Anatomy of a Strong User Panel
Summary
User panels are one of the fastest ways to connect with your audience and extract valuable insights—when done right. In this session, Sydney Lawson, Senior Product Marketing Manager at Rally, dives deep into real user panels—tearing them up, not down—to uncover what top research teams are doing well and what’s worth stealing for your own panel. From sign-up to participation, she’ll break down what makes panels effective and how to optimize every step of the experience.
Key Insights
-
•
Every successful user panel has a dedicated landing page with a clear call to action and explanation of participation benefits.
-
•
Keeping screener questions between five to ten helps maintain low friction and improves sign-up rates.
-
•
Using single-select, closed-ended questions for job functions avoids messy and unusable data compared to open-text fields.
-
•
Including questions about AI usage and interest helps target relevant participants for specialized research.
-
•
Large companies like Google can afford more extensive screener forms with conditional logic due to their broad user base and resource availability.
-
•
Separate FAQ pages linked from the landing page reduce clutter and provide potential panelists with detailed sign-up information.
-
•
Panel engagement improves when participants see study results and understand how their feedback influences product decisions.
-
•
Creative incentive models like digital badges (from Outsystems) can gamify participation when budgets for monetary rewards are limited.
-
•
Including fake tools or options in screening questions (Genesys example) helps identify and filter out insincere panelists motivated only by incentives.
-
•
Tracking participant location enables compliance with regional incentive regulations and data privacy laws.
Notable Quotes
"Every single one of these companies has a landing page on their marketing website with a call to action to sign up."
"The most successful way to ask about job function is a single-select question, not an open field."
"We love to see questions around AI and even asking if participants want to join AI studies specifically."
"Incentives are a benefit but should not be the number one reason people join a panel."
"Google’s sign-up has a progress bar which is really helpful so participants know how far they are along."
"If you ask accessibility questions, it’s so important to actually respect the answers."
"Outsystems gamified their research panel with badges because they didn’t have budget for monetary incentives."
"Genesys includes a fake tool in the software list to stop incentive-driven participants from checking all boxes."
"You want your panel to be representative of your customer base, not exactly all your customers."
"Sharing the results of studies with panelists gets them excited about contributing and keeps them engaged."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Design ops has the opportunity to set a new default future, not follow the path set by the past."
Dr. Karl JeffriesThe Science of Creativity for DesignOps
January 8, 2024
"Our clients all have innovation portfolios, but if you zoom out, it's many micro decisions over time that are often opportunistic, lacking strategic connection."
Milan Guenther Benjamin KumpfThe $212 billion ‘so what?’: unlocking impact in development cooperation
November 20, 2025
"Research repositories aren’t single sources of truth anymore; data and insights live in hundreds of different apps across companies."
Ben Davies Matt Duignan Andrew Michael Dr. Emily DiLeoExpert Panel: The Principles of Research Repository Design
March 11, 2022
"We could create a sustainable culture of design and use it as our leading edge weapon of transformation."
Phil GilbertA Consistent Culture of Design
May 14, 2015
"Researchers often treat users as checkboxes, going in, doing research, checking the box and leaving."
Prayag Narula Rida QadriHCI 2.0: Humanity Deserves the Attention that UX Research has to Offer
March 28, 2023
"Research ops was actually there before research at TravelPerk, supporting designers first."
Ned Dwyer Emily Stewart James WallisThe Intersection of Design and ResearchOps
September 24, 2024
"Google is the digital equivalent of the local shopping mall or the local main street."
Erin WeigelReal-world lessons to improve your conversion rates
June 26, 2024
"Designing for the average means designing for nobody."
Samuel ProulxFrom Standards to Innovation: Why Inclusive Design Wins
November 19, 2025
"Duolingo’s AI push damaged immersion by breaking narrative cohesion and lowering course quality."
Cheryl PlatzEmbrace Your Fun Factor: Game Development Best Practices for Product Design
January 9, 2026
