Twitterversity: Training in the Principles of Market Research Project Management

July 27, 2011 By 1 Comment

Professional training and career development is an ongoing, continuous process. And tomorrow, there’s a great opportunity to keep that process going!

Be sure to join Kathryn Korostoff of Research Rockstar tomorrow, July 28th from 7am-3pm EST, for an exciting day of free market research training at MRXU, their Twitter-based market research training program.

Here’s the agenda for the day:

Class: Principles of Market Research Project Management
When: July 28, 7 am to 3 pm EST.
All times below are EST.

7 AM: Professor Kathryn Korostoff opens the event with, “A Question of Time: Setting Realistic Time Expectations with partners, colleagues and clients.” How long do different aspects of the research process really take?

8 AM: Professor Diane Hagglund will focus on, “Special Considerations for B2B Projects”, and will be available for Q&A via #MRXU

10 AM: Ten Project Management Tools.

11 AM: Professor Greg Timpany on, “Project Management 101: Tips for Beginners”, and will be available for Q&A via #MRXU

12 PM: Professor Michaela Mora on, “A Step by Step Guide to the Market Research Process”, and will be available for Q&A via #MRXU

2 PM: Hot Topics & Final Q&A. The Twitterversity will close with any follow-up on hot topics from the day. All POVs welcome!

Complete details can be found at Research Rockstar.

Follow along with your favorite Twitter client using the hashtag #MRXU. We’ll be there!

Filed Under: Career, Events, Market Research Tagged With: , , , ,

We Want You!

July 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The mission of Research Access is to exist as a hub for the market research professional community – as a place for thought leadership, knowledge transfer, and the sharing of experiences and best practices that help us all improve the market research industry as a whole.

The key ingredient to that mission – and the source of those benefits for all – is you. Market research professionals who share their thoughts, ideas, experience and expertise. Your contribution to the discourse elevates the experience, and enriches the community.

We’ve been fortunate to have so many wonderful contributors to Research Access – experts and luminaries from all corners of the industry – but we’re always on the lookout for talented individuals who are ready to share. If you’re interested in contributing to the Research Access community – through articles, essays, how-to’s, videos, or in some other unique or creative way – please drop us a line at info@researchaccess.com or via Twitter (@researchaccess). The opportunities to make a real and lasting contribution to the market research community are endless! Get involved today.

 

Filed Under: Essay, News Tagged With: , ,

Does Influence Really Matter?

July 25, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Author’s Note: This article originally appeared on the AMEX Open Forum blog —  I wrote it to get people to seriously think about authority and influence.

I’ve been thinking a lot about influence lately.  It seems that I’m not the only one.  Influence isn’t just for celebrities any more.  Small business has gotten into the game as well.  Mike Michalowicz wrote an article that talked about how you can grow your business by connecting with influencers.  And Guy Kawasaki gives us a real life example of  how you can create a path for influencing behavior by setting up an environment for easy compliance.

Why Influencers Matter to Small Business?

Influencers matter to your small business in the same way that segmentation matters to your marketing message – they simplify and cut the cost of communicating to large groups of people.

We’ve been conditioned to think of celebrities as influencers because a single mention from them can set product sales soaring.  During the times of network media domination, small businesses rarely got to participate in this kind of promotion.  But the advent of new media with its wide reaching social networks has suddenly made it possible (even easy) for small businesses to reach their target audience by investing their time rather than money.
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Filed Under: Marketing, Social Media Tagged With: , , , , ,

In Praise of Progressive Government Policy

July 21, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Gentle reader on the right (or left) – please don’t get turned off by the title of this post. This is not meant to be a discussion on the value of liberal or conservative government policies at large.

I refer instead to the forward thinking work that some local government bodies are doing in adopting technology toward public good. One case in point is the work that we’re doing with the City of Redmond, WA as they roll out solutions that help reach their mobile citizens in an effort to manage people’s commutes better and reduce carbon footprints.

I run a digital marketing agency that focuses on combining rich creative with smart technology solutions for our customers. We partner closely with Microsoft on several fronts including with the Microsoft Tag team. Nayamode has powered some of the largest 2D barcode scanning based campaigns worldwide over the last year or so including for customers such as Conde-Nast and Compass Group. However, when we got a chance to work with the City of Redmond to power a local program to educate, inform and influence behavior of citizens as relates to commuting options, we jumped at it.
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Filed Under: Essay, Marketing, Social Media Tagged With: , , , ,

The Dilemma of Social Media Measurement

July 19, 2011 By 1 Comment

[Editor's Note: The  following post by Michael Wolfe was originally published by and is syndicated with permission by The GreenBook Blog.]

