FAQ

• Will Qualitative recruit participants for me?

  Yes, check out our Participant Recruitment Add-On where you tell us your criteria and we recruit a pool of participants for you.

• What kinds of research do you recruit for?

  You can use Qualitative to recruit for any kind of research: 1-on-1 interviews, focus groups, in-person research, surveys, diary studies, usability testing, etc.

• I am an academic researcher, can I use your service for my dissertation study?

  Yes, we work with a lot of academic researchers and you can use Qualitative for your dissertation.

• I am trying to complete my dissertation and wondered if this service would be a good fit for me. I need to recruit 10 participants.

  Yes, we work with a lot of doctoral researchers and we can recruit participants for your dissertation.

• My IRB is a real pain to work with. Will they allow me to use Qualitative?

  Yes, we work with a lot of doctoral researchers and they have all had their IRB applications approved after including Qualitative for participant recruitment.

• Are you able to recruit participants internationally?

  Yes, we can recruit international participants.

• What measures do you have in place to ensure quality participants?

  Each step of our recruitment funnel is set up to eliminate scammers and ensure you only get quality participants who will provide valuable insights for your research. We do not post recruitment campaigns publicly and instead deliver them to your target demographic using the targeting capabilities of the online platforms. We work with you to ensure your screener in Qualitative is set up to minimize response bias. Potential participants are electronically fingerprinted to detect fraudulent activity. We also conduct either public work profile verification or video conference verification of potential participants. As a result of these measures, we're able to guarantee that all of your participants match your recruitment criteria.

• Can you manage a database of research participants with Qualitative?

  Yes, Qualitative enables you to upload a database of participants or recruit new participants through social media, websites, or email. You can then manage these participants through Qualitative's CRM and invite them to research projects.

• How do I import my existing contacts?

  To import existing participants, sign into the app, navigate to Recruitment, and either 1) upload a CSV or 2) copy and paste your participant details. Your participants will then show up in the Participants tab, where you can search and tag participants as well as invite participants matching a particular tag.

• Does your platform work for customer discovery interviews?

  Absolutely -- the user interview workflow that Qualitative is optimized for aligns very well with customer discovery.

• Do you have a built-in screening/survey tool, or is that only for the initial recruitment screener? For instance, let's say I have 500 panelists and have basic info on them. For a survey I plan to host, or a user test I need to find out more info about these people. Can your tool do that? Or would I need to buy a survey tool to use with your panel?

  It sounds like your research process is to email a survey to a list of people and depending on their survey answers, schedule research sessions with them. Qualitative works well for this type of flow and you do not need to buy a survey tool.

• Can we use Qualitative for intercept surveys using NPS questions that include open feedback follow-up?

  You can use Qualitative for intercept surveys that contain NPS questions. Because Qualitative allows you to customize the survey questions, you can also include questions for open feedback.

• Can I recruit for unmoderated user testing?

  Qualitative is set up for researchers to talk to participants and conduct moderated user testing but not unmoderated. We can also recruit a pool of research participants based on your requirements.

• Do you have a ready pool of participants for clients to choose from or do I have to invite by providing links, etc?

  Qualitative gives you 3 ways to recruit: a link you can share, a popup that you can embed on a website, and an invitation emailer. For an additional fee, you can tell us your criteria and have us recruit participants for you.

• How do I apply to be a user research participant?

  Qualitative enables organizations to conduct research. To be a participant, you need to be invited by the organization conducting the research.

• How do I install the interceptor website pop-up through Google Tag Manager?

  1) Open Google Tag Manager. 2) Navigate to Workspace and select your workspace. 3) Click Add a new tag. 4) Click Choose a tag type to begin setup. 5) Click Custom HTML. 6) Paste your Qualitative interceptor <script> tag in the HTML field within the Custom HTML section. 7) Click Choose a trigger to make this tag fire. 8) Click All Pages. 9) Give your tag a name at the top. 10) Click Save -> Submit -> Publish -> Skip to add descriptive version name

• Why can't I see the interceptor website pop-up?

