Do you like listening to music? (songpeople.com)

Member Name: MrTink12

Product:	songpeople.com
Date:	26/11/06 (158 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Free to join, can win some neat prizes, listen to new music

Disadvantages: Might not actually win much, surveys can be a little too long

Songpeople.com is an online research website for the music industry. Opinions given by members assist music industry bosses choose songs that should be released as well as which artists to sign up. A review of the website will follow.

According to the site it is possible to win CDs, Ipods, Amazon vouchers, speakers, gig tickets, and many other prizes with songpeople. Other benefits of joining the site include the chance to hear new songs by major artists, as well as unreleased music.


--------Joining the site--------
Joining the site is free of charge, and it should prove unproblematic to become a songpeople panellist. There is an option at the top of the website homepage to ‘Join Now’. You click on this, and then need to confirm some details. For example you need to confirm your location, email address, name, gender, address, favourite music TV station and a few other simple questions. Filling out the information should take a minute or two, and when completed you are a member.


--------Using the site--------
When visiting the website you will notice the company logo, and underneath a declaration reading ‘official research company for the music industry’. There is not much depth to the site, but everything included is well presented. For instance at the top of the screen you can click on ‘About Us’ which simply details how the company operates.

Additionally there is a ‘help’ section on the website. This provides survey, prize and general FAQs, alongside a check on whether the audio and video will satisfactorily play on your PC, plus some technical help if not. Everything is well explained and concise, but if you still cannot solve a problem this can be reported, with songpeople promising to respond as soon as they can.

The top right hand side of the site says you can read a newsletter by clicking on songpeoplenews.com link. Unfortunately at the time of writing this is an inactive website; it would be a nice feature to read some songpeople news.


--------The surveys--------
They send invitation emails when a survey becomes available for you to take part in. All one has to do to accept is log in to your account and the survey automatically loads. Some surveys guarantee a prize if you are able to complete it, whilst most give member’s entry to prize draws. Surveys usually call for you to rate music videos (cut to about 30 seconds long) or judge songs. Questions tend to be very basic, along the lines of ‘Have you seen this music video before?’ ‘How do you rate this video/song?’ ‘What in particular do your really like/dislike about this video?’ and so on.

Upon winning a prize they email, and simply ask you to click on a link confirming your personal details. The site states that prizes are usually dispatched within three weeks, and this seems very accurate in my experience.


--------My opinions--------
Members will not get loads of prizes; you are most likely to receive a gift every now and then. During my time with the site (two years or so) I have been sent two CDs and they are in the process of sending a radio; obviously not the best return in the world. Nonetheless, I am sure others receive more gifts than I do by virtue of the fact I fail to complete all the surveys the company sends me. For some reason they have recently been sending me more opportunities, hence I decided to review the site in the first place (I had forgotten of its existence for a while).

Of course a pitfall of listening to some commercial music in surveys is that you will have to listen to some real rubbish. Still, you get the chance to say its not quality music which hopefully does influence the industry. Another slight complaint is that the surveys can drag a bit, usually requiring one to listen to 25 or so song clips.

To sum up: Songpeople is free to join, you get the opportunity to listen to some new music, and therefore might be worth checking out. If you would like to take a look at the site then go to http://www.songpeople.com.

Summary: One of those surveys sites that could prove fruitful for some.