort high on heavy tasks | Needs to be explained clearly |
There is no single right answer. Choose based on how long the board is, how demanding the tasks are, and who you are recruiting. The right choice for a short, light board will differ from a seven-day video diary.
A quick way to choose
- Short board (3 days), light tasks: pay once at completion.
- Medium board (5 days), mixed tasks: pay at completion, consider a small midpoint boost.
- Long board (7 days) or heavy video: use staged payments or a base plus completion bonus, so partial effort is respected.
- Vulnerable or hard-to-reach audiences: favor fairness and clear partial pay over pressure to finish.
Protecting data quality
Rewarding speed encourages short, careless answers. Rewarding finishing with thoughtful answers encourages better ones. Make clear that you want honest, detailed responses, and review work before approving payment where your process allows. Define what ‘complete’ means in writing (all required tasks, minimum effort) so decisions are consistent and defensible.
A scenario
A team runs a six-day board with daily photo tasks. They tell participants the total reward in the invitation, add a modest boost after the midpoint, and keep a clear help path inside the board. When someone has trouble uploading, support fixes it quickly and they still finish. The team ends up with strong participation across all days and few complaints.
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