  There are several reasons why you may not be seeing the interceptor website pop-up. 1) You may have already engaged with the interceptor in a particular browser. If so, you won't see the interceptor in that browser for 30 days. We do this to not spam visitors to your website. You can work around this during testing by using your browser's Incognito Mode to visit the website that has the interceptor installed. 2) You may have toggled off the interceptor. Navigate to your project -> Recruitment -> Edit Interceptor and look to see if Enabled is checked. 3) You may have installed the interceptor from the wrong project. Navigate to your project -> Recruitment and compare the <script> tag you see there with what's installed on your website. 4) The interceptor may not be installed correctly on your website. Please drop us a note by navigating to Support and we'll take a look.

• Why is country required in screeners?

  A participant's country is required in screeners because to send incentives for completed interviews, we automatically map the incentive you purchase in U.S. dollars to the best currency for the research participant based on their country.

• Which countries can Qualitative send incentive payments to?

  Qualitative can send incentives to all countries that are not banned due to U.S. sanctions. User research participants select a country when filling out the screener and then Qualitative automatically determines the corresponding currency and incentive based on your project configuration.

• What types of incentives are supported?

  Qualitative supports Visa and Mastercard Prepaid cards as well as Amazon gift cards.

• Can Qualitative provide consent forms to sign and track who signed them (i.e., replace DocuSign)?

  With Qualitative, you can email a consent form to participants and have them return it signed before the interview. You can also add a consent form link to your screener in Qualitative and require the participant to agree to the terms with a checkbox.

• Is there a way to customize the invitation email's branding and appearance?

  With Qualitative, you can customize the branding of all participant-facing communications. This means you can include your organization name and logo, update colors to be on brand, and update verbiage to be on message across emails, calendar invites, and website pop-ups.

• Is there a way to preview the messages that will be sent to research participants?

  To preview all participant-facing communication, you should create a participant with your email address and step through the qualitative research flow.

• Does Qualitative offer screen sharing?

  Qualitative integrates with Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams to enable screen sharing.

• Can Qualitative record interviews?

  Qualitative integrates with Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams, and automatically creates video conferences on those platforms when you schedule participants. You can then record video conferences through those platforms.

• Is Qualitative suitable for diary studies?

  Qualitative is useful for recruitment, onboarding, and disbursing incentives for a diary study. Qualitative also supports screenshots and screen recordings for moderated sessions but not unmoderated. Participant journaling would need to happen off-platform through something like a Google Doc.

• How does the Free plan work?

  Qualitative's Free plan allows you to conduct research with 25 participants per month and never expires. You can upgrade at any time.

• What is the pricing for unlimited contacts?

  For our Unlimited Plan, it is helpful to chat to better understand your needs before providing pricing. Please drop us a note by navigating to Support and we'll be in touch.

• How much do your participant recruitment services cost?

  At Qualitative, we offer custom pricing for our participant recruitment services because each project is unique. The cost of our services is influenced by factors such as your recruitment criteria, the number of participants, requirements for participant verification, etc. We work closely with you to understand your specific needs and provide a tailored quote that aligns with your goals and budget.

• How do I set up Qualitative if I'm a digital agency with multiple clients?

  Your user can create multiple organizations within Qualitative. Each organization will be on a separate plan (Small, Medium, Large, or Unlimited). Each plan includes unlimited projects and users as well as specific volumes of screener page views, participants, etc. Navigate to Pricing to see more details on the volumes of activities included in each plan. So one way you could set up Qualitative is to have each client be a separate organization in Qualitative (all managed by your user). This may make it easy to bill each client since you can pass on the invoice from Qualitative directly to the client. Another way you could set up Qualitative is to create a single organization within Qualitative with separate projects for each client project. This may be more cost-effective since the cost of a single plan can be spread across multiple clients.

• Why is nothing happening when I click on the sign up and sign in buttons?

