Dscout quickstart guide
Looking to uncover insights to help you build better products? You’re in the right place! With our various research tools—both moderated and unmoderated—Dscout makes it easy to gather rich, human-centered data at scale.
But where to start? We’ve put together this guide to help you make some important first decisions to kick off your research.
For the best experience, use Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge when working with Dscout. Other browsers may cause inconsistent performance or limit access to certain features.
Choose a study type
At Dscout, you have five study types to choose from:
Usability test: Quickly capture how users interact with your website, prototype, or app to uncover pain points and improve UX. For more information, see What are usability tests in Dscout?
Media survey: Collect in-the-moment feedback through video, photos, and open-ended responses to bring your research to life. For more information, see What are media surveys in Dscout?
Intercept studies: Catch participants in the moment as they make important decisions while browsing the web. For more information, see What are intercept studies in Dscout?
Diary: Understand behaviors and experiences over time with longitudinal studies that capture real moments as they happen. For more information, see Set up a Diary study.
Interview: Conduct one-on-one video sessions with participants to dig deeper, ask follow-ups, and explore reactions in real time. For more information, see Set up an interview study.
Still not sure which study type makes sense for your research? Use the tables below for a more detailed breakdown:
Unmoderated studies
Continuously recorded
✅ (privacy blur available)
✅ (privacy blur available)
Single-entry
✅
✅
✅
Multi-entry
✅
Device support
Desktop or mobile (one device type per study)
Desktop or mobile (one device type per study)
Desktop only
Desktop or mobile (one device type per activity)
Recruitment options
Auto-recruit
✅
✅
✅
Add participants from screeners (manual recruit)
✅
✅
✅
Bring your own participants (via share link or email)
✅
✅
✅
Add participants from Private Panels
✅ (via Dscout or Private Panels)
✅ (via Dscout or Private Panels)
✅ (via Private Panels)
Multi-variate
✅
✅
✅
Auto-transcription
✅
✅
Playlist creation
✅
✅
✅
✅
Moderated studies
Interview studies
Continuously recorded
✅
Single-entry
✅
Multi-entry
Device support
Desktop or mobile (one device type per study)
Auto-recruit
Add participants from screeners (manual recruit)
✅
Bring your own participants (invite via share link or email)
✅
Add participants from Private Panels
✅ (via Private Panels)
Auto-transcription
✅
Playlist creation
✅
Explore your data (add-on)
✅
AI summaries (add-on)
AI themes (add-on)
AI notable moments (add-on)
Choose a recruitment method
Whichever study type you choose, it’s important to fill your study with the highest quality participants. To help, Dscout offers several options:
Recruit using a screener: Build a screener directly in Dscout using targeting attributes and knockout questions to find only the right participants. You can keep your screener private and only send it to people you choose or make your screener public and recruit from Dscout’s on-hand pool of participants (called Scouts). For more information, see Set up a screener.
Bring your own participants: Invite participants you’ve already screened and know would be a good fit for your study. These could be people you have on a mailing list, in which case you could generate a share link for your study to grant them access. Or, these might be people on a panel you maintain for ongoing research in Private Panels. Either way, if you already have people in mind to participate, you can invite them to your Dscout study.
Running research on Dscout requires activity credits, and both study type and recruitment approach can affect how many activity credits you need. For more information, see Activity credits.
Create a project
Once you’ve figured out which study type fits your needs and how you want to recruit for it, it’s time to get started. The next step is to create a project (if you don’t already have one!).
Think of projects as folders to keep your research organized. You might need multiple studies to get the insights you’re looking for, and you can keep them all together in a single project.
To create a project, click New Project in the top-right corner of the Dscout homepage.
Now, you’re taken to the blank project’s page where you can edit the project’s details, build studies and screeners, and invite collaborators.
Give your project a descriptive title and quick description so any collaborators you invite have context around the project’s purpose. Don’t worry—your research participants won’t see either of these.
Additional resources
You’ll find answers to nearly any of your Dscout-related questions here on our help center. But if you’re still unsure of where to get started, or if you need just a little bit of inspiration to get you going, here are a few other resources that might be able to help: