How to source participants for Condens and Aurelius projects
Using Condens or Aurelius for qualitative analysis? Here is how to recruit the right participants and get sessions ready to code without delays.
How to source participants for Condens and Aurelius projects
Condens and Aurelius are qualitative analysis tools, not recruitment platforms. To run a project in either tool, you source participants separately, conduct your sessions, then upload recordings or transcripts for coding and synthesis. The sourcing step is where most researchers lose time, so the approach you choose has a direct impact on how fast your analysis can begin.
What Condens and Aurelius actually do
Condens is a qualitative research repository built around affinity mapping and structured coding. Researchers upload transcripts and session notes, tag observations, and cluster findings into insight themes. It is designed for teams that run a high volume of interviews and need a systematic way to manage raw data over time.
Aurelius covers similar ground with a focus on tagging, organizing, and sharing insights from qualitative sessions. It supports video uploads, transcripts, and note-based data, and includes tools for building shareable insight reports for stakeholders.
Both tools sit at the analysis layer of the research workflow. Neither includes a built-in panel, scheduler, or screener. That separation is intentional: these platforms are optimized for what happens after the session, not before it.
Why recruitment is the bottleneck
Analysis in Condens or Aurelius cannot begin until sessions are complete and uploaded. If participant sourcing takes two to three weeks, your analysis timeline shifts by the same amount. For teams running continuous discovery or sprint-based research, slow recruitment is the most common reason projects miss their deadlines.
The three main sourcing approaches each have different time profiles:
| Approach | Typical turnaround | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Panel provider (verified) | 2-5 days | B2B, niche roles, fast timelines |
| Own customer database | 1-3 weeks | Existing users, longitudinal studies |
| Social or community outreach | 2-4 weeks | Consumer audiences, budget-limited |
| Research agency recruiting | 3-6 weeks | Highly specialized or regulated audiences |
Panel providers with pre-vetted participants are the fastest route when you need a specific audience profile and cannot wait. For consumer topics with a broad audience, your own database or community channels are viable alternatives.
Defining your participant profile before you recruit
Before you write a screener, define the profile you actually need for the analysis you plan to do. In Condens and Aurelius, you will code sessions by theme or by participant segment. If your analysis depends on comparing responses across different audience types, you need enough participants in each segment to draw meaningful patterns.
A practical approach is to work backwards from the analysis structure. If you plan to compare responses by job function, seniority, or product usage tier, recruit at least 5-8 participants per segment. For a single-segment study, 8-12 sessions is a common threshold before you start hearing repetition across interviews.
For B2B projects in particular, over-specifying screener criteria is a common mistake. Requiring a specific job title, company size range, seniority level, and industry simultaneously can reduce your eligible pool to a few hundred people globally, making recruitment slow even on large panels. Prioritize the 2-3 criteria that most directly affect the research question and keep remaining filters broad.
Building a screener for qualitative projects
Qualitative screeners differ from survey screeners in one key way: you are selecting for people who can articulate their experience, not just for people who fit a demographic profile.
A few practices that improve qualitative screener results:
Include an open-ended question. Ask one question that requires a sentence or two of explanation, such as “Describe the last time you had to make a decision about X.” Screener responses that are single-word or obviously templated signal lower engagement in the actual session.
Screen on behavior, not just role. “Do you currently use a data visualization tool at least three times per week?” is a stronger qualifier than “Are you a data analyst?” The behavioral question identifies people actively engaged with the problem you are researching.
Set a realistic qualification rate expectation. For B2B audiences with multiple screening criteria, a 20-30% qualification rate from initial respondents is common. Build that into your recruitment request so the panel provider can source enough starts to meet your completed session target.
Sourcing through a verified panel
A verified panel solves the core problem with self-serve recruitment: participants have been vetted before they reach you, which reduces no-shows, screener failures, and bad-fit completions.
For B2B qualitative projects, the difference between a consumer panel and a B2B-verified panel is significant. Consumer panels accept self-reported professional attributes with limited verification. Panels built for B2B research validate role, company, and activity against external professional signals. That verification step reduces the rate at which participants pass your screener but fail your expectations in the actual session.
CleverX covers both B2B and B2C audiences across 150+ countries, with screening handled before sessions are booked. For a standard qualitative study of 10-15 sessions, turnaround from screener submission to first completed interviews is typically 2-5 days.
Once sessions are complete, recordings and transcripts move directly into Condens or Aurelius for coding. There is no handoff complexity: you export transcripts from your recording tool, upload them to your analysis platform, and begin tagging.
