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Research Desk sits between your sample sources and your survey platform. Entry links send respondents into your survey; redirect links send them back to Research Desk with the correct outcome.
As of October 1, 2024, surveys must use the RDUD respondent identifier. The legacy RID placeholder is no longer supported for new projects.

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Survey entry link

The entry link is the URL Research Desk uses to send a respondent into your survey platform (Qualtrics, Decipher, SightX, Alchemer, or another supported platform).

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RDUD placeholder

Your survey URL must:
  • Begin with https://
  • Include the Research Desk respondent ID placeholder [%RDUD%] anywhere in the query string
Capture the RDUD value in your survey platform and return it in every redirect link when the respondent completes or terminates.

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Passing qualification data (optional)

Pass qualification values into your survey through the entry link to reduce duplicate screening:
Replace variableName with a field in your survey platform and <qualification_id> with the Research Desk qualification ID. Example:
When qualification data is passed on the entry link, avoid asking respondents the same screening questions again inside the survey.
Redirect links communicate the respondent’s outcome from your survey platform back to Research Desk. Failure to redirect properly records an Abandon status. High abandon rates reduce traffic and may pause your project.

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Generic redirect structure

All redirects use https://www.rdsecured.com/return with an inbound_code and the respondent’s RDUD: Replace <RDUD> with the value captured from the entry link when the respondent entered the survey.
Complete and terminate redirects are required. Without them, Research Desk cannot reliably track outcomes, which affects quota fills, reconciliation, and billing.

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Platform-specific examples

Apply the same RDUD substitution pattern for terminate (2000), security (3000), and over-quota (4000) redirects. Some platforms (Alchemer, SurveyMonkey) use inbound codes without an explicit RDUD parameter in the redirect URL. Confirm your platform’s implementation against the Research Desk redirect guide for your programming tool.

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Redirect security (optional)

Research Desk supports additional redirect security:
  • Redirect hashing — SHA-256 / SHA-512 validation that redirects were not tampered with
  • COMPLETE API respondent validation — Server-side validation of completes (availability varies by account)
When creating a survey, enable Hashing on Return Redirects if redirect hashing is configured for your account. Platform-specific redirect formatting: Platform Redirect Guides Research Desk provides a Test Survey link for internal QA. Open it in an incognito window to bypass client-side security layers that are relaxed during testing. A successful redirect lands on the standard Research Desk end-page confirmation. Completes through test links may be classified differently during reconciliation (for example, as unregistered completes).

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Validating your setup

  1. Create the survey in Draft
  2. Right-click Test Survey and open the link in an incognito window
  3. Walk through both a complete and a terminate path
  4. Confirm each redirect fires with the correct inbound code and RDUD value

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Need help?

Submit a support case at researchdesk.com/support or use the in-app support form.