Seth Godin’s blog post yesterday was about a topic I have been thinking about a lot lately. It’s inspired by the aphorism, “…to a person with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.”
Some of the pain that market research is going through right now is precisely because of this. In the field of market research, we have hammers we are very comfortable with…
A Research Rockstar client shared a great story yesterday, one that I just have to pass on. I have sanitized it a bit, to “protect the innocent.”
Theresa is a market research manager at a consumer electronics company. Her team of 4 researchers used to be a team of 7, so workloads are pretty rough.
She recently had an executive from another department share his concern that customers were being over-surveyed. He knew some non-research employees were using SurveyMonkey and similar tools to conduct customer surveys. He asked Theresa to recommend a course of action.
Knowing that the issue is a lot more complex than just telling people to “stop,” she recruited six people from the different departments involved in the rogue activity. Once gathered in a conference room, she showed them the Research Rockstar class, “Embracing Rogue Research.” The 1-hour class acknowledges the pros and cons of decentralized research, suggests policy options, and even tools to make everyone’s life easier.
While at the Marketing Research Association’s First Outlook conference this past week, I listened to some interesting stories from people using their online communities as both research and marketing vehicles. This dual-purpose approach leaves me feeling, quite frankly, conflicted. And a little ignorant; apparently this is a widespread practice. Until now, I had thought most communities were primarily focused on listening to customers to uncover…
In Search of Useful Market Research Displays: Don’t Forget Venn Diagrams. Bored with bar and pie charts? Maybe it’s time to rethink the types of graphics you are using to display key research findings.
One graphic display that makes rare appearances in market research reports is the classic Venn diagram. It’s a wonderfully intuitive way to show overlapping groups. Attributed to John Venn, the Venn diagram was first introduced in 1880.
People like contests. I don’t know why. Must have something to do with why so many people like gambling.
People generally don’t like surveys. And it’s getting worse. How I long for the days when 20% response rates were considered “low.”
I recently had the opportunity to serve as a guest speaker for a Vovici webinar titled, “It’s Greek to Me: Multilingual Surveys.” It’s a great topic, and one that researchers… Continue reading Essential Tips for Market Research in Multiple Languages
A market research report that consists of 100 bar charts and pie charts is boring. And while I’d love to think market research has some socially beneficial aspects, curing insomnia is not what I have in mind.
You’ve just spent weeks, maybe months, conducting some primary market research for your internal colleagues. Your happily deliver the end results. buy valtrex online valtrex no prescription And instead of… Continue reading Why Internal Clients Ignore Market Research Results
If you’re thinking about having non-researchers help out with customer interviews, it is certainly viable. And has some real benefits. But watch out for these common roadblocks.
In my experience, most market research cynics are simply people who have been burned in the past by bad research. It happens. So they need to be shown ample evidence that this research was done thoughtfully, with the best possible choice of sample source, methodology, and analysis techniques.
