When the majority of companies speak of respondent shortages, they are generally referring to traditional, opt-in panelists.  These individuals are invited to join a panel for purposes of taking market research surveys – in either an open fashion from the web or through a more controlled, direct approach.  To opt-in, historically the panelists have registered, received an email to confirm their participation (and to confirm that they are in fact who they say they are), and then are required to complete a profiler survey – which sometimes can be an extensive process.  As the demand for profiled panelists has increased, shortages have become apparent, and as a result many sample providers today invite panelists to projects irrespective of whether or not they are profiled (or with very minimal profiling).

To help compensate for the lack of profiled panelists, “the river” has become an additional source for survey respondents.  River sampling consists of direct recruitment from the web to a survey without the traditional opt-in process.  Generally respondents do not need to actually join a panel or provide background information about themselves when recruited via this method.  Social media has also provided an active means of recruiting new participants; sometimes collecting basic background details automatically in the process, and also launching projects to respondents when an email address is not available.

So, with river sampling and social media available as new recruitment modes, and virtually all consumers regularly using the web and therefore being exposed to these recruitment channels, why are we still in short supply of respondents? There are conflicting opinions as to the correct answer here.  Some blame the respondents for being under-committed, easily bored and unintentional with their responses, while others blame the market research industry itself. Who is actually more negligent – researchers, or the respondents who help us?  Unfortunately market researchers often “burn” panelists by disqualifying them from projects that they want to take but were not matched up to, exposing them to lengthy projects that frustrate and test their patience, failing to adapt methodologies and programming across various browsers, and often inundating them with a flood of invitations that they cannot possibly have the time to complete.

Yet there are solutions that would better utilize the available respondent pool. First, obviously, is better panel management to eliminate the poor project execution issues mentioned above. Another solution is sample optimization.  Survey routing  via sample exchanges can help to ensure that panelists who are ready and willing to take a survey have one available, and that those who do not meet the criteria of the project to which they were originally invited are instead made available to other projects where there might be a shortage of respondents. It is a matter of better targeting panelists for the surveys in which they actually qualify for, and managing the number of invitations they receive so that they are not over- or under-utilized.

Is there truly a shortage of panelists? The answer is probably yes if you define panelists as the traditional, opted-in variety. Is there truly a shortage of survey respondents?  This answer depends on a lot of factors, but essentially the entire base of the web-using population is now available to us as market researchers.

Since there are many potential uses – phone calls, texting, apps, email, web browsing, playing music/videos, playing games, photo/video capture and more – iGR’s findings are highly relevant not only to the smartphone industry, but to our own market research industry as well. As researchers attempt to develop solid recruitment and engagement models for survey respondents, it is crucial to know which smartphone activities most often capture the attention of their users, both overall and by demographic segmentation. While some of the data collected by iGR aligns with what we might assume is expected usage, other data show that smartphones, more than likely in combination with social media, are defining communications altogether.

In the not-so-surprising results category, 20.5% of respondents reported that they use their smartphones for “all of the above,” meaning that one in five engage in all of the major activities that their devices have to offer. Also to be expected, younger users are more likely to play games, listen to music and download/watch/send videos than older users. iGR also found that certain smartphone activities are age-neutral; users download apps and take/send photos at the nearly the same percentages regardless of age.

Yet other findings from this study were somewhat startling. iGR’s first choice on the survey’s activity list was “voice calls.” Given that the name of this device type is smartphone, and the fact that they have rapidly replaced earlier generation mobile phones, it would be assumed that nearly every respondent would have either selected this option or the “all of the above” option – because doesn’t every smartphone owner use their device to make and receive phone calls? According to iGR’s findings, the answer here is no. Only 64% of respondents checked the “voice calls” option, so in totality with the “all of the above” responses, that leaves 15% of participants who report not using their smartphone for phone calls.

As probably anticipated, the percent of these “non-callers” increases to about 20% in younger groups, and drops to 10% for those age 55+, but overall these findings mean that about 15% of U.S. smartphone users say they are not making phone calls on their devices – which equates to about 40 million people.  In reality, it is likely that some in this group occasionally make phone calls, but they do not appear to value the ability. We confirmed with iGR that those in this group are also no more likely than the others to additionally own a tablet, so it does not appear that multi-smart-device usage is influencing these numbers.  With the rise of social media, communications have often become one-to-many, and the traditional voice call no longer provides the power and efficiency in comparison to newer communications modes.

For both online and mobile research, most survey projects are initiated via email and/or text invitation rather than by phone call, so the impact of these findings is not as significant, however they are incredibly impactful for CATI and IVR research practices.  Smartphone penetration is increasing across all demographic groups, yet it appears that the decline of mobile phone call use has already begun. Furthermore, now that the majority of U.S. households are mobile only without active landlines, CATI and IVR research methodologies will continue to decline in both reach and effectiveness. It seems as though the next era of market research must rely on non-phone methodologies – perhaps the message from consumers today is “Don’t call us, and we won’t call you.”

Why do many perceive that market research panels are reaching their demise?  The overarching reason is the great variability in terms of panel quality, which makes it difficult to replicate results from study to study and therefore causes mistrust in the reliability of the data and insights that are obtained via panels. Some of the important questions being asked that affect panel quality include:

• Are the panelists truly who they claim to be?
• Do the panelists accurately represent the general populations being sought?
• What percentage of the panelists are “professionals,” meaning that their participation is motivated solely by the desire to receive incentives/rewards?

These questions are legitimate reasons to sometimes doubt the authenticity of panel research, however many panels have taken steps to address these issues. To help ensure that panelists are who they say they are, authentication processes and software solutions have been introduced. Most panels implement at least one, and often multiple, authentication measures. To help ensure panelists are representative of the base populations, panelists are frequently sought out from various online sources, and newer recruitment strategies such as river sampling and social media enrollment are employed to reduce biases.  Detailed profilers are also utilized to define specific audiences and identify demographics, behaviors and interests that represent the desired populations. To help ensure that the feedback panelists provide is thoughtful and accurate, panel owners frequently track respondents to make certain that they are truly engaged and non-duplicative, rather than “professional” panelists speeding through survey questions and/or enrolling under aliases just to receive the rewards. Processes to identify, track, terminate and blacklist these undesirable panelists are often elaborate and highly effective.

