Where are the tools to enable Web 2.0 research?

By Tim Macer | 

Researchers cannot afford to ignore Web 2.0 approaches to research, as Forrester’s analyst Tamara Barber makes clear in a persuasive article on Research Live, in which she settles on market research online communities (MROCs) as being the most effective way to achieve this.  How to do Web 2.0 research, from a methodological point of view, is engaging a great deal of discussion at MR events this year.

In her piece, Ms Barber has focused on social or participatory characteristics of  Web 2.0, where there is obvious value to research. But the other characteristics of Web 2.0 lie in the technological changes that have emerged from its 1.0 antecedents – that the Internet becomes a platform for software, rather than a delivery channel for information. Indeed it is technology – using Ajax, Web services, content integration and powerful server-side applications – that are as much the hallmarks of Web 2.0 as the outward manifestations of the social web. It’s on the technology side that there is a lot of catching up to do, in the world of market research, and until this gets sorted out, Web 2.0 research will remain an activity for the few – for patient clients with deep pockets.

The specialist tools we use in research are starting to incorporate some Web 2.0 features, but nowhere does this yet approach a fully integrated platform for Research 2.0 – far from it. Panel management software is morphing into community management software, but the Web survey tools they link to don’t make it easy yet to create the kind of fluid and interactive surveys the Web 2.0 researcher dreams of. Neither are the tools to analyse all of the rich textual data that come out of these new kinds of research truly optimised for all forms of Web 2.0 research data. There are pockets of innovation, but multi-channel content integration – a key feature of Web 2.0 sites – is still difficult, so researchers are still drowning in data and left running to catch up on the analytical side.

Another problem arises too as more ambitious interactive activities and research methods emerge: the demands on both the respondent and the respondent’s technology increase, and some are getting left behind. Participants find themselves excluded because their PC at home or at work won’t let them run the Java or other components needed to complete the activity – whether it’s a survey, a trip into virtual reality or a co-creation exercise, and their PC won’t let them upload what you are asking them to upload. Even relatively modest innovations such as presenting an interactive sort board in the context of an online survey or  focus group will exclude some participants because their browser or their bandwidth won’t handle it. Others simply get lost because they don’t understand the exercise – there is a growing body of studies emerging into the extent to which respondents fail to understand the research activities they are being asked to engage in.

New Scientist recently reported on innovations taking place in gaming technology where the game learns from the level of competence demonstrated by the player and uses this to adjust the game’s behaviour. It’s the kind of approach that could help considerably in research. Unlike online gamers, we can’t ask participants to spend more than a few seconds in learning a new task and we can’t afford to lose respondents because of the obvious bias that introduces into our samples.

For Web 2.0 research to move beyond its current early-adopter phase, not only do researchers need to take on these new methods, but research software developers also need to be encouraged to take a Web 2.0-centric approach to their developments too.

Tim Macer

Tim is a world-renowned specialist in the application of technology in the field of market and opinion research and is probably the most widely-published writer in the field. His roots are in data analysis, programming, training and technical writing. These days, as principal at meaning he works with researchers, users of research data and technology providers around the globe, as an independent advisor. He is quite passionate about improving the research process and empowering people through better use of technology.

Human-Centred Innovation - Why Market Researchers & Product Designers Should Be Best Friends

This presentation provides insight into the open innovation and co-creation idea and describes a human-centred innovation approach with respect to the changing roles of market research and product design. The increased importance of strong interdisciplinary (internal) collaboration of researchers and designers for being successful in open innovation is emphasized. Only the combination of external co-creation and internal collaboration make open innovation programs successful. Embracing a human-centered innovation approach means also to intervene in existing structures of power within the company which are built upon hierarchy.

Author: Steffen Hück - Chief Netnographer at HYVE 

http://twitter.com/Netnoblography

"Fascinated by the combination of the two areas "Social Media & Online Communities" with "Open Innovation & Co-Creation". I work at the innovation agency HYVE where I am responsible for Netnography Research. I supervise open innovation and social media research projects especially in the food, cosmetics and media industries. Furthermore I am member of the advisory committee of the German Social Media Association “Arbeitsgemeinschaft Social Media”. - Steffen Hück @ Linkedin 

Communispace Named a Leader in the Full-Service Market Research Online Community Market

Communispace, pioneer of online customer insight communities for the world’s leading brands, today announced that it has been named a leader in The Forrester Wave^TM: Full-Service Market Research Online Community (MROC) Vendors, Q4 2009.  Communispace was among the select companies that Forrester invited to participate in the report—the first of its kind for the MROC sector—which includes vendors that help clients build and maintain private online communities that are systematically used for market research purposes.

In this evaluation, Forrester assessed vendors across 46 criteria bucketed into three categories: current offering, strategy and market presence.  Communispace captured the highest score in all three categories and according to the report, “differentiates itself based on superior service, outstanding customer references, and a strong and tenured management team.”  The report also states, “Communispace, the most well-recognized name in the MROC space, is true to its reputation as a premium vendor.”

The report continues, “Communispace excels in its customer service, moderation, and very high-quality deliverables that provide findings in an engaging and creative way that any senior executive would be able to digest with ease.”  In their analysis, Forrester gave Communispace the highest score for services (4.45 out of 5) highlighting the range and quality of services it provides particularly in community management, recruitment, reporting quality, creative services, analytics and account management.  Communispace received 5 out of 5 in the reference accounts category, indicating its client “references are very pleased with few suggestions for improvement and are using advanced capabilities of the community.”  The company also received high scores for analytics (4 out of 5), or the “analysis performed to distil community insights” and internationalization (4.5 out of 5), the ability to “serve clients with global research needs.”

During the past decade, Communispace has built more than 350 communities for the world’s leading brands that offer real business value and a competitive advantage.  The company currently has more than 230 employees who work with thousands of community members across 92 countries.

“It has been ten years since we launched our very first insights community for a client, and it is gratifying to see the field expanding and becoming a real ‘industry,’” said Diane Hessan, CEO of Communispace.  “As the leader in this growing pack, we’ve already worked with hundreds of companies to refine our offerings, improve our methodology and expand our expert staff.  This expertise, combined with our unmatched commitment to customer service, is why we’re able to provide researchers with more timely, robust insights that give their businesses the competitive edge.”   

To download a complimentary copy of the report, please visit:http://communispace.web4.hubspot.com/Communispace-Named-a-Leader-in-the-Full-Service-Market-Research-Online-Community-Market/

Adidas created an online community to gain insight through social media.

Social networks boast hundreds of millions of members. When companies create a presence on Facebook, Twitter, or other sites, if even a small percentage of members join it opens up untold amounts of data. Untold, and often unmanageable.

When Adidas developed a Facebook fan page, it quickly attracted 2 million users. The company acquired a proportionate number of followers on its Twitter and YouTube pages, leading to the perhaps surprising question: Are these communities too big?

How useful customer communities are depends on how easily messages can be disseminated and how quickly companies can act on insight. In Adidas's case monitoring and analyzing postings by 2 million members wasn't realistic, so it created a community within a community. The company worked with Passenger to create a private community called Adidas Insiders, inviting only the most active users on public pages to join.

"We're always looking for ways to be closer to the consumer and gather information on what they think of our brand, products, concepts, and marketing," says Chris Murphy, director of digital media at Adidas. "This is a unique opportunity to quickly gather real-time consumer feedback."

To extract that feedback, Adidas hosts conversations between consumers with the Insiders group, starting discussions about brand perception, marketing campaigns, or communications channels. Murphy says one of the biggest challenges has been keeping communication frequent and relevant. "Our community became active quickly, and it's important to keep feeding members information, content, products, activities, and polls," he says. "Our biggest surprise has been how willing and active our community members really are. It's a great help to me spending time with consumers that love the brand as much as we do."

