Upcoming Webinar! Objects in Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear

Posted on January 17, 2012 by KL_Admin

These days in the market research world, consumers are rapidly evolving from respondents to active participants. To keep up with this trend, researchers should begin to pay attention to interactions from social networking because these trends, like the car you’ve been watching in your rearview mirror, are closer than they appear.

This presentation will be the first of the year for the IIR’s “Insights Series.” It will examine the opportunities presented by new types of Market Research (e.g. social media listening, mobile, text analytics, MROCs, Crowdsourcing, Neuromarketing, etc.) and will offer recommendations & best practices on how to bring them into your research arsenal.

Click Here to Register

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Market Research, Social Media, and Crowdsourcing Combine Forces

Posted on January 17, 2012 by John Huntsman

We recently teamed up with Crowdsourcing.org to answer the question, “what do the world’s social media users think about crowdsourcing?”

Together we tried to get a sense of how the world is feeling about the different forms of crowdsourcing through the analysis of social media buzz and sentiment. Using a tool called Netbase, which indexes and analyzes millions of conversations across the web, we analyzed data for the top 15 sites generating the most buzz for each of the five main crowdsourcing categories in Crowdsourcing.org’s Directory: cloud labor, crowd creativity,crowdfunding, distributed knowledge and open innovation (definitions available here). This report examines a year of data — timeframe: November 1, 2010 to October 31, 2011 — garnered from Facebook, Twitter, blogs, forums, news sites and consumer reviews.

Click Here to View Report

This report is only a taste of what’s to come from this collaboration between KL Communications and Crowdsourcing.org. In the coming weeks, we’ll post in-depth data and analysis reviewing the top sites in each of the five categories. Stay tuned!

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TMRE Take-away: Less Data, More Insights

Posted on November 28, 2011 by Ernesto Martinez

TMRE was really excited to have a former CEO speak to market researchers, especially one from one of the largest corporations in the world. As Bill MacElroy, Chariman of the supplier group Socratic Technologies, put it, “This is an area market researchers want to be: face to face and on the C-suite with the decision makers.” Needless to say, I agreed and was excited to see what she had to say (in my head I thought, “CEO’s DO listen to market researchers…”). And a former CEO who made a large multinational corporation profitable once again was truly a treat.

For Anne Mulcahy and Xerox, market research became important for them when they hit rock bottom. They went into a ‘quiet phase’ (no press releases, no advertising, and no new product launches) for a year and a half and really began doing research on the company, brand, and the products. Traditional market research really allowed them to see where they needed to make fixes to improve the company. Market research provided data and hard facts on what was going on with the business… a painful process that revealed past mistakes, but also areas for realistic improvement. Market research provided not only the facts on the ground, but insights as to where they were going wrong.

For Anne Mulcahy, market research not only shows you the challenges, facts, and the lay of the land, but also insights on direction. This, she believes, is the challenge for our industry: it’s not simply enough to provide these hard facts, but what do you do with them? When asked about social media, again, while great data can be gathered, data isn’t really needed. She emphasized that value with social media is not just adding another layer of insight, but being ableto synthesize it with other data streams to create insights that are holistic and trulyactionable. In order for market research to remain relevant, they have to provide more than just mountains of data.

Data alonewill not save the day for a company who is struggling to be profitable, to regain lost market share, or to see how a new product will be received before launch. What will save a company is a combined effort of data with insights and actionable steps. Anne Mulcahy would not hire Steve Jobs (someone who once claimed to not use market research services). She agreed that he was a genius, but that was not how her company decided to operate. Market research provided the tools she needed as part of a system to turn around the multi-billion company she was running. To the other CEOs that think like Anne Mulcahy, market researchers welcome you to TMRE. As we prepare to gather next year (again in Florida), I am confident many of us will take the message of providing actionable insights to the problems corporations face.

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Balancing Co-Creation and Vision

Posted on November 28, 2011 by John Huntsman

In Jonathon Fields recent book, “Uncertainty: Turning Fear and Doubt Into the Fuel for Brilliance,” he praises the use of creating your own co-creation community to help craft ideas and uncover insights about your products & services. He claims that they not only help add certainty to what you’re doing, but can also alert you to any threats or opportunities that you may have otherwise missed. However, Fields does warn against relying too heavily on the “co-creation crutch” when embarking on the quest to create something new:

“You must also be alert to the lure of leaning on the crowd as a crutch to protect yourself emotionally from the pain of being the sole owner of a creative failure…If you find yourself relying on the crowd not only to inform but to guide your direction, that’s a major sign that you’re yielding autonomy and vision to others…Bringing other people in does not lessen the burden…it simply provides a greater set of data points, constructive judgement, and a higher level of incremental certainty.”

This is certainly a valid point to keep in mind as you embark on any co-creation initiative, whether it be long-term insights communities or shorter crowdsourcing projects. While you most certainly want foster an environment that allows your collaborators to come up with new, out-of-the-box ideas, it’s not always prudent to hand them a blank slate and say, “do whatever you want.” At first glance it may seem easier to go into these initiatives with a “management by abdication” approach, but you greatly increase the risk of acquiring results that are off on a tangent, and ultimately don’t achieve your goals.

What insight professionals need to aim for is the balance between delegating creative tasks and establishing rules & parameters that guide these activities. Ultimately true vision still follows a top down approach, and without strong leadership clearly defining strategic direction, all of the co-creation activities in the world won’t create true forward progress. At a time when developing a close relationship with customers is more tantamount to success than ever, finding the balance between creative openness and clear direction is a worthy state to aim for.

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An Ethnography on The Market Research Event

Posted on November 28, 2011 by Ernesto Martinez

As the warm weather greeted me in Orlando and I drove to the Peabody Hotel, I began wondering how this market research conference was going to be. This was my first time attending a market research event. I have attended and presented at several academic conferences, but this would be the first time I would listen and learn on how major corporations did research. With over 1,200 people expected to attend The Market Research Event (TMRE), the conference was hosted at a very nice and luxurious hotel in Orlando, Florida. The Peabody Hotel is enormous, with indoor water falls, and resort style pools that one sees in vacation destination pamphlets. Unfortunately, Orlando’s warm weather was unnoticed, and the Peabody Hotel’s pools were unused, primarily because attendees spent the entire time inside the hotel and the hotel’s convention area. With over 6 keynote speeches, and 150+ presentation and sessions, the Peabody’s luxurious feel served as a nice backdrop to the many activities we attended.

On top of all the sessions, the people who attended were from all over the country: Silicon Valley, Chicago, Minnesota, New Jersey, Texas, and of course San Diego (among other cities, of course). There was also an international presence; I met representatives from Heineken, Mexico, suppliers from Japan, and a representative from Vodafone/Germany.

This event really also brought great vendors who have been in the market research business for some time, as well as major brands. The presentations and speakers also provided insights on our industry. Taking a step back, I analyzed the event and captured what it really meant for attendees. I thought of this in terms of the vibe of the event, the presentations given at the event, and a highlight I took from Anne Mulcahany, former CEO of Xerox.

The Vibe: Vendor or Client?

The vibe at TMRE was very energetic, primarily because of the nature of the event. While some of us were like a farmer looking for that plot of land we can harvest and grow new accounts, others (primarily corporations) were in search of new farms to plant their seeds to grow. TMRE mainly attracts suppliers of market research (like us, KL Communications) and major corporations (Time, Kraft, Pepsi, Coca-Cola, Intel, Home Depot, etc.). Suppliers, however, borrow services from each other too. So, for example, in my research project with one of my major clients, I was looking to ‘buy’ services from sample providers. So the vibe was not all competitive among suppliers. This is not to say it was collaborative either. Eye balls could quickly be seen being glanced towards the middle part of every person’s body (where our name tags were hanging). If it was a major brand, a quick smile would be (hopefully) exchanged. The thought of “success” would enlighten the supplier if he or she got a smile from a major corporation. Soon after, hawking that individual would inevitably ensue in the near future (because, after all, it was only a three day conference!). As a conference participant told me when I was excited to meet a corporate client interested in our CrowdWeaving™ offering, “This is like dating… you may like someone, but you don’t want to be aggressive and scare the person off!” I wondered if that’s why our booth had chocolates to give away… everyone likes chocolate, regardless of gender J.