Still, the perception of panel unreliability remains because while many panels employ these quality assurance methods, many others do not. And as competition to get and keep panelists has increased and research profits margins have decreased, many researchers now are forced to multisource from several panels to fill their quotas, and utilize panelists without having full insight into the QA practices of each source.  Thus the reliability of the data can be called into question, and claims of death for panel research models have been made.

Yet what panel research needs is evolution, not extinction. More comprehensive quality assurance implementation is the responsibility of every panel owner, and needs to occur across the industry. What is also proving quite beneficial is the emergence of sample exchange networks. Today it is a rarity for a single panel owner to possess all of the sample required for a study (especially when the elimination of recruitment source bias is the goal), and therefore sample exchange programs are gaining in usefulness and popularity. With the exchange model, various recruitment sources drive their panelist traffic to a common point, where researchers can buy and sell the needed sample effectively. Panelists who do not qualify for one survey might be sent directly into another, so that there is more efficient use of panelists overall. This model also offers new monetization possibilities for underused panel assets – segments that one research study has no use for might be highly valuable to other studies. Additionally, by routing samples through a common exchange, more uniform quality assurance practices can be implemented to ensure the data and insights are highly reliable and easily replicated, and routine market research practices can be automated.

So are market research panels really dying off? We don’t think so. As multiple panel providers come together in exchanges and apply uniform quality standards, the power to service is industry is greater than ever before. The broader concern regards the role of the Internet players.  Will online market research panels be replaced by the Internet giants – Google, Facebook, Twitter, and others – who have a better ability to micro-target and larger databases with potentially better representation among broad (as well as sub-) populations?  Maybe, but at this point we see little overlap with the services compared to what online panels are providing.  The Internet players are targeting quick and easy micro-polls, while online panels deal with complex projects, both qualitative and quantitative.  There is room to co-exist side by side for many years, and we believe that online panels will play an even more important role in market research for the future.

Kinesis Now Provides Automated Electronic Gift Card Redemption for Market Research Participants

AUSTIN, TX (Apr 8, 2013) - Kinesis Survey Technologies LLC (Kinesis), the industry leader for future-proof market research software solutions, announces a new partnership with the web-based electronic gift card platform iCardMall.

Kinesis has integrated iCardMall’s system with its robust panel management solution, Kinesis Panel™, to enable Kinesis clients to offer iCardMall’s selection of America’s top-branded electronic gift cards as part of their research panel’s incentive/rewards program. As panelists participate in market research initiatives, they can accumulate rewards points (as specified by the panel owner) that can be converted into gift cards of varying monetary value for redemption with various iCardMall-affiliated merchants.

“Recruiting and retaining qualified market research panelists requires the utilization of incentives and rewards that are highly appealing and easy to use,” said Kinesis CEO Leslie Townsend. “iCardMall provides a wide selection of gift cards from leading merchants, and Kinesis has seamlessly integrated its system with Kinesis Panel to ensure our clients can offer the industry’s most attractive rewards programs to their panelists.”

Kinesis clients who elect to utilize iCardMall can be set up in 24-48 hours, and manage the reward points’ allocations/redemptions to fit their research incentives model. Panelists, in turn, can easily redeem points for an electronic gift card with the retailer of their choosing, and have the gift card emailed automatically. Kinesis Panel also includes customizable email templates to facilitate the gift card delivery mechanism, as well as detailed reporting about the redemption transactions in real-time.

iCardMall provides electronic gift card distribution from major merchants including Chili’s, Regal Entertainment Group, Old Navy, REI, T.G.I. Friday’s, Sears, Lowes, Barnes & Noble and many more. Additional information about iCardMall is available at: www.icardmall.com.

 
About Kinesis Survey Technologies
Kinesis Survey Technologies, LLC provides a multimode survey and panel management product suite to advance innovation in both mobile and desktop-based market research. Delivering intuitive, state-of-the-art applications, Kinesis software products can be effectively utilized without deep programming knowledge yet are robust enough to perform the most complex of survey and panel functions. Headquartered in Austin, TX USA, with European offices in London, UK, Kinesis offers product versions for both the market research industry and enterprise business organizations, and proudly supports next generation research applications worldwide.

The team sought to identify insights about several challenging questions facing today’s advertising researchers.  One goal was to readily identify which respondents represent the mobile audience vs. the desktop audience. Their results largely confirm what Kinesis has also found in our independent research: that smartphone respondents skew slightly younger whereas tablet and desktop respondents skew slightly older; and that for all device groups (desktop, tablet and smartphone), the device type that was used to participate in this study was reported as the “favorite” online device by the majority in each group. This is a clear indication that market researchers must enable successful survey project interaction for all major online device types, in order to support the preferences of the widest range of respondents (and therefore the most representative groups of consumers). Illuminas/Federated Sample recommended, as Kinesis has long championed, that researchers utilize a multi-mode research software platform with device detection functionality to enable surveys to display appropriately for each device group.

This is increasingly important as mobile survey taking continues to climb. According to Federated Sample data, as of January 13% of market research surveys are now being conducted on mobile devices, which represents significant growth over their figure of 6% last year. Kinesis sees substantially higher mobile rates on our platform (over 30% as of 3Q 2012), which is likely attributable to the fact that Kinesis offers the industry’s most comprehensive mobile research functionality, but Federated Sample’s data serves as confirmation that mobile device usage among all market research participants continues to swiftly rise.