Everyone with any sense of what is going on in the field of marketing right now knows that there is almost a mad frenzy about social media, the likes of which we have seldom seen. In fact, this frenzy has become so strong that it has spawned almost a gazillion self-proclaimed experts and gurus. It almost feels like the American Wild West, with the itinerant snake-oil salesman coming to town to sell us a bottle of his miracle cures.

As I have reviewed the literature on this subject, there appears to be three camps or approaches towards social media measurement. These are as follows:
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Filed Under: Market Research, Social Media Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

When Research Contradicts Conventional Wisdom

July 14, 2011 By Leave a Comment

We came across a great post this morning from our friends at Dimensional Research entitled, “When ‘Everyone Knows’ Contradicts the Research.” (It’s actually a post from earlier this year, resurfaced via their Twitter account; follow them at @DimensionalR.)

The all-too-common market research challenge that this post tackles will likely sound familiar to you: What happens when the findings of the research disagree with what “everyone knows?”

This is a perennial issue for market researchers. Conventional wisdom has taken root, research is conducted to prove it true, and the research proves exactly the opposite. Why? The research must be wrong. The survey must be flawed. The data is bad.
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Filed Under: Market Research Tagged With: , , , ,

How to Control Your Customer Satisfaction Scores

July 13, 2011 By Leave a Comment

We tend to measure customer satisfaction after the customer experience has already happened.  But that isn’t when the opinion about the experience is really created.

Customer experiences are actually created long before your customer ever reaches your doorstep.  They often start with impressions and perceptions created when your potential customer interacts with friends and colleagues who may tell them about your company, or they search online and find articles and reviews about your business.

This is the moment when expectations are created based on what messages are currently active about your business and the customer experience.  While you can’t control others — you can control and design a customer experience. Here’s how:
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Filed Under: How-To, Market Research, Marketing Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Going Green

July 12, 2011 By Leave a Comment

In the early nineties before I moved to the US, I remember visiting the country and being struck by the move toward becoming green. Reflected primarily in consumer goods and how manufacturers touted the ability to recycle their material as an indication of their green nature.

This past decade saw more companies making a move toward becoming green and aiding in sustainability in general, in the workplace. While it’s true that this has been used often by companies as a differentiator in their marketing efforts especially to win the hearts and minds of the customers today that care about such issues, it would be folly to dismiss the idea as either vapid or bad business.
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Filed Under: Essay, Innovation Tagged With: , ,

What We’re Reading – Respondent Engagement

July 11, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Happy Monday to all!

We’re digging into our blog roll this morning, and finding an endless supply of interesting content worthy of your attention. Here are a few pieces in particular that should be on your radar:

  • A New Model for Respondent Engagement - Our good friends over at the GreenBook Blog have nailed it out of the park once again. In this post, they tackle the perennial problem faced by market researchers – that of declining response rates among greater competition for attention, and as a result, declining sample quality as well. Fortunately, as GreenBook editor Leonard Murphy points out, there are new models emerging to re-engage those who’ve become desensitized or indifferent, and the results are encouraging!
  • Does Satisfaction Always Lead to Loyalty? Not Necessarily. - Many companies, my own included, seek out higher customer satisfaction as a way to promote long-term customer loyalty. Rajan Sambandam argues, though, that loyalty does not always increase in correlation to customer satisfaction, particularly for companies who deal in products considered “necessities.” The money those companies spend chasing customer loyalty may be better spent elsewhere.
  • The Limiting Adjective of “Marketing” Research - Be sure to read through this thought-provoking essay by Kevin Lonnie of KL Communications, who argues that the very name attached to our industry – “Marketing Research” – is outdated and limiting, and it needs to go. What do you think?
  • Not All Data’s Created Equal - A terrific article on the danger of quoting “statistics.” Here’s a taste:

I’d far rather we got on with the business of surprising and delighting our clients, rather than ’8 of 10 cats believed’. Show human reactions to things. Proper ones, not some manufactured focus groups. How do people REALLY behave in the juice aisle?

What are you reading this week? Be sure to share your favorite articles/blog posts/chat discussions/etc with us, here in the comments or via Twitter (@researchaccess).

Filed Under: Market Research, News Tagged With: , , ,

Clarity of Purpose

July 8, 2011 By Leave a Comment

I was struck by a recent conversation I had with a senior executive at a large publicly-trade e-commerce company.  This person, a friend, is an intelligent and rightly-skeptical sort whose professional success came not from the endless recitation of homilies or from spouting corporate orthodoxies; instead, he is who he is- he works hard, is intelligent, and treats people well.  His differentiator is a rare commodity: clarity of purpose.

That was the thread that tied together all of his exuberant comments about his company- that the organization has clarity of purpose and at every moment, at every juncture knows what it wants to accomplish for its customers and itself.  Every artifact build inside the company has to accrue to one or more of the immutable principles that form the foundation of the company and to which the employees have an abiding commitment.
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Filed Under: Career, Essay Tagged With: , , ,
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