What is it?  Recruitment is the process of identifying and finding research participants who meet a set of predetermined criteria that define the profile of the desired audience to take part in a research study. 

When is it best used? Recruitment is critical to all types of primary research because recruitment directly correlates with the quality, accuracy and relevance of the data gathered. For qualitative studies, a screener (i.e. a short set of questions) is designed and then used to determine whether potential recruits qualify for a study. In quantitative research, the first questions of a survey questionnaire are usually designed to allow only those who meet the minimum criteria to continue with the survey.

What does it entail?  Recruitment starts with identification of the ideal participant profile based on the target audience of the study. Demographic, behavioral, attitudinal, psychographic, etc. characteristics are often combined to reflect the intended participants for both market and user research studies.

The recruiting process can vary based on the type of study, number of recruits needed, and the ease or difficulty of finding those who meet the criteria i.e. the number of these people in the population or the Incident Response Rate (IRR). A researcher, or specialist recruiter, then creates a recruitment plan based on where and how to best find these respondents. Recruitment methods include intercepting people directly through a website, sourcing through social media, through in-person intercept, via an online database of users or prospects, or through a participant pool/sample panel. 

Interchangeable term: N/A

Use in a sentence: Customer experience research Once the participants for my qualitative study have been screened, then the recruitment scheduling phase can begin.

Related terms: Sourcer, participant recruiter, recruiting, screening, screener, participant pool / panel, sample / sampling, intercept recruitment, Research Ops, Research Operations, ReOps

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