The Illuminas/Federated Sample project also sought to compare incidental mobile survey participants with intentional mobile survey participants, meaning that they allowed device preference to occur naturally for the first group and specifically targeted smartphone and tablet users in the latter group.  Intentional mobile users were found to use a greater variety of devices more frequently, consider themselves more “tech savvy,” and participate in social media more often than their incidental counterparts.  These findings have broad implications across the market research landscape – for how respondents should be authenticated, how panels and sampling exchanges are managed, how qualitative exercises are conducted, how behavioral modeling should adapt, and for market research methods in general.  Interestingly however, both groups reported fairly similar views about being exposed to advertising messages, purchasing behavior as related to ad exposure, and the desire to interact with brands via social media.

Much of the insight shared during the session confirmed Kinesis’ long held recommendations about mobile optimization for survey design, such as keeping overall survey length down and restricting answer grids to a reasonable number of options (four) to avoid problematic scaling and scrolling issues. One somewhat surprising insight had to do with the use of open-ended survey questions. Kinesis has routinely recommended sparing usage of open ends in mobile and multi-mode surveys, because typing on a smartphone screen is often more difficult than on a desktop keyboard, and could possibly affect the responses. However, the Illuminas/Federated Sample research showed very little difference in the number of characters a respondent typed, regardless of the device type and also whether they were an incidental vs. intentional mobile user. While the average desktop respondent typed 33 characters, the average intentional smartphone user typed 32 characters and the incidental smartphone user typed 31 as an open-ended response.

The Illuminas/Federated Sample study offered the ARF conference audience new data and insights that have not been provided before, and more studies of this nature would surely benefit the industry and its end clients. As mobile technology usage escalates, and more individuals consume brand information and advertising via handheld devices, market and advertising researchers must understand the behaviors, preferences, and demographics of these respondents and develop research projects accordingly.

Cape stated that it is not uncommon for researchers to exclude as many as 20% of survey respondents in any given project due to inattention. Yet his findings demonstrated that quite often what researchers classify as inattention might better attributed to other cognitive factors and/or circumstances, and that the reason researchers often assume inattention when respondents fail to correctly answer attention-trapping questions is simply because that is what they are looking for and expecting.

One very interesting finding was that the use of grids to measure inattention is not as effective as other question formats. Cape indicted that respondents spend only half a second per item when considering options in a grid, but 8-10 seconds per regular question. He stated that almost all respondents would “pass” the attention-trap questions if they were not presented in a grid; only a 4% failure rate would be expected. Cape also indicated that a 5% inattention threshold is considered normal because respondents, like everyone else, often have a mismatch between the task at hand and the thoughts in their mind.  He claims as much as 30% mismatch between actions and thoughts in the general population throughout the day.  Respondents in his study were more successful at answering the “trap” question correctly if it was provided early in the grid (when their attention was expected to be highest), as opposed to later on in the same grid. When appearing in the middle to later parts of the survey, many respondents answered the trap question with the same corresponding answer as they had given on the previous question (recency bias) or with the corresponding answer that they had been providing most often (frequency bias).

There were many other interesting insights shared during this presentation; in fact, too many to attempt any kind of substantial summary here. To learn more about the entire study, read the corresponding paper that was published.  The general point Cape made was that some measurement instruments regularly used in survey research are often not as effective and valid as assumed. Specific to this topic, Cape suggested that truly inattentive and momentarily inattentive respondents are hard to separate, since the same “trap” is capturing both groups and classifying them as the same.  The paper offers some quality control suggestions that could aid researchers in discerning who is and who is not truly inattentive, so as not to unfairly penalize and exclude respondents when it isn’t necessary. This is the first paper on this topic that we have seen in a while, and with the industry’s collective  goal of providing more accurate research results, this topic is worthy of further exploration.

Based on Twitter’s description of the survey tool, it does appear to be extremely user-friendly. Brand surveys are embedded directly within tweets; no pop-up window or redirection to an external site is required.  For Twitter users, the surveys resemble regular Promoted Tweets from @TwitterSurveys in their timelines on both mobile devices and desktops, and Twitter states that individual user information will be anonymized before it is shared with the advertisers or Nielsen. For Twitter advertisers, pre-campaign testing and post-survey analysis tools are available, and they can view survey responses across devices (desktop, tablet, smartphone) and by segmentations including geography, gender and interests.

Following on the heels of Google Consumer Surveys, Twitter’s survey offering further confirms that the big Internet players see an important role for micropolling to support their business models.  Naturally with the immense user traffic these websites experience and the colossal amount of data they own, few can compete with them in terms of sampling range and big data compilation abilities. Still, their entrance into the market research space doesn’t signal a takeover of the industry nor the end of traditional market research firms and online survey platform vendors.  Companies and brands will still often require a more customized and detailed research project experience than the Internet players cannot provide, and they will seek out research professionals and more robust survey tools to obtain the specific insights they seek.

The market research offerings of Google, Twitter, and also Facebook are forcing some big changes upon the industry, however. The continued demand for more succinct surveys, greater multimode access capabilities, and implementation of SoLoMo research tools that combine all of consumers’ major web activities together during the research experience are happening. Success in the wake of these changes is dependent on each research company’s willingness and ability to heed the call. There is room for a wide variety of industry players moving ahead, but only ones who maintain a forward-thinking and agile approach to market research will flourish.  Market research is likely to become more fragmented as data collection occurs in a wider range of manners and places – leaving what many see as an increasingly large opportunity to tie the bits and pieces together into a cohesive reporting framework that drives overall business decision-making.

New whitepaper addresses processes and issues associated with migrating survey research data

 AUSTIN, TX (Mar 8, 2013) - Kinesis Survey Technologies LLC (Kinesis), the industry leader for future-proof market research software solutions, has published a new whitepaper entitled Online Survey Platform Conversion: Processes, Issues and Projected Costs.

The whitepaper identifies commonly-encountered survey project migration issues and offers various recommendations about how to successfully convert market research data from one software platform to another.  It addresses how to discern which data to migrate vs. archive, details the various conversion methods and related security issues, and explores cost and timing factors.

“Once the decision to switch survey platforms has been made – for reasons such as access to improved technologies, efficiencies, and/or return on investment – there are numerous steps that must be taken in order to achieve a smooth conversion,” said Kinesis CEO Leslie Townsend. “The information provided in this whitepaper is based on Kinesis’ vast experience in migrating market research data from other vendor platforms to our own, and we hope it proves a valuable resource for companies seeking to undertake such an initiative.”

The Online Survey Platform Conversion: Processes, Issues and Projected Costs whitepaper is available for free download: click here.

About Kinesis Survey Technologies
Kinesis Survey Technologies, LLC provides a multimode survey and panel management product suite to advance innovation in both mobile and desktop-based market research. Delivering intuitive, state-of-the-art applications, Kinesis software products can be effectively utilized without deep programming knowledge yet are robust enough to perform the most complex of survey and panel functions. Headquartered in Austin, TX USA, Kinesis offers product versions for both the market research industry and enterprise business organizations, and proudly supports next generation research applications worldwide.

The evidence that respondents are using mobile devices to participate in market research is already substantial. At Kinesis, we now see more than 30% of our survey traffic coming from mobile devices, and other research software providers indicate that their mobile traffic is now anywhere between 10-20%, depending on the platform. Since research communities are often a vehicle for posting new research projects, as well as the landing pages for respondents once they have completed them, it is now imperative that all community functions be mobile-enabled.

Adding to the demand is the natural synergy between research communities and traditional social media websites. The leading social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, etc.) provide interactive functionality that is highly similar to the functionality of research communities – personalized member profiles, news/activity feeds, discussion forums, media sharing, quick polls, etc. are readily accessible from mobile devices for the leading social media sites, so users have come to expect that this support is available on all websites that they visit. Not providing these common features in a “device agnostic” fashion most certainly has a negative impact on community members’ engagement. Longer term, it will also cause significant non-response bias within the data collected via the community.

Active and thriving communities provide significant research data that cannot be obtained through surveys alone. Multiple research initiatives can be managed from a single community, with a dynamic balance of both quantitative and qualitative elements. Because community members typically must sign in to the community prior to any interactions, historical data and trends about each community member can be married to their feedback as well. Mobile device support only enhances these community benefits, by providing additional flexibility and a real-time data collection mechanism.

All companies that utilize communities as part of their market research initiatives must take immediate steps to support mobile device interaction. How to implement this support is a topic that Kinesis President Leslie Townsend will address as part of NewMR’s Research Communities virtual event being held March 15. She will discuss how community providers can go about introducing the necessary mobile features and functionality; topics include available technologies, recruitment modes, incentive models, support requirements, and use of social media and qualitative elements. Click here for more information and to register for this free event.

Kinesis Survey Technologies realizes 16 percent year-over-year revenue growth in 2012

AUSTIN, TX (Feb. 19, 2013)- Kinesis Survey Technologies LLC (Kinesis), the industry leader for future-proof market research software solutions, today announced that its 2012 revenue exceeded the previous year by 16 percent, driven primarily by strong demand for mobile solutions and robust online panel management tools.

Kinesis has been profitable every year since being founded, with all year-to-year growth having occurred organically, and 2012 marks the company’s ninth consecutive year of revenue expansion. Kinesis also continued to dominate last year among end to end survey and panel management platforms, as it led the market in providing fully device-agnostic research solutions.

“Kinesis is very proud to have achieved such significant growth during a year that was relatively flat for much of the market research industry,” said Leslie Townsend, Kinesis President. “This success is attributable to the market-leading capabilities and efficiencies of our survey and panel management product suite, and the outstanding value it provides to market research companies and enterprise businesses.”

Key 2012 achievements for Kinesis included: major new software releases for each of its three core products,  Kinesis Survey™, Kinesis Panel™ and Kinesis Community™; office expansion and relocation of both its U.S. headquarters in Austin and European branch office in London; new and/or expanded strategic partnerships with industry-leading companies Federated Sample™, MarketSight® and TrueSample®; and publication of the most detailed mobile survey traffic statistics by a market research software vendor ever before in the industry.

“As we anticipated, 2012 was another highly successful year for Kinesis, driven by our commitment to provide best-of-breed market research functionality at an exceptionally attractive price point,” said Kinesis CTO Juha Vehnia. “Kinesis has a proven track record of delivering superior ROI, and as such we were fortunate to welcome a large number of new domestic and global clients to the Kinesis platform, thus propelling our additional organic growth.”

The increases in revenue and operating cash will be allocated in part toward further survey and panel management solution development and platform enhancement, as well as the addition of new staff in the development, customer support, sales and marketing, and IT departments of the company. Kinesis anticipates another year of sizeable expansion and growth for 2013.

About Kinesis Survey Technologies
Kinesis Survey Technologies, LLC provides a multimode survey and panel management product suite to advance innovation in both mobile and desktop-based market research. Delivering intuitive, state-of-the-art applications, Kinesis software products can be effectively utilized without deep programming knowledge yet are robust enough to perform the most complex of survey and panel functions. Headquartered in Austin, TX USA, with European offices in London, UK, Kinesis offers product versions for both the market research industry and enterprise business organizations, and proudly supports next generation research applications worldwide.

Kinesis Panel 4.0 Delivers More Flexibility and Productivity for Research Panel Management

AUSTIN, TX (Feb. 5, 2013) - Kinesis Survey Technologies LLC (Kinesis), the industry leader for future-proof market research software solutions, today announces the latest version release of its panel management solution, Kinesis Panel™.

Kinesis Panel 4.0 has new benefits for both panel managers as well as research panelists themselves. For those working in panel research, it offers Visual Query Builder, for building visually-aided query trees rapidly and without the need to understand background logic.  It also offers “smart” folders to automatically organize projects for companies launching hundreds and even thousands of projects.  In addition, one-click chart previews instantly depict query results to determine available sample and its demographic makeup.