Because members of the Insiders group love the brand, research shows they're more influenced by Adidas' messaging. A report by Forrester Research analyst Lisa Bradner, "Social Brand Strategies," found that certain types of social media were more effective in influencing perception depending on who was doing the speaking. If online reviews or discussion forums were peer-generated, for example, they had a bigger impact than if they were company-generated. However, when a consumers' favorite brand is generating the discussion forums, podcasts, and videos, they're even more effective than if peers created them.

By testing strategies and concepts with the smaller Insiders group, Adidas has also become more responsive to the needs of the larger public communities on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter. But the real ROI, Murphy says, is in improvements made by the product marketing team. "We're able to play with colors and materials and get instant feedback from these fans, which allows us to be more efficient in development and go-to-market planning," he says. "We've even asked about things like voiceovers for videos and received surprising feedback that's caused us to alter creative. As a result, hopefully we generate more views, interest, and reach a broader audience."

Adidas found that developing a private community is more challenging than a public fan page, but the benefits can outweigh the added effort. "It takes time to nurture the community, since members are tied to your brand and realize the brand is watching and knows how to reach them," Murphy says. "There's some trepidation that exists in this community that doesn't in Facebook or MySpace where members can be anonymous." But, he says, Insiders are more likely to become brand evangelists. "These are the people we see as on-the-ground marketers willing and able to help promote the Adidas brand."

Online brand communities inspire customer engagement, advocacy and insight

Passenger, a leader in private online brand communities that inspire customer engagement, advocacy and insight, today announced research data and an accompanying white paper by Sector Intelligence that analyzes how companies are currently using social media as part of their corporate marketing and product development strategies. The white paper examines how 16 Fortune 500 food & beverage, financial services, automotive, retailers and sporting goods brands are involving customers directly in the planning and development of company products, services and marketing initiatives, as well as the corporate social media strategies themselves, via private online communities. The study found that these interactive communities provide deeper insight into customers’ needs than traditional market research, have increased customer advocacy and loyalty, and can help avoid consumer backlash as companies develop their public social media presence.

“Never before has the impulse for consumers to connect with brands been expressed and acted upon on such a large scale, and never before have so many disparate individuals come together to help produce products and services that would be in turn distributed on a mass basis,” said Craig A. Honick, managing partner, Sector Intelligence. “The gap between customers and brands is getting smaller each day, and the brands we interviewed in this study documented that direct conversations through private social networks are improving the climate for innovation in tangible ways.”

“There is no doubt that social media has changed how companies interact with their customers, and strategically engaging with and listening to customers is a growing area of investment for many brands right now,” said Samantha Skey, general manager, Passenger. “The survey demonstrated that private online communities are shifting the way brands think about communicating with their customers, and the dialogue that results from these communities is proving to be a catalyst for significant change within organizations.”

The study delivers quantitative and qualitative results that demonstrate how marketers and brand managers are changing the way they interact with their customers to solicit feedback and input through private online communities, and get deeper insight into the preferences and lifestyles of their audiences. Highlights include:

• 86 percent of respondents report that private online communities provide richer insight into customer needs
  
• 33 percent report that the community input alone has actually changed product designs and marketing plans
  
• 43 percent report they use fewer focus groups as a direct result of engaging in collaboration via the private online community while 36 percent report conducting fewer surveys
  
• 64 percent report that the community has improved the context for decision-making within the company
  
• 96 percent report that their marketing department is deriving value from collaboration with customers, 71 percent report the same for market research; 66 percent report a positive impact on product development

Based on the interviews with the brand executives, Sector Intelligence drew the following conclusions:

• Word of mouth is likely to become a more central part of a company’s future marketing strategy as they learn to integrate loyal customers into the brand strategy. The intimacy created by ongoing conversations can be a powerful model for connecting with the customer base and learning how to foster loyalty
  
