Running out of career options? Start testing products and services from the convenience of your home and earn money!
With e-commerce booming and several companies branching out into more ventures, there are several sites that offer their new products in exchange for honest feedback. To be a good product tester, you don’t need to have any social media accounts or online presence. All you need to receive free products is an eye for detail.
Product testing, as a profession, is gaining an insane amount of popularity because of the ease it provides. You also get to keep the products in return for sharing your honest reviews. The flexible timing and zero payment policies make it an ideal career path for all the people who are struggling with hectic jobs.
Want to know more about how to be a product tester? Here’s how to get started:
What does a Product Tester do?
Product testing, as the name suggests, is basically an honest product review. Brands and websites, before launching full-size products, have to make sure of their performance. This is where product testers come into action because they can email you a complete survey and response to your product. The tester shares his reviews over a mutually decided time period. At the end of the testing period, the product tester may present his feedback through online surveys, personal experiences, and user testing. The surveys and reviews then help companies to improve their products.
All the products you buy are first tested by a product reviewer so that it has zero issues. Websites or companies like Johnson and Johnson have permanent product reviewers who give them legitimate feedback from a user’s perspective. You can mutually decide on a set pay for sharing your opinion or negotiate to keep the free goodies. If your feedback and reviews are valuable, the company will reward you with more products or monetary compensation.
Product testing is not just limited to tech products or makeup. Sometimes, a restaurant also allows you to test food so that they can improve their recipes. Additionally, salons can also pay you to test their services.
How to Become a Product Tester?
Becoming a product tester might not have any academic requirements. However, you’ll need to do an extensive amount of research to start a product test. Keep on reading to find all the ways to get started:
Identify Types Of Product Tests:
Being a product tester doesn’t necessarily mean that you will be testing products left, right, and centre. For a successful review, you need to narrow down your niche and interests. For example, you can’t provide valuable feedback on cosmetics if you’re someone who doesn’t use them at all.
Utilize your surroundings to identify product tests that you can actually conduct with honesty. If you’re passionate about food, email restaurant owners and pitch yourself as a product tester and if you’re a bookworm, email authors and offer them a complete review of their book.
Register with Websites to Earn Money:
Registering with several sites and brands is the easiest way of getting started. There are many websites that are always on the lookout to hire people who can do at-home product tests. However, you might not always get cash compensation for product reviews on these websites.
These gigs may often pay you in the form of amazon gift cards, more free products, or sweepstakes. If you want to register to test products, start emailing e-commerce websites and famous brands around you.
Screening:
Once your email coordination is complete, companies may issue you instructions for conducting a screening. This process is more like an interview, where brands test whether you can test products.
For example, an infant-oriented brand may ask you if you have a baby so that your product tests can be legit. This is your time to earn points and prove how efficiently you can conduct a product test. Hence, remember to be your best self here and avoid covering up about things you cannot do.
Start Testing Products:
Once you make it through the screening process, you’d receive instructions to test products via email. Be sure to go through these instructions carefully so that your product testing is as thorough as it can be.
The email will have all the focus groups required for a good product test, so ensure your review is aligned accordingly. Start thinking of what demographics to include in your product test and if you have any questions, shoot the brand an email right away!
Things to remember when Testing Products:
Want to be a perfect reviewer? Remember to keep these things in mind:
1. Use a specific Email Address:
It’s always a good idea to create a specific email address for product testing. Reputable companies looking for reviewers always notice your email address first because it sets an impression.
Hence, if you have an unprofessional email address, consider changing it to a new one where the address is kept strictly professional. This will also help you keep your projects in one place so that there’s less confusion.
2. Don’t Rely on One Company:
If you wish to pursue product testing as a steady career path, make sure you register with several companies. This will open doors for more opportunities because you won’t get many responses initially.
Keep reaching out to different websites and companies so that you have more chances of getting responses. This will also help you identify all the do’s and don’ts of professional emails because what works with one company might not work with another.
3. Get your Payments Streamlined:
In every profession, it’s extremely important for you to streamline your payments. Before taking up a product test, be sure to explicitly discuss the payment method and whether you will get to keep the products. In many cases, websites offer you prizes and gift cards as compensation.
If money is a priority for you, then make sure you complete your communication before agreeing to a review. Also, choose a reliable method for receiving payments, for example, getting paid via PayPal. Streamline our payments via PayPal, and you’ll never have to worry about mismanaging your funds!
4. Write Honestly:
The point of product testing is not to hear appreciative comments. Websites and companies require honest feedback to identify the focus groups that need improvement. Hence, don’t be over-appreciative just because you got a free product.