For panelists, engagement is key.  Additional new features available in Kinesis Panel 4.0 include automated email templates that can be customized for specific community audiences, along with self-configurable email and SMS contact settings to give panelists control over how and how often they may be contacted.  Facebook login for panelists, automated incentive redemption options, and further social media enhancements provide panelists with additional control over their panel experience.

“The online panel business is undergoing a major transformation as competition to recruit, engage and retain market research panelists continues to increase significantly,” said Kinesis CTO Juha Vehnia. “With this latest release, Kinesis has incorporated dynamic new functionality and additional usability efficiencies that keep project management tasks to a minimum while improving panelist retention.”

Kinesis Panel is the market research industry’s most comprehensive panel management solution. It provides a robust infrastructure to support very large panels and offers seamless multimode (desktop, tablet and mobile) device execution.  Its flexible query system, cutting-edge email delivery/tracking features, advanced reporting tools, and full integration with Kinesis Survey™ and Kinesis Community™ deliver unparalleled data synchronization and insight generation capabilities. More information about Kinesis Panel is available here.

About Kinesis Survey Technologies
Kinesis Survey Technologies, LLC provides a multimode survey and panel management product suite to advance innovation in both mobile and desktop-based market research. Delivering intuitive, state-of-the-art applications, Kinesis software products can be effectively utilized without deep programming knowledge yet are robust enough to perform the most complex of survey and panel functions. Headquartered in Austin, TX USA, with European offices in London, UK, Kinesis offers product versions for both the market research industry and enterprise business organizations, and proudly supports next generation research applications worldwide.

As the largest and most powerful social media site, Facebook continues to expand its reach and influence by routinely unveiling additional features. The latest announcement from Facebook is the new tool Graph Search, and it is definitely worth paying attention to if you are a member of the market research community.  Although currently in beta test and not yet widely available, the intent for Graph Search is that it provide users with highly targeted and relevant content contained within Facebook’s pages and based on their personal connections. As Graph Search’s capabilities are further expanded, companies and brands (both large and small) will likely be among the primary beneficiaries of this tool. Sharing highly intentional content on the company page(s) and with page “fans” will increase the potential of that content showing up in more and more Graph Search searches, thereby increasing exposure of the company/brand among Facebook’s one billion users without additional advertising and marketing expense.

For market research, the most obvious benefit is access to highly targeted samples and feedback. Graph Search provides the ability to submit a specific query and be immediately directed to people and pages that match the search parameters. Query for specific demographic info (age, gender, location, etc.), interests/affiliations (page “Likes,” event attendance, etc.) and photos/comments…with the ability to cross reference the search parameters.  This tool has the potential to deliver valuable insights and target research participants from all walks of life, both in the local area and across the globe, like no other resource.

Of course, Facebook Graph Search is new and its availability is limited, so it will take time to understand the full impact and usefulness of it. Some of us at Kinesis have volunteered to be Facebook Graph Search beta testers, however none of us have been selected as of yet. We will update this blog with our experiential findings as soon as we can – so please stay tuned.

In market research, metadata (also known as paradata) is data that is collected about panelists and survey respondents during background-running processes.  Metadata fields often vary from one software platform to another; some systems retain only basic data while other systems collect quite extensive data.  Kinesis Panel™, for example, currently collects approximately 20 metadata fields for panelists, in addition to the metadata collected during specific project participation (including both survey and community participation). For research software platforms that are robust in this area, there is a wealth of metadata available of three or more types – that which relates specifically to joining the panel (recruitment source, join date, etc.); that which relates specifically to survey projects (invitation date, completion status, points received, category of project, etc.); and that which relates to community participation (number of discussion posts, quick poll responses, etc.).

Many researchers run survey projects and manage panels with little to no consideration of this available metadata, and in doing so, are leaving valuable insights undiscovered. Metadata can be used to create highly targeted activity filters to retrieve panelists and respondents who have completed/not completed a specific project, responded only to specific categories (oral health care, automotive) of projects, participated only in specific types of projects (diaries, communities), participated only within a specified timeframe, or engaged in other similar examples based upon the needs of the particular study. Leveraging this metadata can result in improved quota setting, more targeted survey invitations, higher response rates – and ultimately – better insights.

Specific to panels, another example for metadata use is determining panel health and overall performance.  The use of the “join date” field can be utilized to ascertain the length of time that each panelist, and specific groups of panelists overall, have been members of the panel.  This data might be valuable determining the most “loyal” recruitment sources or to study the duration of panelists based upon any number of demographic, behavioral, incentive-based, or other attributes.  Metadata can reveal what factors are motivating panelists to join, to stay, and to refer others.

There are many other uses of metadata in addition to those mentioned above – for delivering incentives, conducting respondent authentication, compensating recruitment partners, and so forth.  The implementation of mobile technology also impacts the types and uses of metadata, as respondent authentication practices and project participation metrics are somewhat different for mobile users as compared to desktop users. Determining what metadata is available via the utilized software solution, and then taking time to thoroughly capitalize on it, are efforts that are very worthwhile.

Today’s highly competitive business environment dictates that market research companies conduct research in new and more innovation ways.  Metadata facilitates the discovery of additional insights that are vital to maximizing the value provided to end clients…do not overlook it.

The fervent adoption of mobile and web technologies, along with growing populations and strengthening economies, is resulting in significantly increasing demands for products, services and ecommerce throughout Latin America. The economic outlook is on a par with that of the U.S. – and brighter than many other parts of the world, with the UN’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean forecasting 2013 growth to be 3.8% on average throughout the region.  Brazil, the region’s lead market, is projected by Bloomberg to grow at a rate of 4.2% next year. With economic expansion expected to continue over the next several years as well, market researchers should be paying close attention to this region…the need for brands to understand how best to market goods and services to Latin Americans will result in a boon for the market research industry.