This environment was rather fun for me. For one, I had never been in an environment like this. My objectives for this event were simple: familiarize myself this new environment, learn what other companies were doing in regards to research, and introduce KL Communications to future clients. With these simple goals in mind, I began exploring more and more of TMRE with a fresh perspective, in hopes of meeting some of the 1,200 attendees along the way.

The Presentations

Like most conferences, some presentations were really funny, engaging, and interesting, while other’s not as much. However, this is how I categorized presentations:

Pitch—these presentations usually provided highlights of what a supplier could do for customers. I went to this one in which Paradigm Sample presented their mobile capabilities. I learned that the 16-32 demographic groups response rate increases significantly if you engage survey or market research using mobile platforms. Further, this age group also is more prone to participate and collaborate with activities that are asked by market research (for example, if you ask them to upload/text message a picture, they will).

Showcase—these presentations were usually educational in nature. I went to three of these and they included 3M, Google, and Vodafone. Here, internal market research ‘geeks’ (I include myself in this group) showed off how market research has been important to them. For 3M (who openly admitted that they do not use suppliers as much, if at all) it was to engage with the ‘complaining consumer’ to really get an in-depth understanding of product development. For Google, it was the experiments they were running on YouTube and advertising (note: if you rarely ever get commercials on YouTube, DO NOT delete your cookies… you are on the experiment group that has no advertising. Likewise, if you are getting too many ads, time to delete the cookies). Finally, German-based Vodafone had a Ph.D. civil engineer present the modeling and forecasting they do using the stats software “R.” He runs regression analysis with different variables to show the return on investment on so-called intangible marketing campaigns. Very nerdy, but I did learn that the software R is free and open to use (and good for visualization), and that buzz (or how ‘popular’ a brand is) is valued higher than price or packaging for consumers.

Hybrid– these presentations combined the pitch and the showcase to show the partnership of a firm and their client in finding actionable market research insights. KL Communications with TimeInc., was an example of this. TimeInc. presented how they used our services to understand iPad consumer use and consumption. We presented real data on iPad trends and how we combined this with the capabilities our firm offers. Other attendees included Communispace presenting with Coca-Cola, as well as HBO with one of their suppliers.

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Objects in Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear

Posted on October 27, 2011 by Kevin Lonnie

“The survey” is synonymous with quantitative research. To the rest of the world, “the survey” is where quant begins and ends.

In a similar vein, “Let’s do some groups” summarizes about 98% of the qualitative industry. I’m not trivializing the great work by our leading qualitative experts, I’m saying that in the public domain and for that matter, in the halls of business, “Let’s do some groups” is where qualitative begins and ends.

Now, of course, we have online surveys and online groups, but that’s just moving the same techniques to the web.

I would like to personally thank “the survey” and “some groups” for an admirable job. They have represented us for the past 60 years now and we wouldn’t be a $30 billion industry without them. But it’s time to break out the gold watch and hold the retirement ceremony because their time is past.

Yet even with the prospect of exciting new technology and prodded by tough economic times, left to our own devices I think we would still be slow to change. In fact, last month I hosted a table at MRA’s Corporate Research Conference on the impact of social media. I was a bit surprised that the seven corporate researchers at my table admitted to only the most basic understanding of social media, let alone its potential implications to our industry. They also shared that interest in social media insights was not coming from the research group but rather from senior management.