• The conversations happening in private online communities are unique from other forms of research such as focus groups. The ongoing, direct communication of this medium provides businesses with a consistent, more affordable way to instantly engage with consumers. As this becomes normative behavior, these conversations turn into more impactful relationships
  
• For some of the more conservative brands surveyed that have shied away from public social networks because of the risks involved, private communities facilitate innovation and direct conversations with consumers in a safer forum, while still organically encouraging customer advocacy
  
• Even with budget crunches, companies are investing in tools and services that will help them listen to and learn more from their customer base
  
• Private online communities can enhance internal collaboration within larger brands in diverse sectors. By talking to their customers directly throughout the various product development and marketing processes, the lines between various divisions are blurring- both for economic and productivity reasons

via http://www.thinkpassenger.com/ 

Why not use Facebook for an online research community?

Facebook - ideal for research?

By Matt Foley Source: PluggedIn

I was giving a demo of our research community capabilities the other day when out of the blue someone asked me - “Why can’t we just set up an online research community in Facebook?” Wow. This is a complicated question to answer, especially when I haven’t finished my x-large Dunkin Donuts coffee for the day!

I’ll be honest - the question took me back a bit because they actually had a very valid point. Facebook is a great way to connect for ongoing customer insights, and to even create something of an ongoing research community. The people are there, the “essential” technology is there and (chances are) your company already has a presence there - so why not just use Facebook for your online research community?

As with most things in life, it’s not that simple. And I’m not just saying this because I build online research communities for a living :) Read on for reasons why Facebook might not make the most sense as a venue for your online research community.

Reason #1 - Privacy matters

Visit PluggedIn Blog to read further

Reason #2 - Recruitment & knowledge of participants

Visit PluggedIn Blog to read further

Reason #3 - You run the show

Visit PluggedIn Blog to read further

Reason #4 - You “own” the show

Visit PluggedIn Blog to read further

The Community Maturity Model

by RACHEL HAPPE

Community management is becoming a lot more common at all sorts of organizations – driven by adoption of people doing more and more online and the social media tools that allow for easy conversation and collaboration. As that happens, however, there is a lot of friction due to lack of standards – not just technical standards but also standard expectations and understanding of what community management is and what should be expected of it.

This lack of standards is causing a lot of friction and frustration – particularly for community managers themselves. Companies have bought in to social media and online community to the extent that they think it’s important and have put some resources into funding community management positions and tools to enable community but there is still a lot of uncertainty about what to expect of both the roles and the tools. That lack of clear articulation can create a lot of pressure and/or missed expectations for community managers.

One of our missions at The Community Roundtable is to further the discipline of community management – not just in our own community but more broadly in the marketplace. Our first effort to define the discipline is our Community Maturity Model:

This model does two things. First, it defines the eight competencies we think are required for successful community management. Second, it attempts – at a high level – to articulate how these competencies progress from organizations without community management that are still highly hierarchical to those that have embraced a networked business ecosystem approach to their entire organization. We use this model in a number of ways:

• As a mental model for understanding all the areas and skill sets required for community management and hopefully, to remind community managers that it is about assembling a internal team to gather all the required skills – not to try and be the expert in all of them individually
• As a tool for community managers to educate and set the expectations of colleagues and advocates within the organization
• As a roadmap for community managers looking to understand what is important to do given their current state of evolution, and in what order
• To organize content, programing, and conversations within The Community Roundtable
• As a way to categorize and find best practices and case studies – we will be working with our members on both Quick Cases (techniques and methodologies) as well as full case studies and be matching those with the appropriate box on the matrix
• As a good model over the long term to develop training

While the Community Maturity Model is something that is core to our services, we also want to ‘open source’ it for those that find it useful. Feel free to use it either for internal or external presentations – we just ask that you attribute it back to The Community Roundtable.