Attracting the desired respondent bases and keeping them engaged in online research is not without its challenges, however. Latin America is comprised of nineteen countries each with its own cultural and socioeconomic factors that must be considered, and Internet access varies country to country. Still, market researchers who are attuned to the differences and who understand the potential of the region will generate insights that can accelerate this growth. Social media will undoubtedly play a large role in online research recruitment; eMarketer reports that 68.9% of web users in Latin American are regular visitors to social sites (which is well above the global average of 61.9%). Combined with high mobile phone and tablet usage rates, Latin America is poised to embrace new MR methodologies.

Research companies looking to enter into or expand their presence in this region should be seeking out inventive strategies for conducting impactful research with Latin Americans. One such opportunity that Kinesis is electing to take part in is the upcoming Insight Innovation Exchange conference being held March 25-26 in Sao Paulo. This conference series aims to assist attendees in the rethinking of how to best reach today’s consumers globally and generate insights that guide impactful business strategy. Sao Paulo was selected as the host locale for the event since it is the largest city in South America, and a hub of economic and technological transformation in the region.

Latin America is going to be a major focal point of market research activity in the coming decade and, we believe, one of the brighter spots for expansion of online data collection in our industry. There is opportunity to uncover purchase decision insights and drive new marketing strategies throughout this fast growing and influential region like never before.

Updated whitepaper provides comparative data from Q1 and Q3 2012 detailing the increasing usage of mobile devices among market research participants

AUSTIN, TX (Dec 20, 2012) - Kinesis Survey Technologies LLC (Kinesis), the industry leader for future-proof market research software solutions, has published an update to its whitepaper entitled Online Survey Statistics from the Mobile Future.

The updated whitepaper includes detailed Q3 2012 statistics about Kinesis’ online survey platform usage, and specifically the incidence at which various traffic metrics now occur on mobile devices versus desktop devices. Q1 2012 data published in the original version of the whitepaper remains and is provided for comparative analysis. Kinesis, as the leading mobile and multi-mode survey software provider, has published its data primarily as a predictor of what the market research industry as a whole will likely experience as mobile usage among survey respondents continues to increase. The whitepaper also addresses how the current lack of mobile device support may be biasing online research studies.

“Comparing the first and third quarters of this year, Kinesis saw significant increases in its mobile survey traffic for both the U.S. and Europe,” said Kinesis CTO Juha Vehnia. “Mobile survey respondents now represent 30.74% of Kinesis’ overall U.S. survey respondents. While many companies may not be ready for advanced mobile research methodologies, the data clearly indicates that mobile device users now represent a significant portion of market research survey participants. The industry must take immediate steps to ensure it is adequately supporting this group.”

Statistics detailed in the whitepaper were compiled based upon metadata from all survey traffic hosted on Kinesis’ SaaS infrastructure during the first and third quarters of 2012. Traffic breakouts are provided by device type, browser type, and geographic region. Also included are data relative to completion and dropout rates by device.

The updated Online Survey Statistics from the Mobile Future whitepaper is available for free download: click here.

About Kinesis Survey Technologies
Kinesis Survey Technologies, LLC provides a multimode survey and panel management product suite to advance innovation in both mobile and desktop-based market research. Delivering intuitive, state-of-the-art applications, Kinesis software products can be effectively utilized without deep programming knowledge yet are robust enough to perform the most complex of survey and panel functions. Headquartered in Austin, TX USA, Kinesis offers product versions for both the market research industry and enterprise business organizations, and proudly supports next generation research applications worldwide.

So, what does Kinesis predict for 2013?  All market research professionals are seeking answers as to where the industry will head next year and beyond. There were many big stories in 2012 — that mobile and social media technologies are displacing traditional methodologies/business models, that big data is front and center for investor attention, and that the Internet industry is impacting the traditional panel business. As market researchers from all segments of the industry ready our business strategies for next year, here is what Kinesis President Leslie Townsend sees coming down the road.

1. Market research revenues will achieve modest revenue gains (4+%) in 2013, irrespective of global recession. Some of the revenue next year will be driven by Google Consumer Surveys, along with Facebook, Twitter, and the broader Internet industry’s attempts to enter the market research space in a more deliberate way.  The presence of these players is already generating significant demand for market research based on “gut-level” responses to just one or two key questions.  These companies facilitate this data collection at a very low cost, and much of this research spending comes out of marketing and advertising budgets, but it will drive revenue growth for overall annual market research spending.  Rapid deployment of very simple projects at an extremely attractive price point will facilitate departmental spending for research in cases where time and budgets do not permit full-fledged projects.
2. Smartphones and tablets will be used in greater proportion than desktop devices by consumers.  Direct consumer communications and advertising via mobile devices will continue to grow rapidly and will often utilize social media and location-based services.  High-margin revenue generation will occur in this segment of the marketing industry because of huge demand upon consumer engagement, and for market research, it will ultimately result in a whole new set of in-the-moment and SoLoMo research solutions. Incidentally, Kinesis does believe that mobile usage in survey research participation will also significantly increase next year, even if it doesn’t overtake desktop usage. Mobile respondents now account for more than 30% of Kinesis’ overall survey traffic in the U.S., and we are experiencing noticeable growth in mobile respondents on a quarter-by-quarter basis.
3. The amount of data collected in the MR industry will double or triple in the next year because of the focus on big data.  Web analytics, social media (Facebook posts, tweets, blogs, etc.), purchase patterns, ad viewership, CRM data, and a host of other sources are all contributing to the huge growth in market research data collection.  Much of this information is now considered vital to marketing strategies and how companies compete.  The market research industry is still learning how to best combine data in ways that are meaningful and draw new insights, but we expect big data to drive this change and result in significant cross-platform and cross-function assimilation of data. It’s going to happen fast (look at where the investment spend is going).
4. Like 2012, 2013 will also be a year of great vendor expansion. The market research industry will continue to see many new vendor start-ups, with more from the Internet industry, but dropouts and consolidation will also continue.  Many of the newer companies do not adequately consider that research agencies and end clients often need and require a great deal of flexibility and integration to internal processes, and they do not have the necessary support structures in place yet. Perhaps this is among the best competitive advantages that longer-term industry players have right now. Also, as new product and solution launches require greater capital than ever before in the industry, it is now more difficult to get a start-up off the ground.  New vendors must find ways to shorten delivery cycles, specialize in new methodologies, further simplify and automate business process, and integrate to other data sources.
5. “Old school” market research will live on in 2013 and well beyond!  While all market researchers need to be embracing the new methodologies and solutions that are being driven by big data, mobile, geolocation, social media, etc., this hardly means that traditional (“old school”) market research is going to vanish any time soon. The need for a rational approach to sampling frameworks and behavioral models as applied to research will remain an ongoing science, and will be an essential component of understanding and modeling for big data, as well as the desirability for implementing these new research methods and modes.  Traditional research will be the bedrock of validation and justification for the majority of “big spend” research projects, and many specialty segments will continue to rely upon traditional methodologies – and comparisons thereto – for the foreseeable future.

