Field Agent Reveals Download/Usage Stats
- Friday, December 3rd, 2010
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Field Agent has revealed that its iPhone app of the same name has been downlodad by 4,000 people across the UK in the four weeks since it launched.
The app takes a crowdsourced approach to market research and field marketing. Brands typically spend a lot of money with field marketing companies to verify that a particular promotion they have paid for is happening in a given store; or that their products are selling for the right price; or that a poster that should be on display actually is.
The app enables members of the public to provide the answers to these questions in return for cash. Clients enter questions via a website and these are then pushed out to anyone who has downloaded the app – giving agents the opportunity to earn real anything from £1 to over £10, depending on the job. “Agents” can cash out as soon as their job is approved, even after earning £1 for one job, thanks to the PayPal process where Field Agent picks up the fees. Agents are selected based on how close they are to where the job is located, so there is no recruitment, training or management involved. For the client company, the cost of collecting the data they need is roughly halved.
Of the 4,000 ‘Agents’ who have downloaded the app, over 700 have completed at least one job, earning a minimum of £1. 9 per cent of active Agents have completed five or more jobs. The lowest paid job (an opinion survey) earned the respondent £1, and the highest paid job (a supermarket price check) was £10. The top earning Agent has so far earned £93, having carried out 24 jobs, earning an average of £3.88 per job. The 100 top-earning Agents have averaged just over £20 each since the app was launched.
FieldAgent says the only real downside is the perceived lack of jobs, which in turn can prompt an early deletion of the app. So far, however, the patience of the many has been stronger than the impatience of the few, who often vent their spleen as a negative app review. Even though it’s tricky to track how many people may have deleted the app, the company says it knows that 82 per cent of those who have donwloaxded it have opted in to receive push notifications when new jobs are available in their area, and says it is encouraged by this level of engagement.