ONLINE RESEARCH COMMUNITIES FOR PHARMA & HEALTHCARE CLIENTS

via http://www.dubstudios.com/our-blog/

At Dub, we've recently been building a number of online research communities to capture discussions around some very private and sensitive issues. These insight and innovation-purposed communities have been commissioned by players in the pharmaceutical and health and well-being industries, who are growing increasingly switched-on to the opportunities online communities present. These include the ability to gather candid feedback and rich insight from end-users, of the sort they've never before experienced. In a sector where insight from sufferers and patients of such richness has traditionally been hard to come achieve, online research communities present a major shift.

Of course, when discussing Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), Over-active Bowel Disorder (OBD) and other serious personal conditions with real people, respecting their privacy and offering them relative online anonymity is tantamount to the success of the study. With this in mind, our approach allows project owners to assign tasks and questions to individuals by way of private one-on-one discussions, at the same time as supporting open group discussions. The former puts people at great ease, and when combined with the fact that respondents are participating from the comfort of their own home or place of choice, affords response nirvana.

Group discussions such as forums and blog also have a part to play in that they allow the community to connect, bond and share experiences with each other. Thus they reward respondents for their openness and honesty by allowing the connect with fellow sufferers, thus providing a level of support and comfort in knowing.

The recruitment of patients and sufferers is no easy task, so making them feel comfortable, respected and valued contributors within the community is essential. Our approach achieves this in a number of ways.

First we work tirelessly to design the tasks and activities that benefit from our own of research into the language and behaviours of the target audience. We see our role as party hosts, not entertainers, so it's important that we communicate with them in a language they recognise - theirs not ours.

Secondly we encourage Community Managers to share with them the insights that are being gleaned, so that they themselves are learning from the project and not just giving.

As our online research community work continues, so to does our amazement at the audience-types that are increasingly comfortable in sharing their lives online, be it in private or social environments. Our communities are an efficient and powerful way to connect, create learnings, gather feedback and support sufferers who wish to help others at the same time.

Online is hurting Traditional Research in a new way

by Simon McDermott via http://www.attentio.com/

Traditional research has obviously taken a whack since the inception of the Internet. The billions of euros that goes to online research came from somewhere, but not a problem, the major agencies have shifted larger portions of their business online or bought companies that had done it first.

What is happening now is something different, what occurred before was Internet as the medium of transport i.e. online panels, internet based questionnaire, web based focus groups, now it is Internet as the source. This is where companies like Attentio make their bread and butter. The cost is through extracting the information and while this is significant, when we do it, we have it and then once categorised and “cleaned” we can really reuse and enable insights for clients repeatedly. We get those insights from truly conversational sources such as the blogs, forums, networks where the discussions are free flowing, unstructured and unedited.

While reading Research Live (a leading research website) I saw an article demonstrating the impact. The piece was entitled Pressure from online alternatives could stunt research recovery and Morgan Stanley’s Edward Hill Wood says “in recent years ‘traditional’ MR agencies have been undercut by start-ups using purely online data collection methodologies and new approaches such as social media analysis”

Those 7 words “new approaches such as social media analysis” talk to thousands of jobs that will change, millions of euros of lost sales to research companies, methodologies that won’t exist in 5 years, but also companies who will get information quicker while you and me get listened to more. A metaphor for the impact of this is record producers. Online distribution was first a new channel to ship CDs but when online downloads emerged the impact was catastrophic. Services like iTunes, Last FM and Spotify have and will do very well but they are new approaches and most record companies simply have not dealt well with the new world. I believe as with the music analogy the Research Industry will lose revenue although a large portion will go to listening and community based approaches, but will the larger players be flexible enough to do something about that? We’ll see.

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A peer network for community managers and social media practitioners.

The Community Roundtable is a virtual table where social media and community practitioners gather to meet, discuss challenges, celebrate successes, and hear from experts. Along with providing a welcoming environment in which to gather and learn, The Community Roundtable is dedicated to furthering the discipline of community management. We are a great resource for community and social media managers looking for:

• Peers that understand and can help navigate day-to-day challenges
• Content focused on the unique needs of the practitioner and not on the latest top 10 list
• Programs that help with both tactical needs and with strategic thinking

MEET COMMUNITY ROUNDTABLE CREATORS:

Jim Storer

Jim (@jimstorer) is an experienced community builder and social media strategist. Over the last ten years he’s built and managed communities and consulted with both start-ups and large enterprises on how to effectively build lasting value with community and social media solutions.