Leslie Townsend briefly shared these predications during Research for Good’s Predictions for 2013 webinar that offered a panel discussion with her and fellow panelists Simon Chadwick of Cambiar, Reineke Reitsma of Forrester, and Leonard Murphy of Gen2 Advisors and the GreenBook Blog. The webinar was moderated by Kristin Luck of Decipher, and it was a lively and highly insightful conversation in which the panelists fielded prediction questions from the attendees. Many questions had to go unanswered during the actual event due to time constraints, but those interested can see the complete Q&A follow-up from Reineke here and from the others here.

StartSampling provides project management, product fulfillment and research facilitation for in-home product testing initiatives. The company’s process enables quantitative insight to be gathered by having consumers experience products in a ‘real world’ environment, and then supplying their feedback through online surveys that are powered by Kinesis’ survey software platform, Kinesis Survey™.

“StartSampling offers the industry’s leading methodology for in-home product testing, and Kinesis has many clients with large research panels for whom this type of research is highly desirable,” said Kinesis President Leslie Townsend. “We are pleased that our partnership enables Kinesis users to conduct in depth product testing research with StartSampling, and then collect detailed consumer feedback via Kinesis Survey.”

Kinesis Survey is an online survey solution that supports complex survey designs and high-volume respondent traffic. It facilitates seamless survey execution via desktop, tablet and mobile devices, and includes advanced reporting and analytics tools. StartSampling has been a Kinesis client since 2008.

“Kinesis has been an outstanding vendor for StartSampling, and now we have extended our relationship into a strategic partnership,” said Jim Fehr, StartSampling’s VP of Information Technology & Research Services. “StartSampling offers the most reliable and proven process for in-home testing projects, coupled with exceptional customer service, and we are pleased to introduce our services to Kinesis users.”

StartSampling leverages its extensive fulfillment facilities combined with full service custom research capabilities to provide a unique, all under one roof solution for in-home product testing.  Services include survey design and fielding, panel screening and recruitment, custom packaging and mailing services and detailed analysis of results. This comprehensive solution means fewer delays, more accountability, and a smoother client experience.  StartSampling works across industries with product manufacturers, market research agencies, consultants and service companies.  Additionally StartSampling provides research sample for a vast array of research initiatives via its proprietary consumer panel.

About Kinesis Survey Technologies
Kinesis Survey Technologies, LLC provides a multimode survey and panel management product suite to advance innovation in both mobile and desktop-based market research. Delivering intuitive, state-of-the-art applications, Kinesis software products can be effectively utilized without deep programming knowledge yet are robust enough to perform the most complex of survey and panel functions. Headquartered in Austin, TX USA, with European offices in London, UK, Kinesis offers product versions for both the market research industry and enterprise business organizations, and proudly supports next generation research applications worldwide.

About StartSampling
Based in Carol Stream, Illinois, StartSampling is the pioneer in online promotional marketing services and focuses on product sampling, research and related media services. Founded in 1999, StartSampling distributes over 750,000 product samples each week and offers a full range of promotional sampling services for brand marketers. StartSampling is also the leading provider of turn-key solutions that power the online sampling centers of major retailers such as Walmart, Costco, Kroger and CVS.  StartSampling research connects clients with engaged consumers to better understand the decisions consumers make, and why they make them.  A full service online custom market research company providing everything from concept tests to conjoint analysis, StartSampling specializes in In-Home Product Tests, Recognition Based Ad testing and Innate Behavioral Preference based consumer segmentation.  For more information, visit www.startsamplinginc.com.

Appropriate or not, this kind of thing happens in business on a regular basis. Due in large part to social media, work partnerships and friendships cross paths like never before.  The customer referenced in the above paragraph probably considers the Client Services rep that he called for computer advice to be friend.  In fact, they may BE Facebook friends and connected on LinkedIn. They probably do work “favors” for each other routinely, but is it acceptable to extend that goodwill beyond work and into their personal relationship?

We feel this issue is especially timely given that outside forces are beginning to permeate the field of market research. “Favors” have long been part of the game for our industry; we have all had projects where the incidence rate did not measure up to what had been assured, where the number of completes went well beyond what was budgeted for a project, and on and on.  For many years our industry has rallied together and helped each other out – often by subsidizing end clients’ projects at our own expense. But now as power players like Google and Twitter increasingly move into our space, it will be interesting to see if the market research industry will maintain the same mutual support / esprit d’corps.

Understanding that today’s always connected lifestyle means that customers and coworkers can reach us any time of the day or night, it is up to each of us to draw our own boundaries and decide how much work and play crossover we want in our lives. But there is a fine line – a judgment call really – as to what constitutes a reasonable favor and what crosses the boundary (or even borders on abuse), for both a company and for each individual employee.  For the most part everyone prefers working in an environment of give and take, and favors are often a necessary part of retaining business. Furthermore, it only makes good business sense for Client Services reps to strive to have a solid “friendship” with every client. Good customer service is vital to the market research industry.  It’s what makes the projects come in on time and under budget.  It creates the stress that energizes us to continually do more with less and to innovate when we must.  We just need to decide if the boundary lines need an individual, or a collective, adjustment – and if it will possible to keep up the spirit of reciprocity as we move toward increasingly self-service business models.

