SurveySavvy Review: a Legit Panel?

I decided to review SurveySavvy after seeing the site scale the popularity charts quite spectacularly over the last few months.

This review will help you learn more about the site’s legitimacy, the scam rumors, the reason for its existence and whether or not you can trust it.

An Overview of the Company

Survey Savvy has been operated by Luth Research, based out of San Diego California, since 1999. Luth LLC was actually founded by Rosanne Luth (who is the current President of the company) in 1977.

Roseanne Luth is a successful business owner who interestingly enough has also served a five-year term as a board member of the San Diego Better Business Bureau. Not only that, she was also the Bureau’s first woman chairman in 1998.

Luth Research became so successful and respected that San Diego Book of Lists ( by San Diego Business Journal) ranked the company among the top 25 San Diego Women-Owned Businesses.

It’s also worth noting that in December of 2008, Rosanne Luth was named Most Admired CEO in the Private Sector category in San Diego.

The site claims it has disbursed more money (close to $14 million) than any other paid online survey site as cash rewards to its members for completing surveys.

Each member gets paid approximately $3 for every completed survey. Their online panel has managed to gather over 1.5 million members in 190 countries. That alone is a big sign of a company being legit!

The panel also offers entries into sweepstakes held every month as a bonus for those who completed a survey screener but didn’t qualify for the main one.

That apart, SS is like any other paid survey site you must have dealt with. In exchange for your honest opinions, the company pays you a certain amount of money in association with bigger companies who have use for those opinions.

Now all that sounds pretty good in theory but before one jumps in, it’s always a good idea to check if a site is legitimate and is not one to disappear after collecting vital info from members regarding their contact details and credit cards. Apart from signing-up, there are a few things you can do to check if a website is genuine or not.

SurveySavvy Review BBB

Personally, I always prefer to cross check any survey or business site I come across with BBB, aka the Better Business Bureau. The organization offers an unbiased and free-of-charge look at any company’s past record.

And the good news is this firm boasts of an impressive A+ grade from the BBB and has done so since 1993. That’s the best stamp of approval you can hope to get for any business or survey site!

Next up, I decided to check up a few forums to see if the site generated any negative experiences. When compared to other competing survey sites, I found that Survey Savvy carried some of the best reviews around!

However, there was one last check remaining before deciding to join the site; checking out if the site demanded a sign-up fee or any other charges. I’ve been pretty vocal about this in all my other reviews of legit paid survey sites that you ought to join only those sites that offer paid surveys 100% free.

The panel, to my happiness, passed this check comfortably and I signed-up promptly with the site.

Joining the Panel

Signing-up for the site was rather quick. All I had to furnish were some basic details about myself and that was it.

Once your account is verified via email, you are required to fill-in sections known as “Member Profile” and “Member Portrait”. Both these sections are designed to glean more information about your spending and shopping habits. This data helps them direct some more targeted paid surveys towards you.

Filling out this “Portrait” boosts your chances of being eligible for surveys that you are invited to. Although doing this is not compulsory, it would only help you.

Survey Savvy houses a lot of ‘Portraits’. This also means you can fill-out only the ones that attract your interest. Once you complete these “Portraits”, the site knows where your interests lie and accordingly, sends you invitations for only relevant surveys.

This helps you save on time that would’ve likely been spent on trying to qualify for a survey that you wouldn’t have qualified for anyhow.

Once you are done with that task, you can expect survey invitations to arrive in your inbox.

The site sends you a sizable number of invitations every week so it’d be a good idea if you can create a separate inbox folder just for them. An easier option would be to create a separate email ID altogether and use it for paid survey sites that you are active on.

Survey Savvy hosts a lot of surveys with payouts ranging from a single buck to even $50. However, I must tell you that qualifying for every survey may not be possible for you.

However, the site compensates the time you spent on answering such survey screeners without success by entering you into a sweepstakes; without doubt, a nice offer! This is in-line with what two other very popular survey sites do as well, viz. MyView.com and American Consumer Opinion, aka. ACOP.

In the time I spent answering surveys, not even once was I offered a survey paying less than $1.