I realize that MR is not a technology led industry; our roots lie in the social sciences and statistics. But when technology affords us the tools to do our job better than we ever have before, it’s time to get on that train. And technology is affording us the opportunity to become a proactive, rather than a reactive industry. Sure companies want meaningful interactions with their customer base, but mostly they want to make money. And our industry can do that not only through risk reduction, but through growth opportunities. And while “the survey” and “some groups” can help with the former, they offer little for the latter.

I have read countless articles expressing the viewpoint that the new opportunities presented by New MR (e.g. social media listening, mobile, text analytics, MROCs, Crowdsourcing, neuro-monitoring, etc.) are merely new tools in our toolbox. I don’t agree with that politically correct argument. I think these new tools are the replacements. Which means “the survey” and “some groups” are going the way of the dodo bird.

As for the timeframe, I think we will have a radically different research environment within 10 years. And as usual, it will be driven by money.

Most expensive surveys will be replaced by social media listening.
- Attitude & Usage / Huge Tracking Surveys, no reason for them anymore, again replaced by social media listening
  - Text analytics is the engine that will power social media, more and more powerful algorithms will make sense of what today is largely white noise. The quant jocks of today will be the text analytic gurus of tomorrow
- Product/Concept Testing Surveys – We’ll now have consumers helping to drive the co-creation process via Crowdsourcing.
- Focus Groups will be replaced by meaningful, transparent conversations & neuromonitoring / neuromarketing observations
  - Online ethnography will allow for virtual testing centers where passionate consumers provide video feedback
  - MROC forums will provide the same moderator led discussions at a fraction of the cost
  - Neuromarketing will allow us to know what consumers really think about your new product/ad with a roadmap of firing neurons that words just can’t equal

Mobile will become the dominant mode of data collection just as it’s becoming the dominant mode of voice & data communication. An app driven interactive experience will replace “the survey” which is far too bulky and dull for the mobile environment.

So while I come to bury “the survey” of today, I think like a Phoenix it will rise again. Unlike today’s self administered boring survey the survey instrument of tomorrow will be greatly augmented via gamification. While social media will replace the huge trackers, we still need an objective survey to cross-validate social media produced findings. Survey designers will need to become survey engagers in that it will be as important to create an appealing fun environment as it will be to craft questions. We spend too much time arguing between five and seven point scales (in fact 11 is better yet!) and not enough on engaging the respondent so that they are sharing thoughtful opinions. Tomorrow’s survey programmers will be more akin to game developers with a strong combination of both left brain and right brain skill sets!

And while we remain reluctant to change, there is finally enough motivation to propel even researchers into the 21^st century. And that’s the prospect of enormous competitors who are quite willing to take our lunch money. And yes, I’m talking about Facebook and Google. With their enormous database (Google + puts Google in this discussion) of personal information these goliaths are well positioned to dominate our industry unlike anything we’ve seen before.

Unless, of course, we embrace change and realize that we have one key advantage that no amount of technology can supplant and that is the intellectual property, the sheer skill to make sense of it all.

We’re moving to an agile, proactive, interactive future. It won’t resemble the industry we grew up with. Forces are conspiring to accelerate the rate of change.

Now is the time to put the pedal to the metal, because that car you just noticed in your rearview mirror is actually far closer than it appears.

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What Are You Really Telling Me In Social Media?

Posted on October 27, 2011 by John Huntsman

A recent blog post by Civic Science discusses “aspirational self-disclosure” and how those who rely on social media data need to take this into account. Aspirational self-disclosure is the human tendency to “say things to make ourselves look funny, successful, humble, stable, adventurous, or simply normal. We keep thoughts to ourselves that make us look uncool, out-of-touch, confused, or boring.” It makes logical sense that social media conversations, which can occur within wide networks of peers, are subject to this phenomenon. Taking another step, it could then be inferred that the nature of these discussions are not getting at what people truly think, but rather what they want others to think that they’re thinking.