As a social media/community strategist he’s advised a wide range of clients including Cisco/WebEx, Deloitte, EDR, iRise, Amway, the Santa Fe Institute and Tenacity. He was an active contributor and editor on two books on the impact of community and social media on traditional business and political practices:

We Are Smarter Than Me: A collaboration of Wharton, MIT and thousands of business innovators, worldwide. Drawing on their collective “in the trenches” experience, the wearesmarter.org community (and subsequent book) revealed what does and does not work when you bring social netowrks and communities into your decision-making and business processes.

Barack Inc.: This book spells out the lessons of the Obama campaign and goes on to illustrate them, citing companies that have used similar techniques to succeed.

Early in his career Jim managed very large communities (1ook+) and very small peer networks (150+) that served as great foundation for his consulting and strategy engagements. He blogs at http://jimstorer.com

Rachel Happe

Rachel (@rhappe) has over fifteen years of experience working with emerging technologies including enterprise social networking, ecommerce, and enterprise software applications. She has been both a product manager and a management analyst, and brings with her multiple perspectives on technology development and use. As an analyst at IDC, Rachel initiated their enterprise social software practice and wrote groundbreaking research including

• The Power and Passion of Organic Communities: How Technology Can Be Used to Increase Discovery, Engagement, and Productivity
• The Social Enterprise: How Social Networking Changes Everything
• U.S. Social Networking Application 2008–2012 Forecast: Enterprise Social Networking Takes Hold.

First community for market research online moderators

Itracks, international online data collection specialists and online qualitative patent holders, today announces the launch of a global initiative to support moderators as they move into the online market research world.

Itracks - encouraged by a huge 40% increase in online bulletin board focus group activity and the success of its Populis online community platform – is launching the Itracks Online Moderator Community, the first ever program of its type, with a mission to provide the foremost location for online moderators to learn, discuss and generate ideas about online qualitative research.

“Qualitative research is going online – and it’s going there very, very quickly,” said Itracks’ President and CEO, Dan Weber.

“I’m very proud that a Canadian company – my company – has established itself as the world leader in this exploding market, but it’s vital that we take world class moderators with us into this incredible new communications era. The Itracks Online Moderator Community is designed to do just that and it will be a win-win situation for both us and the people who get involved.”

“This is an important milestone day for online qualitative research – make no mistake about it”.

The Community will give moderators the chance to achieve training, discuss best practices and stay current with online qualitative technologies. They will receive their own account and training, receive 24/7 support and become a part of Itracks’ RFQ process. It is open to all moderators, whether they are independents, members of market research organisations or perform an in-house role.

This is the latest initiative from Itracks, which has grown from a small Canadian start-up into a globally-recognised expert in its field within the last ten years. Founder Dan Weber – a former winner of the Canadian Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year award – now heads an operation with offices across the United States, customers worldwide and the ability to work in more than 20 languages.

The Community will operate across a wide range of industry sectors. These will include agriculture, construction, energy, technology, financial, consumer packaged goods, retail, telecommunications, medical, travel, transport and government.

“We have tried to be leaders at Itracks since the day we started and today’s announcement is a continuation of that commitment to our market,” concluded Mr Weber.

About iTracks

Itracks is a world-leading expert in online focus groups and the patent holder for qualitative applications. Leading market research professionals and Fortune 500 companies recognise Itracks’ online applications as the most client-focused, reliable and flexible available. The sophisticated suite of qualitative, quantitative, online community and panel services are easy to use and come equipped with a wide range of multi-media capabilities. Visit Itracks’ website at www.itracks.com.

The web address for the online moderator community is http://moderator.itracks.com.