If you are an online surveys old-timer, you’ll know that most surveys pay in the range of $2-$5. That said, there is no upper limit here and you can even receive offers that pay upwards of $10.

As for length of surveys, most of them can be wrapped up in around 20-25 minutes. Another good thing about Survey Savvy is that the length of its surveys is directly proportional to the money on offer; so the longer a survey is, higher is the pay!

What the Heck is Savvy Connect?

In February 25, 2013, the company announced a new feature that I personally love. They introduced SavvyConnect software that upon installing, panel members are enrolled into Survey Savvy behavioral research panel allowing them to receive more paid research opportunities.

This is basically an exclusive market research panel that brings more opportunities, special offers and higher earnings for members.

What this app basically does is gather information about your activity on the web. They then use these data to provide behavioral metrics such as what TV shows people watch online, where people shop online, what the leading search terms are, and other such insights.

By the way, if you want to join this exclusive panel, you can sign up here (this is different from the main panel reregistration).

What About Privacy?

Here is the company’s answer to this very important question:

The SavvyConnect applications communicate data to our servers using SSL Encryption. By going ‘Incognito’ or using ‘Private Browsing Mode’ in your browser, SavvyConnect stops collecting data so it is easy to participate yet also stay in control of what you share. Our Privacy Policy provides further details about how we use your data and keep it secure.

I am usually vary of installing such apps, but knowing this company and the reputation of its founder and CEO, I didn’t have to give a second thought to installing the app. The cool thing is that you get invited to very good paying surveys that you won’t receive otherwise.

Referral Program

Finally, I have to mention the fantastic referral program offered by the site whereby you are paid money just to refer your friends and family.

I can stick my neck out and claim that Survey Savvy owns the best referral program out there by far. Plus, every time a referral made by you completes a survey and gets paid, you pocket some amount of money too (close to 15% of what your referral is paid).

Additionally, you will also be paid money if a referral of your referral earns money with the site. For all the people out there with excellent networking and recruiting skills, SS offers the perfect opportunity to create an excellent mode of passive income.

Once you become a member, the site provides you with your very own personal link. You can use this link on social networking sites, forums and anywhere else you can think of. The people who register using this personalized link become your referrals instantly.

There is also the option to invite people via email, which you can access through the site’s user menu. At any given time, you can send one personalized email invite.

Cashing Out

Sadly, SurveySavvy LLC doesn’t offer PayPal paymnets. That said, of all the paid online survey sites out there, SS probably boasts of the lowest threshold payment.

You can request for a withdrawal even if your account has a balance of just $1. In other words, you can get paid even after completing one survey only! However, it might take a month before a check drops into your mailbox.

This also means that you’ll be required to use a real mailing address to receive any paychecks from the site. Also, you are never sent anything apart from your requested paychecks.

Is Survey Savvy Scam or a Legit Company?

The site seems to have a lot of people worried as they wonder if a site can really pay that much money just for people’s opinions or if it’s a scam.

Of course this is normal as most other survey sites such as i-Say, SurveySpot, SurveySay, and even Global Test Market have had to deal with this issue.

Personally, I had a wonderful time with this company, although there might have been others with less pleasant experiences. So before I vouched for Survey Savvy completely, I decided to find out some more details.

• First up, I checked if the site attracted any complaints regarding payouts. There are many sites that promise a lot but offer very little in return when it comes to redeeming rewards. However, I found no such complaints against Survey Savvy in its reviews.

• The site does take around 4-6 weeks to process payouts but that is par for the course. But what I truly like about the site is that you can request for a payout even with only $1 in balance.

• The one grouse I have with Survey Savvy is the relative lack of options and range when it comes to their surveys. However, this is offset by the fact that you are paid healthily for all the surveys the site does possess.  This is the stark reality with paid online surveys, which is also why I advise readers to join as many survey panels as they can.

I hope this extensive review helped you make sense of SurveySavvy.com and how it works. Although the site doesn’t get to be among my top recommended panels, it is a legitimate one that you can still try and give it a shot. The decision to Join SurveySavvy of course, completely rests with you.