Be honest with your reviews, and try to be as detailed as possible. This will contribute to the betterment of the product and also increase your credibility in front of the company. If a product doesn’t live up to your expectations or has noticeable faults, don’t hesitate to pen down your honest reviews.
Learn Skills to Become a Product Tester:
To be a successful professional product tester, it’s important to have certain skills such as:
1. Writing Skills:
Good reviews require quite a lot of writing skills. Hence, if you’re looking forward to establishing a career in this field, start polishing your writing skills. There are several mobile apps that can help you improve your grammar and skills.
Product testing websites require reviews that are extremely thorough so that they can identify the focus groups which need to be worked on. Hence, take help from writing apps and craft reviews that are rich, easy to read, and free of all errors.
2. Time Management:
As a professional tester, you’ll receive several products at a time. Therefore, you must have exceptional time management skills to keep up with the deadlines. Websites, after sending a product, don’t just require a detailed review.
They also need you to adhere to the deadline so that the product launch isn’t delayed. Therefore, you need to identify which reviews need to be done first. If you’re a rather slow writer, consider asking for relaxed deadlines so that you can produce good reviews without a rush. You’d also need to prioritize every product, depending on the criterion set by the company.
3. Diversity:
It’s great to build a niche, but a little flexibility never hurts anybody. Don’t restrict yourself to a single type of product, and keep experimenting! This will help you have a consistent flow of products to test in a certain time frame.
Be wary of not straying too far from your niche, though, because that will make you go all over the place. For example, if you have a history of testing spices, you can venture into testing different types of foods as well.
8 Popular Product Testing Websites:
Don’t have any idea of how to get started? Go through our list of the best websites for product testing and start winning rewards and earning money. Let’s get into it:
1. Amazon Vine:
If you’re a frequent buyer on Amazon, don’t let the opportunity go to waste, and start leaving a review after every purchase! Amazon refers to its product testers as ‘Voices’ and recruits only on an invite basis.
However, if your reviews catch their eye, you could get an invite within minutes! Hence, make it a habit to always leave reviews so that Amazon can notice your skills. You can also go back to your purchase history and review previously purchased items.
2. User Interviews:
Looking for cash compensation in exchange for reviews? Head over to User Interviews and get paid an average of $40-$200 per survey! You’ll test various websites and other platforms to check their efficiency and submit your observations in the form of surveys, user tests, and online focus groups.
User Interviews doesn’t have any specific requirements to test its products, but you must be above 18 years old and have a stable internet connection. You’d also need to have a device that has a built-in microphone.
3. McCormick Consumer Testing:
Cooking enthusiasts should head over to McCormick’s testing panel to review some awesome products! McCormick offers both remote and on-site product reviewing opportunities so if you’re based in the same locality, be sure to give them a shot.
Just inbox them at their official email address and then wait for invites. Once you become a part of the panel, you can get paid via PayPal or even in the form of sweepstakes or gift cards.
4. Influenster:
If you’re a social media influencer, the time is ripe for reaching out to influenster to test out products! Influenster sends its reviewers a Voxbox, which is filled with various full-sized products. The products are usually cosmetics, and there are no strict requirements for posting a review. All you need to do is test the products for a certain time period and share your honest reviews on your social media accounts.
5. Swagbucks:
Swagbucks allows you to earn some cash in exchange for completing short tasks. These can be anything from online surveys, games, or watching videos. You can also choose to get paid in the form of points, which can be redeemed on different sites. Swagbucks is known to pay their testers handsome amounts, so make sure you check it out!
6. Survey Junkie:
Visiting a website needs to be a pleasant experience, and that’s where surveys become helpful. Survey Junkie collects feedback via various surveys to understand user experience and how well their product performs. You will earn points after completing each task, which you can redeem on different sites or cash via PayPal. Survey Junkie also has a web extension that monitors your activity and rewards you accordingly.
7. Pinecone Research:
If you haven’t ventured into product testing out of the fear of things being uninformative, wait till you see Pinecone Research! This platform requires you to go through emerging ideas and concepts and share your thoughts on the development. In return, you get rewarded with gift cards and cash prizes. The best part about this platform is that it has a user-friendly mobile app, allowing you to test products on the go!
8. Smiley360:
Get paid with full-size products in exchange for comprehensive reviews with Smiley360! All you need is to create a free account and start accepting missions according to your interests. If you qualify, the website will send you various goodies, which you can review and test as you please.
Wrapping Up:
Product testing is an excellent way of earning a few bucks without spending too much energy. However, you need to do your homework before jumping into the field, and this is where this guide plays a part! Go through all the information and get ready to start your journey as a product tester. We hope you enjoy the reviewing process as much as we like freebies!