While it’s possible that people might not be disclosing their true thoughts in these public realms of conversation, it should also be noted that people do not always make decisions based off what they think as an individual. For instance, if someone goes clothes shopping they may decide to buy what’s fashionable instead of what they actually like. In David Brook’s most recent book, The Social Animal, he attempts to tear down classical economic thinking that suggests human beings are rational, utility-maximizing beings. He makes a strong case that human beings are often driven more by emotion (sometimes he almost uses the word subconscious as a synonym for emotion) and live in a complex, overlapping network of social circles and pressures (direct family, extended family, friends, neighbors, work colleagues, etc). Attempting to separate the thought and decision-making process from this reality is non-human, and therefore not reliable.

While both theories provide convincing examples and evidence supporting their assertions, it seems that going with only one of these lines of thinking will prevent us from truly gaining a holistic perspective on whatever group we’re trying to understand. For example, a quick analysis of Netflix in social media showed a sharp rise in negative sentiment in the month of July when they made sudden changes to pricing and offerings. Upon reviewing the reasons for this change, people’s perception of corporate greed appeared to be common. The excitement of getting instant access to thousands of movies at a great price was suddenly pushed to the back in the public realm. It could be argued that aspirational self-disclosure echoed one of the feelings customers felt towards the change (i.e. tell all your friends that you will not be taken advantage of and will cancel), but if asked individually many people would still see the value of continuing the service. The end result is somewhere in between; some people leave Netflix because the viral emotion of the moment drives them (some may sign back up in a few months) while others remain customers because they still recognize the value.

So what is social media telling us? It’s telling us one side of the story. If we want to hear the whole story, we need to compare it to complementary insights. These complimentary insights could be in the form of surveys, polls, or an individual diary, so long as the thought process happens in a more private environment than social media. Once this balance is achieved, we have a much better chance at seeing both sides of coin.

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Anticipation for the Upcoming Market Research Event

Posted on October 27, 2011 by Allyssa Gresser

In a few weeks not only will I be attending The Market Research Event in Orlando, FL, but I will be presenting as well… and if the rumors are true, more than 1,200 senior-level market research and consumer insights executives will be in the audience.

Typically when I attend conferences such as these, I do some research a few weeks before heading out to the main event. I make sure to understand the main focus of the conference, and review speaker lists to see which topics are of most interest to me. I may reach out to a few people prior to going and set up a few meetings. However, usually most of what I learn about the conference happens on site.

This year is very different.

As a presenter, I have taken the time to really look into what this conference has to offer, and what strikes me most is how different it seems compared to the past few years. In years past the theme of these conferences tend to focus on one particular topic, but this year, the word that pops into my head when preparing for the conference is “choices.” When I tell someone I am presenting, they automatically assume that I am presenting in the Social Media and Communities track – why not, it makes perfect sense, as these are integral parts of our IC2 platform. But this year, there are many other new and exciting options to take in. I will be co-presenting with Mark Gallops, Executive Director at Time Inc, in the Mobile and Technology Track on how the iPad and other tablets have changed media consumption, which represents another aspect of our IC2 philosophy. To me it is very exciting to see all the advances that are being made in the mobile and technology space and how market research plays a role in that development.

Of course, I will have much more to say after the conference, but in the meantime if you happen to be going to The Market Research Event, check out my presentation and stop by our booth to touch base. Look forward to seeing you there!

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America’s Great Divide: What Does the Shrinking Middle Class Mean for Market Research?

Posted on September 20, 2011 by Kevin Lonnie

The articles/story lines about the length of the recession, the potential for far greater economic retreatment keep pouring in. But I tend to look at economists as fiction writers, they’re all capable of telling a compelling story, but they don’t seem to have any better handle on reality than you or I.

As a researcher, I’m comfortable with facts and in trying to make sense of the facts that I know. And one fact struck me to the core this week. That was the news that P&G was basically giving up on the middle class. OK, that’s a gross exaggeration (perhaps I am a latent economist?) but after 60 years of catering to the sweet middle, the gen pop center of the US population, P&G is “now betting that the squeeze on Middle America will be long lasting.”