  This is most likely because you have a content blocker such as uBlock Origin installed and it is blocking authentication with Google or Microsoft. To resolve this issue, you should whitelist Qualitative with your content blocker. To whitelist Qualitative with the uBlock Origin extension for Chrome, you should: 1) Navigate to chrome://extensions/, 2) Click the Details button for uBlock Origin, 3) Click Extension Options, 4) Click Trusted Sites, 5) Add qualitative.io to list of trusted sites, 6) Click Apply Changes, and 7) Open https://qualitative.io/ in a new tab and sign up or sign in. If you still have questions, please drop us a note by navigating to Support and we'll take a look.

• Is there any way to set up an account without signing in through Google, Microsoft, or Zoom?

  We require authentication with Google, Microsoft, or Zoom because Qualitative integrates with those platforms to create and update meetings for your research sessions. To not have this integration would significantly reduce the value of Qualitative so we don't currently have plans to support signing in without Google, Microsoft, or Zoom.

• Is there a way to sign up using a group email from Google? The person using the trial is different from the payee. For that reason, we need to connect a group email.

  You have to use the email associated with your Google account to sign up for a trial. You can then add the payee as an organization admin within Qualitative so they can manage billing.

• What sensitive data is collected from participants?

  We collect participant names for personalizing communications to participants. We collect participant email addresses for sending meeting invites, interview reminders, and incentives. We collect participant phone numbers for sending texts to confirm interview attendance. We collect answers to screening questions from participants so we can determine if a participant meets the recruitment criteria.

• How does Qualitative safeguard sensitive data?

  Qualitative encrypts all communication between users' web browsers and our servers. All data is stored in an encrypted format. You have to grant access to your project for us to be able to access it. We also adhere to strict data handling protocols when conducting participant recruitment or qualitative analysis for you.

• How does Qualitative secure the data collected from participants?

  Participant data is encrypted and stored securely in a MongoDB database utilizing MongoDB Encryption at Rest. Participant data is encrypted with SSL when transmitted between Qualitative's servers and users' web browsers.

• Is your service HIPAA compliant?

  Yes, Qualitative is HIPAA compliant.

• Can I download my participant responses?

  Screener answers and interview times for participants can be downloaded in TSV format by navigating to your project's Participants tab and clicking the Download Participant Responses button. The filename for the download will be in the format of participants_<TIMESTAMP>.tsv.

• How long is participant data retained?

  Qualitative does not automatically delete your participant data. At the conclusion of your project, you should navigate to Project Settings -> Account Management and click the Delete Project button to remove all participant data (screener answers, interview transcripts, etc). Please note you will not be able to recover participant data once it has been deleted.

• I have a participant who canceled his scheduled appointment and rescheduled for another time. How can I send him a new meeting invite?

  If the participant is requesting a time that corresponds to their availability in Qualitative, you can click on their name for the new time, and the system will cancel the previous invite and send a new one. If the participant is requesting a time that does not correspond to their current availability in Qualitative, you should click the Email Availability Request button for that participant so they're sent a link to select new times and once they do that, you can click on their name for the new time.

• Does Qualitative store user research insights?

  If you're purchasing our qualitative analysis add-on, then the insights from that are accessible in the Analysis tab of your Qualitative project.

• Who will be managing my account?

  We believe effective communication and project management are essential for the success of any research project. That's why we assign a dedicated project manager and research team to all of our accounts to handle communications, provide updates, address any questions or concerns, and ensure that the project stays on track. Your dedicated project manager can be reached by most forms of communication, such as video conference, text, and email to facilitate smooth and efficient communication throughout the duration of your project.

• What added value can you offer my research?

  When evaluating qualitative research companies, it's easy to think that all firms offer similar services with the same claims surrounding support and participant quality. However, what sets us apart at Qualitative is the additional value we provide beyond the standard qualitative research process. We offer clear, strategic recommendations based on your research goals, helping you understand the likely path to success. Once your project is underway, we provide ongoing support to ensure your research is successful. We aim to be a valuable partner for your research.