Recording and transcript format for Condens and Aurelius
Both platforms accept standard transcript formats. A few practical notes on getting sessions in quickly:
Condens supports uploads from Zoom, Google Meet recordings, and plain text transcripts. If your sessions are recorded through a platform with automatic transcription (such as Otter.ai, Fireflies, or Grain), you can export the transcript directly and upload without additional processing.
Aurelius accepts transcript uploads and supports timestamped formats, which allows you to click through to specific moments in a recording when reviewing coded segments. This is useful when you need to share a specific quote with context during a stakeholder review.
If you conduct sessions through an AI-moderated interview platform, transcripts are typically generated automatically and can be exported at session close, cutting preparation time before upload.
Incentive structure for qualitative participants
Qualitative sessions require more from participants than surveys: a 45-60 minute interview carries significantly higher cognitive load than a 10-minute questionnaire. Incentive levels should reflect that.
General benchmarks for qualitative interview incentives in 2026:
| Audience type | Session length | Typical incentive range |
|---|---|---|
| General consumer | 45-60 min | $50-$80 |
| B2B professional | 45-60 min | $100-$150 |
| Senior executive (VP+) | 30-45 min | $150-$300 |
| Specialist (clinician, engineer) | 45-60 min | $150-$250 |
Underpaying for qualitative sessions reduces completion rates and tends to attract participants motivated primarily by incentives rather than genuine engagement with the topic. For analysis in Condens or Aurelius, session quality directly affects the richness of data available for coding.
Connecting recruitment to analysis
The most efficient workflow connects sourcing directly to the analysis calendar so that upload and coding can begin as soon as the first sessions complete, rather than waiting for all sessions to finish.
A practical structure:
- Submit screener and session request to your panel provider
- Conduct sessions on a rolling schedule over 5-10 days
- Upload each transcript to Condens or Aurelius within 24 hours of completion
- Begin coding after the first 3-4 sessions using a provisional tag structure
- Adjust tag structure as patterns emerge in later sessions
Starting analysis before recruitment is fully complete lets you identify saturation earlier and make an informed decision about whether to extend or close recruitment. Both Condens and Aurelius support iterative tagging, so an evolving code structure does not require rework on earlier sessions.
For related sourcing context, see how to recruit participants for user research and the qualitative research playbook for a full project structure.
For platform comparison context, Dovetail vs Condens covers how these analysis tools differ in team fit and workflow, and best B2B participant panels covers sourcing options for professional audiences in depth.
Frequently asked questions
Do Condens or Aurelius include participant recruitment?
Neither Condens nor Aurelius includes a built-in participant panel. Both tools are qualitative analysis and insight repository platforms only. You source participants separately through a panel provider or your own network, then upload recordings and transcripts into Condens or Aurelius for coding and synthesis.
What is the fastest way to recruit for a Condens or Aurelius project?
Using a verified panel provider with screener-based recruiting is the fastest route. Services like CleverX can return qualified participants in 2-5 days through a screener you define upfront. This is faster than recruiting through social media or researcher networks, which typically take 1-3 weeks and involve manual vetting.
How many participants do I need for a qualitative analysis project in Condens or Aurelius?
Most qualitative projects reach saturation at 8-15 participants per audience segment. If you are running discovery interviews, 8-12 sessions per persona is a common starting point. Condens and Aurelius are designed to handle transcript-level coding, so 15-30 sessions is a manageable upload size before diminishing returns set in on analysis.
What screener criteria work best for qualitative analysis projects?
Good screener criteria for qualitative work focus on lived experience rather than just demographics. Ask about frequency of behavior, recency of a specific action, or role in a decision process. Avoid over-specifying with too many criteria, as that shrinks your pool significantly. Aim for 3-5 qualifying criteria and use open-ended screener questions to pre-assess articulation.
How do I get session recordings into Condens or Aurelius after interviews?
Both Condens and Aurelius accept manual uploads of video files and transcript files. Condens also supports direct import from tools like Zoom and integrates with transcription services. Aurelius accepts uploaded transcripts in common formats. If you record sessions through a research platform that offers transcription, you can download the transcript and upload it directly, saving a processing step.
Can I recruit B2B participants for qualitative analysis projects?
Yes, but B2B recruitment requires a panel with verified professional data rather than consumer panels. You need to screen on role, company size, industry, and often seniority level. Generic panels return lower qualification rates for B2B titles because professional attributes are self-reported. Panels like CleverX verify participant profiles against professional signals, which reduces the number of screener failures you encounter.