Creative Consumer Research cut incentive costs 20%+ with Tremendous

Challenge

CCR conducts both in-person and online research with more than 8,000 participants annually. CCR used to print checks in advance and distribute them during in-person studies, and it mailed checks for online studies. That meant voiding unused checks, and canceling and replacing checks that were lost, stolen, or contained errors.

The labor, printing, and postage costs amounted to more than 30 hours of work a week and 20-25% in additional overhead costs.

“Doing paper checks is a living nightmare,” BJ said.

Solution

A Tremendous representative contacted BJ as CCR was conducting vendor research. They set meetings with Tremendous and our competitors to compare the platforms. Ultimately, CCR chose Tremendous because of our platform’s ability to send payments easily, at low cost and at scale.

“I was looking at these other vendors, and I feel like your solution is much more user-friendly than a lot of the other solutions," BJ said.

In June 2020, CCR began using Tremendous to pay participants virtually, offering them the choice of gift cards or prepaid Visa cards. CCR was able to streamline their processes and get research participants paid in just a few clicks. As lockdowns lifted and in-person research resumed, CCR has continued to pay participants digitally via Tremendous.

Results

30 hours per week in time savings

CCR’s office administrator used to spend upwards of 30 hours a week sending and reconciling checks. With Tremendous, she spends less than one hour per week. Within 24 hours of an online or in-person study completing, the administrator compiles the participant information in a spreadsheet, uploads it to Tremendous, and disperses payments. If any of the incentives fail to deliver, the admin calls the participant, asks for their email, and resends it—all in a matter of minutes.

“From a management perspective, uploading a file of emails versus cutting 200 checks is amazing," BJ said.

20-25% in unnecessary overhead eliminated

With checks, $1,000 of incentives used to cost $1,200 to $1,250. By removing the labor and monetary costs of printing, mailing and reconciling paper checks, CCR was able to completely eliminate that 20-25% in unnecessary overhead.

“It's just so much easier on us from an operations point of view,” said Richard Cisneros, President and Chief Research Strategist of CCR. “And with those increased efficiencies comes increased profitability.”

Valuable resources reallocated and retrained

With 30 hours a week freed up, CCR was able to train their administrator to take on new responsibilities — like improving the look and feel of their client-facing deliverables.

“It’s huge,” BJ said. “She’s able to do various other things that she couldn't have done before because she was doing this tedious job working with checks."