Day 1 at the CASRO Technology conference opens with a talk from Diane Bowers, the conference President talking about a global research business network and how the United States cannot and should not operate singularly in worldwide research and developments. Diane thanks the CASRO committee and organizers.
Next up Tony DiPonio, the committee chair and SVP, Information Systems Market Strategies International. Tony discusses the crossroads in technology now in Market Research and where the future lies. He talks about the thinking behind the Technology Conference programme – thinking about Big Data, trends, social media, data mining, gamification, facial expression, behavioural economics, mobile and so on. Tony reflects on how important it is to understand the framework of compliance that researchers have to adhere to (ISO standards). Tony introduces Tim Macer, MD of Meaning UK.
Tim opens up with the annual survey ‘The State of Technology in Market Research”. It’s a 15 minute online interview offered in 4 languages -the reports are being released tomorrow. This survey has been conducted annually by Tim since 2004. In this study, there are 5 topical areas:
1. General Trends – research volumes by mode, where web surveys are continuing to increase in their importance with CATI is declining where Paper is plunging going from just over 20% to 10% from 2006 to 2012. In asking ‘which sources of online sample do you use?’ researchers reported that the sample provided by their client is on the rise as well as third party access panels from 2004 to 2012. In asking “What percentage of projects currently involves the following deliverables or distribution methods to the client?’ researchers reported that MS Power Point is on the rise (slightly) between 2006 to 2012 but Excel from 2009 to 2012 as a format has risen sharply from 2010 to 2012. MS Word and Acrobat PDF both decreasing in use from 20116 to 2012. Cross-tabs on the way down, featuring as a not very important deliverable, although they are still required as a primary analysis method.
2. Survey Length Questions asked to researchers: are your surveys getting shorter? Largest group said ‘no, they’re still the same length’ but 13% say surveys are actually getting longer. So what do researchers do to try and reduce survey length? 50% said they’ve adopted a policy or best practice guidance while 42% say they’ve simply adapted surveys. In asking the researchers “What do you consider is the natural limit for surveys?” Researchers concurred by and large (looking at averages) that it should be 15 minutes for web, 18 for phone and 7 minutes for mobile. In looking at the breakdown – a huge amount of researchers said 5 minutes for mobile.
3. Mobile Apps VS browsers? Looks like the browser has the edge over the app option but 34% said both. In the future, people think there is still a future for browser based surveys with 37% predicting browsers will still be used, but 34% predicting Apps will be needed.
4. Panel quality measures “How much of your quant survey work uses panels or other sample sources whee participants recieve a reward?? 63% on average in Asia Pacific, 61% in Europe, N America say 66%. “Which of these incentives do you use and to what extent?” 48% said vouchers are used occassionally, 53% said donation to a good cause, 52% said non-monetary gifts, 32% said cash. “What methods do researchers apply?” Reports show localised methods, so 73% report speed detection, 63% report straightlining detection, 52% said challenging questions but 9% said no methods used. Of those interviewd operating panels, three quarters of the firms interviewed said they do subscribe to independanct panel verification services.
5. Communities Does your company operate any online research communitites? The results from this has decreased since last year where in 2012 people feel they don’t have time to carry MROCs out. Smaller companies find these more challenging but show the most amount of interest in MROCs. “Do you expect the use of MROCs to increase?” 34% said they feel their use of MROCs would increase. 79% feel they need dscussion boards or forums in order to cassry out a research community software platfoorms. How would you describe the support for these capabilities in the software tools tat you currentyly use?” 52% said blogs.
Wrapping up: Tim recommends downloading this report tomorrow, and summarizes his slides. Apps will be more in demand in the future, communities: little or no growth – more smart technology needed here.
Kristin Luck, President of Decipher introduces the Keynote Jonah Berger who is a professor of Marketing, Author of ‘Contagious’
My next blog will go over Jonah’s talk.