These survey design modifications should be in place by now given that mobile device usage is prevalent among survey respondents.  Unfortunately – or fortunately (depending on how you look at it) – these modifications are no longer sufficient on their own. Strategy Analytics recently reported that global smartphones in use have now surpassed 1 billion, and will reach 2 billion by 2015. While some argue that smartphone penetration is still relatively low worldwide, it does represent approximately half of the mobile phone market in both the U.S. and Western Europe, and continues to grow.  Mobile respondents already expect shorter surveys (and today they drop out of surveys at a higher rate than desktop respondents). Combined with the emergence of the “microsurvey” from companies such as Google, Facebook, and Twitter, the expectations of all survey respondents are radically changing. It is time for the market research industry to get radical as well and alter its online data collection practices to support this substantial segment of research participants.

Often we encounter a lot of pushback on this issue. Statements such as “It’s too difficult to change our trackers, so we are just going to terminate mobile respondents from them,” or “There is just no way you can ask a respondent to take a conjoint exercise on a mobile device because of the length.”  Today’s reality is that researchers must make the necessary methodological changes, despite any difficulties mobile support entails, because otherwise the survey results are pretty meaningless anyway. The data excludes a percentage of the population that is already significant and rapidly increasing in size.

Below are some more “radical” process modifications to consider:

• Utilize larger sampling frameworks, while displaying shorter question sets to each respondent.  This process may entail presenting questions or question blocks randomly or in rotation to a subset of respondents.
• Leverage prepopulation as much as possible.  Any fields that can be prepopulated eliminate the requirement to display another screen to respondents, thereby shortening the survey.
• For concept testing, two to three concepts are more than likely the maximum quantity that will yield a respectable response rate in any one survey, in combination with the larger sampling framework that has already been described.
• Trim project objectives and conduct more projects, rather than attempting to apply multiple objectives to a single project.  The data set may need to be married across projects on the basis of behavioral or other sampling methodologies, and not tied to individual respondents.

 
These suggestions do not encompass all process changes that are going to be necessary, but they will go a long way to enabling truly device-agnostic survey research. Ensuring a positive respondent experience for all survey participants is the goal that every market research company must be moving toward. Skeptics argue that “Our clients will never go for it,” and this may be true in some cases, but unless researchers help clients transition to new paradigms, we as an industry have totally lost to the DIY world and are on the fast track toward irrelevance. Market researchers cannot afford to neglect the full support of mobile respondents – for they will outnumber our desktop respondents in the not too distant future.

Leslie Townsend Joins the Council Committed to Elevating Online Research Quality

AUSTIN, TX (Oct 10, 2012) - Kinesis Survey Technologies LLC (Kinesis), the industry leader for future-proof market research software solutions, announces the recent appointment of Kinesis President Leslie Townsend to the TrueSample® Quality Council.

TrueSample, a division of SurveyMonkey® – the world’s largest survey company, is a patent-pending data quality solution that ensures each survey respondent is real, unique and engaged. TrueSample established the Quality Council to drive data quality standards and best practices, and to enable the collaboration of key thought leaders across the research industry. Since Kinesis provides the leading end-to-end survey and panel management software platform, Ms. Townsend’s appointment to the Quality Council adds significant insight from the market research solution development perspective.

“Leslie Townsend’s vast survey research experience and solution development leadership make her an ideal addition to the TrueSample Quality Council,” said Mark Menig, Head of Global Strategic Business Development for TrueSample. “Kinesis was among the first survey solutions to integrate the TrueSample offering, and we are pleased to now further extend our partnership.”

Kinesis integrated TrueSample into the Kinesis platform in 2010 in order to provide additional respondent validation options to its clients. TrueSample combines identity verification, de-duplication and engagement modeling into one real-time application that removes fake, duplicate and unengaged respondents from research samples. Kinesis offers the highly advanced market research platform that includes Kinesis Survey™, Kinesis Panel™ and Kinesis Community™.  All Kinesis solutions support seamless multimode (desktop, tablet and mobile) project execution.

“The integration with TrueSample provides users across the Kinesis product suite rapid and easy access to tools that ensure high data integrity, whether they are building an ongoing panel or running a single survey project,” said Townsend. “Effective respondent validation tools are vital to our clients and across the broader market research community. I applaud TrueSample’s fervent commitment to online research quality, and I am proud to join its Quality Council.”

The TrueSample Quality Council convenes twice per year to share information and experiences related to data quality and to collectively define the product direction for TrueSample. Ms. Townsend will be among the featured presenters at the next Quality Council meeting. More information about the TrueSample Quality Council is available at: http://truesample.com/qc.

About SurveyMonkey
SurveyMonkey Inc. is the world’s largest survey company, helping customers collect more than 1.5 million online survey responses every day. SurveyMonkey has revolutionized the way people give and take feedback, making it accessible, easy and affordable for everyone. The company was founded in 1999 with a focus on helping people make better decisions and has built technology based on more than 10 years of experience in survey methodology and Web development. Customers include 99 percent of the Fortune 500, academic institutions, small businesses, HR departments and neighborhood soccer leagues everywhere. The company has more than 150 employees throughout the United States and Portugal, with headquarters in Palo Alto, California.

About Kinesis Survey Technologies
Kinesis Survey Technologies, LLC provides a multimode survey and panel management product suite to advance innovation in both mobile and desktop-based market research. Delivering intuitive, state-of-the-art applications, Kinesis software products can be effectively utilized without deep programming knowledge yet are robust enough to perform the most complex of survey and panel functions. Headquartered in Austin, TX USA, with European offices in London, UK, Kinesis offers product versions for both the market research industry and enterprise business organizations, and proudly supports next generation research applications worldwide.