As a result, P&G is now subscribing to “The Consumer Hourglass Theory.” This phrase was coined by Citigroup and it describes a two tier buying public. In fact, Citigroup has created an index of 25 companies that are best positioned to cater to the highest-income and lowest income consumers. Such firms have posted a 56.5% return for investors over the past two years [Dec. 2009-Sept 1, 2011] whereas the Dow only showed a return of 11% over the same period.

Further evidence of a growing inequity in consumer spending can be seen in the Gini Index, a measure of income inequality that ranges from zero when everyone earns the same amount, to one when all incomes goes to only one person. The last calculation of the US Gini index produced a coefficient of 0.468. The US now has a Gini index similar to Mexico and the Philippines. None of this has been lost on P&G, which has accelerated its efforts to target the newly divided American marketplace.

When I started out in MR (back in the day) working for NFO, it was all about achieving a nationally representative sample. Heck, ever since World War II ended, it’s always been about reaching Middle America. But Middle America is under attack, with as many as one out of three Americans raised in the middle class is now slipping into poverty. And those remaining are shell shocked. No longer do they purchase from an aspirational, times will only get better attitude. How many family/friends do you know who are now buying their staples at Dollar Stores? More and more this reminds me of the mindset that my parents and grandparents had forged upon them by The Great Depression.

So finally, what does this mean to our industry? If there is no middle, only a bipolar distribution, why bother with gen pop samples anymore. Aren’t they now meaningless in our niche driven society?

As a cottage industry, MR has historically been slow to change. In a way, we’re like the Ents (talking trees) in The Lord of the Rings movies, but once the Ents begin to march they are a force to be reckoned with.

If everything we’re meant to support is changing, then how will that impact the way our industry operates or the tools we bring to the battle? To be honest, I’m not sure. In theory, you could just continue to use the same tools we always have and simply modulate the sample to reflect the new target. But with the land under our feet literally changing, it seems clear we need to account for not only where the consumer stands today but where they will be tomorrow.

It would be fascinating to develop an index of American’s self image. Something that goes beyond the Consumer Confidence Index and one based on household self image. If we understand the underlying mindset, then we can accurately predict consumer spending (e.g. A married mother of two with a household income of $75k who views the country mired in paralysis and her job security as tenuous will likely reflect the buying habits of a low income household).

All of this points to the need for MR to focus more on the “why’s” that are found in the underlying nuances than the “what’s” that might be gleaned from an attitude grid.

To predict the future of a new product/service, we need to understand the significance of the disappearing middle class. The middle class may be shrinking more slowly in terms of sheer numbers, but the rate of departure is far greater when you look at mindset. Or just go to your local Dollar Store, take a look at all those pricey SUV’s in the parking lot and you’ll see what I mean.

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Looking Forward to the Corporate Researchers Conference

Posted on September 20, 2011 by Sean Holbert

In a few days, I’ll be in Chicago for the Corporate Researchers Conference. It’s the inaugural edition of this conference, organized by the MRA, Quirk’s, and Corporate Executive Board. What intrigued me most is that the three organizers each bring a unique perspective on the research industry, which I’m hoping leads to some well-rounded perspective.

What I’m most looking forward to is the emphasis on the changing role of research. There are sessions scheduled with companies like J.D. Power, AMEX, and Kraft Foods to discuss the new face of insights and how we handle the data overload that social media has brought us.

For so long, researchers were measured by the data they collected, but today, the importance of data collection is trumped by the importance of data synthesis. How do we make sense of all of the information available to us and, even more importantly, how do we communicate that synthesis to senior management.

As we all know, it can sometimes be a challenge to distance ourselves from the deadline-driven world of market research in order to think about the bigger picture, but it is becoming more evident to me that the true value in our profession is shifting from tactics & execution to strategic synthesis & communication. I’m curious to see how some of my colleagues are tackling this challenge, and am optimistic that this conference will provide a great platform for some lively discussions.

Of course, I’m also looking forward to the networking events and catching up with colleagues as we dive into the fall conference season. I hope to see some of you there!

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