In-house market research departments are facing great challenges as the market research industry undergo changes, as my colleague Kathryn Korostoff, president of Research Rock Star points out in her recent article Market Research Departments: The Hero of the Market Research Story.

According to Korostoff, in-house market research departments are dealing with:

 1. An unmanageable number of market research-related associations, social networking groups, events and interactive “media”—too many to keep up with, too many to ignore.

  2. Proliferating pockets of unsanctioned research, often done by well-meaning but untrained colleagues.

 3. Increasingly sales-hungry research suppliers, making the risk of answering a phone call almost unbearable.

4. Insufficient time to truly assess the options and merits of social media-related research methods.

 5. Insufficient time, and in some cases authority, to establish and enforce customer research policies (which are of urgent importance because of the unsanctioned research that does take place).

 6. Internal clients becoming aware of numerous “market research” services and solutions, many of which are at best distractions and at worst disruptive.

7. Internal clients who are reading about “free” market research options, when in reality the phrase “market research” is being used very loosely.

Undeniably, the increasing presence of social media, the vast amounts of user-generated content and the proliferation of low-cost online data collection tools are having an impact on the matket research industry, not only for in-house market research departments, but also for research vendors. Some of the challenges research vendors face today are:

• Clients with little training in the fundamentals of research, expecting to get a lot of “free” research just because they have access to cheap online survey tools, social media and information on the Internet.

• Clients’ complacency with “good” enough research and willingness to bend rules that impact data quality due to small budgets.

• Clients’ unwillingness to share critical internal information that would allow research vendors to provide the support clients need and reduce their “vendor management” time.

• Convincing clients that old established ways (“we have always done it this way”) may not be valid anymore for their current situation.

• Time to keep up with demographic and cultural trends that have an impact on how we design research, collect data and analyze it.

• Need to deliver faster results on very small budgets.

I agree with Korostoff, there is a battle out there, but after being on both side of the line of fire as an in-house market research department and as a market research vendor, I can say the battle is equally fierce on both sides. Interestingly enough, we all want the same thing: We want our clients to succeed as much as they want to succeed themselves. 

My hypothesis is that we could win the battle via collaboration since clients and research vendors complement each other. We each have something unique to offer. We can be partners.

To clients I propose: 

1. Let vendors provide you with training and bring you expertise, new approaches and insights when needed.
2. Share your industry expertise with us, tell us about relevant business issues we need to be aware of in order to serve you better.
3. Let’s exchange experiences about the use of emerging technologies and knowledge about new consumer, industry and social trends and their application to market research.
4. Let’s collaborate in testing new approaches and re-evaluate established methods in the light of current market conditions.
5.  Let’s us help lighten your burden and in turn help us grow and keep our industry moving forward.

 If you have other ideas of how clients and research vendors could collaborate to keep the market research community thriving, I welcome your comments. 

To learn more about our consumer data service visit Consumer Shopping Behavior Insights. To request consumer shopping behavior data and insights don’t hesitate to contact us.

CONSUMER FACTS

A recent visit to the Chocolate Conference 2010 in Addison, TX organized by DallasChocolate.org, I had the pleasure to taste Amano chocolates, and listen to a presentation about chocolate making by Amano Artisan Chocolate’s founder Art Pollard.

His commitment to quality and passion for fine chocolate has made his creations winners of many awards (31 to be exact). A self-proclaimed foodie with a background in Physics and experience in building machines he set out to build his own chocolate making machines and the results are amazing. The brand name itself which means “by hand” in Spanish gives a hint of the careful process he uses to make chocolate. Personally, I like the Dos Rios.

A chocolate lover myself, I can understand his passion. I count myself among the many Americans who eat chocolate and do it quite often, but have never heard of Amano.  According to Experian Simmons’ latest data, chocolate consumption in the US is pretty high. Seven out of 10 adult Americans ate chocolate between February ’09 and March ’10, which translates into more than 165 million, and 4 out of 10 ate 10 or more servings in a 30 day period. That’s a lot of chocolate!

These numbers don’t reflect chocolate made by artisans like Art, but I hope many soon discover chocolates like Amano Artisan Chocolates. Their palates will have the experience of a lifetime.

To learn more about our consumer data  service visit Consumer Shopping Behavior Insights. To request consumer shopping behavior data and insights don’t hesitate to contact us.

by Michaela Mora

Posted on August 13, 2010

A few months ago, I got a call on a Friday at 5:45pm CST from a new client who was referred to me by a colleague. He was trying to help his own client to determine which media buying strategy they should follow. They had tested several positioning approaches and now needed to know who they should target and with which media. They asked me if we could analyze the data and develop a targeting model that could guide their decisions. Of course, we did.

After trying different approaches, we recommended a Tree Analysis-based model, which met sound statistical requirements, but also was very actionable. The client could clearly see what ROI they would get from targeting different segments, which not always meant going for the largest segments, since greater reach also meant higher cost and a greater spillover on segments that were not worth targeting.

The client who called me, had worked with a different research vendor before, someone with a degree in statistics and a professional researcher. When I asked, why did he decide to award us the project, he said “You had the marketing perspective on the issue from the start.” I have to thank that to my previous experience as a market researcher on the client side closer to how business decisions are made.

This case came to my mind, when I recently read the post Why market researchers can never be marketers by Annie Pettit, Chief Research Officer at Conversition Strategies.

She discusses a problem market researchers have been fighting against, which is the use of market research as a disguise for selling. She describes the role of market researchers as guardians and advocates of the rights of research participants. As Pettit says, market researchers should provide a sanctuary for research participants to freely express their feelings and opinions. Then she goes on to say:

“Market researchers do not Sell and do not Market. There is no sanctuary if participants feel they will be targeted based on their opinions. Sugging (selling under the guise of research) and mugging (marketing under the guise of research) tear down the walls of the sanctuary. And once torn down, building them back up is a monstrous task.”

I couldn’t agree more. Market research should not be used to harvest prospects lists or to sell directly to research participants. I get that request now and then and my answer is always NO. That’s a job for telemarketers.

However, I don’t equate marketing with direct marketing (in which telemarketing is a tool). It goes beyond that to encompass strategies companies use to market their products and to do that effectively they should use market research to support business decisions. Here I’m talking about results and insights at the aggregated level, where participants anonymity is guarded. In the above example, the targeting model was never meant to target people who participated in the research, but consumers in the general market that may be like them and would have an affinity with the clients’ products.

Market researchers often complain they are not taken seriously and that too many research reports are used more as dust collectors (the thick ones can support a sofa’s missing leg also) than providers of decision support. I have had the fortune to see the implementation of research insights in action with huge dividends, and all I can say is that after all the correct methodological and data quality considerations has been made, what makes a difference in delivering actionable research is looking at the results from a marketing perspective in light of current market conditions and a client’s financial and capacity resources.

Market researchers, who know the principles of marketing are always in better position to help their clients. They will not do the selling. That’s the clients’ job. But market researchers should provide insights on who to sell, what to sell, why and to some extend how to sell to promote clients’ business growth.

To learn more about our consumer data service visit Consumer Shopping Behavior Insights. To request consumer shopping behavior data and insights don’t hesitate to contact us.