Keith Bates
Last year The Research Alliance celebrates its 20th anniversary. Marketing Sciences, together with TRA members, approached some of their global clients to discover how the world of market research has changed in the past 20 years and to establish what industry experts think the field will be like in 20 years’ time.
The industry is undoubtedly different today compared with 20 years ago and respondents felt that the biggest change had been technology which has revolutionised business practice in market research. Despite the fact that technological innovations present certain challenges to researchers, the vast majority of the changes offer the industry profound opportunities. Technology helps streamline processes and methodologies, ensures quick and efficient data capture and provides a breadth of tools which were previously unavailable. Respondents told us that the success of market research would be dictated by the industry’s ability to embrace technological change.
Technology tribulations
Respondents to the survey believed that technology developments over the past 20 years had created a number of challenges. There are now myriad consumer channels available to all marketing professionals, leading to a certain contact fatigue. This has resulted in falling response rates across the globe. In Sweden the term “market research” has become synonymous with telemarketing which results in confusion for participants and ultimately a refusal to take part. Back in 1993 people seemed eager to engage and be interviewed, but nowadays this is the exception rather than the rule.
While people are now less willing to participate in formal market research, they are often more likely to share their opinions on social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook. This move towards expressing opinions via social media has been very useful, especially during the recession, for companies who cannot afford to invest in full scale market research projects. However, while social media is a useful tool, very few know how to effectively analyse the data and it is sometimes difficult to gauge how it has been collected and whether respondent profiles are valid.
Technology has also given birth to DIY research and some argue that market researchers are becoming increasingly redundant as direct channels of communication between decision makers and those who have the answers increase in number, especially via the internet and social media. Duilio Novaes of Grupo de Assessoria e Pesquisa, Brazil, warns of the risks of DIY research “mainly because, if made through the internet and social networking, few people still know how to analyse and take advantage of the information contained in social networks.” However, TRA clients believe that there is a role for more agencies to start championing DIY methods of data collection and facilitating its use.
As technology allows for a quicker turnaround of data, clients are becoming more demanding of research firms to produce results quickly and at a low cost. A director of a Spanish public opinion agency explained that clients are sometimes too short-termist. There was a general concern that this rush to higher speed and lower cost was sometimes at the expense of quality and that all parties have a responsibility to maintain standards. Martin Rowland of Kodak agreed that the pace of business these days means it can be harder to find the time and budget to research everything on the scale we used to see. As Zed Zawadaof of MSZ in Poland put it, the high demand for data has meant that “quantity has beaten quality.”
The rise of big data is also creating a conflict for researchers as companies sit on a wealth of information, ready to be mined. Undoubtedly big data provides new opportunities for market researchers but professionals need to learn to use these new sources wisely. The market research manager of a major healthcare organisation in Germany was extremely positive about the application of the internet in research, but also warned about recognising its limitations.
There were also some concerns about how technology has changed the respondent experience. Alexandr Shashkin, CEO of Online Market Intelligence in Russia, claims that technology has meant that respondents increasingly take surveys on their own. Agencies and clients alike should be mindful of creating greater engagement with these more isolated respondents.
Technological triumphs
Today, market researchers are tech-savvy mobile users who can work from anywhere in the world using tablets and smartphones. As the director of Avisa Communications and Marketing in Spain says, technological advancements such as “telephone surveys, internet surveys and more recently the online survey via other devices [such as]…tablets and iPads” have revolutionised the way in which researchers can obtain and analyse data. Gone are the days of face-to-face interviews with little more than a pen and paper.
The enhancement of data collection through technology has in turn benefited clients. Alexandr Shashkin, believes that improvements in technology over the past two decades have provided researchers with more research tools, and access to new types of information – such as behavioural data.
The adoption of technology has facilitated lower costs and more rapid data collection. Despite fears that this could lead to a drop in quality of data, clients are now enjoying quick results and at a fraction of the cost, providing almost instantaneous insight . Mobile research was cited as a perfect example. The director of Avisa Communication and Marketing, Spain, sees the mobile phone as a critical part of the future: “It is a personal tool which you carry with you all day that has a high rate of response and the perfect identification of the interviewee. It can also have all the advantages of the online survey – it is an online/telephone mix.”
Technology has also allowed clients to become more involved in the research process, giving them a certain degree of control “over the process and the results through real time field monitoring and data access through dashboards” says Alexandr Shashkin. And with so many mediums of communication on offer, the researcher-client relationship has strengthened. Ulrika Giers, head of commercial excellence, Nordic & Baltic at Sanofi, expresses how “the service is deeper, now operators work closer with the customer which has led to a partnership and closer relationship.”
Valentine DjiDji, of Placoplatre and Ara Shahnazaryan of Geberit, France, both agree that new technologies have allowed researchers to offer a better service, especially with the increased use of video and images in research presentations. This focus on enhanced outputs and reporting means that researchers have taken on more of a consultancy role, rather than that of just data collector. Clients are less concerned with numbers and science; they want results, interpretation and recommendation.
It was also felt that technological developments have brought the world closer together. A former Insights Head at Tesco in the UK argues that British agencies are now achieving a very good presence internationally, something which is increasingly important for clients who, as they look to the future, will be seeking depth of insight across global markets. Tomasz Ziolkowskiof Marketing Partners in Poland believes that now, and in the future, technology will “redefine the ways to reach and communicate with respondents on a global basis, enabling local brands to go global.”
The next 20 years…
According to the survey, there is no doubt that technology has irreversibly changed market research over the past 20 years. Many of these technologies mean market research is in a stronger position than ever before. Technology allows for a vast amount of data from various geographical locations to be collected quickly and cheaply. This simply wouldn’t have been feasible two decades ago. A number of clients predicted greater international integration in the future and said they will want agencies to deliver consistently across all countries. To achieve this we need more integration between market research agencies. This view is felt across the world, as clients from France and Spain request “exchanges to create observatories and databases” says Patrice Chanrionof FCBA, France. The former audience director of EITB Radio and TV predicts that “market research studies of the future will tend to be multi-country, where only language will separate us.” Similarly, a Spanish public sector client describes how market research will “take on more international forms, even grouping nations or zones of the planet that have similar patterns of consumption and groups that had up to now been considered too small to be financially worthwhile to study, but thanks to new technologies are more affordable.”
Market research has come a long way in 20 years and it remains a powerful business tool across the world. Technology has played probably the most critical role in its evolution. As long as researchers embrace the challenges, risks and opportunities of new technological developments, the next 20 years will be bright.
Keith Bates is Executive Chairman at Marketing Sciences
