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Market Research 2012 – The Year in Review From A Client-side Perspective

Edward Appleton comments on seven observations that characterize the world of market research in 2012.

by Edward Appleton

Director Global Marketing at Happy Thinking People

By Edward Appleton

Incredible how time flies, but 2012 is almost behind us. Time perhaps to lean back and reflect on the year in Research from the Client-side perspective – here are seven observations about what to me seemed to characterize the world of MR in 2012.

1. Budgetary Pressures are Here to Stay

Hands up if you’re working in an environment where there is little pressure on budgets – not many, I would guess.  2012 was a year of slow growth in many Western European countries, of continuing economic uncertainty, and widespread, ongoing de-leveraging (as it is so horribly called – trying to pay off your debt is a more pithy way to put it). This impacts on investment decisions – if you’ve got limited visibility, you hold back. Plus appetite for risk is limited.

MR is impacted by this – can we do the same for less? Be more creative, find a different way? I can’t see the situation changing much in 2013.

2. Market Research is Changing – but is it Transforming Itself?

There’s no doubt in my mind that tectonic shifts are happening in the world of Business Intelligence that will influence the way “Market Research” is perceived and practiced in future. Just take one example: more and more Companies are beginning to wake up to the power of the data they already have, looking at ways to interrogate and segment available databases, mining them for insights. Transactional data documents behavior and as such is more robust than self-reported data. As e-commerce expands, e-retailers will understand the power of insights – but it will be more profiling and segmenting rather than survey-driven.

Is this Research as we know it? Are we part of the change process, or merely being swept along by it?

Whatever else happens in future, I’d dare to make one prediction: despite its much battered status, the Survey will not die as a tool, even though it will almost certainly lose its hegemony. Change often doesn’t happen as rapidly as many of the oft-cited examples have us believe. Video didn’t kill the radio star ( http://dai.ly/Ts2jvt ), just knocked him or her off their perch.

3. DIY – The Elephant in the Room?

It’s not something you read about so much in MR social media, but I’d say that DIY was the elephant in the room in 2012. It’s going on all the time – and is a hugely disruptive force, for better and for worse. As appetites increase for insights Client-side, but budgets remain flat or even slightly negative, DIY is an obvious way to do relatively uncomplicated pieces of research. There are increasingly more and more ways of making DIY MR more sophisticated – buying in Analytics tools, for example, that your own software cannot handle.

I’m not going to comment on whether the above is a good or bad thing – economic forces aren’t like a football match, where shouting “that’s unfair” is a commonly accepted response.

4. Social Media – Have We Peaked?

2012 was the year for me where the level of debate about Market Research on Social Media dropped off. I can think of a number of established names in MR that became notably quieter on Twitter. I can also echo +Ray Poynter’s suspicion that it seems to be always the same people that are engaging.

Are more of us Researchers beginning to question the value of Social Media Engagement? It would begin to look like it – if anybody actually has the stats, I’d be interested. I personally found this a rather sobering trend and hope that conversations continue on the web with renewed vigor. Hence this blog effort.

5. Price Differentials are as Big as Ever

From a Client perspective, I can honestly state that the differences in pricing amongst Agencies offering very similar methodologies remain surprisingly large. Maybe some suppliers are doing extremely well and simply price from a position of strength. A more likely explanation is a time-lag phenomenon – a slow-motion reaction to a realization that supply is outstripping demand, and commoditization continuing apace, with all that means from a pricing perspective. Some sectors of research are, in my view, still overpriced, something that market forces will no doubt correct.

No idea how quickly price-adjustment will happen – lowering prices is even more painful than raising them. In the meantime, for Clients of all shapes and sizes, there’s always the DIY option.

6. Research Roles are becoming Hybrid

I’ve noticed a trend amongst Client-side Researchers’ job roles and titles expanding to include responsibility for a second role – Insights and Strategy, Insights and Segmentation Management, Insights for Product Development are some examples.These roles place responsibility for Execution on the person generating the Insights – join Actionability and Insights at the hip. There is an organizational logic to this – closing potential gaps between an Insight and what actually happens to it by creating integrated or hybrid roles enhances efficiency. It also increases creates a more direct link to sales and profitability by shoving Researchers towards the front line. 7. We’re beginning to Shape Up

As a profession, we’re not exactly sexy – tell someone you’re a Market Researcher, and you often wonder if the response “that’s interesting” is heartfelt. This perception as “dull” isn’t without cause: we’re supporters of other people making decisions, we are always immensely (read: irritatingly) precise, reluctant to sing our own praises, and often slated as being negative and methodologically primitive by the Creative professions.

I sensed the first stirrings of Change here in 2012 – Agencies presenting themselves better, engaging more professionally at Trade Fairs, listening more carefully to my needs for a given project, responding more crisply to RFPs.

There’s way to go, for sure. But I sense that we are moving out of our comfort zones in a positive sense, taking our purist hats off, and embracing change more wholeheartedly.

You’ve probably noticed that there’s very little about new methods or tools in the above -which isn’t because I don’t value true innovation and improvement in MR, just that from a Client perspective, it is only ever a means to an end. Plus: incremental innovation is hardly ever enough to drive a change in behavior.

What will 2013 hold? I’d see the pace of change increasing if anything. Many of the underlying drivers will still be there.

I continue to think that as Researchers we’re well placed to benefit from Change – but that the onus is on us to be out there, position ourselves well, continually learn new skills, interface with new disciplines, engage with people whose opinions and decisions matter at the highest levels of Business.

Our image may be dull but it certainly isn’t tainted – we just need to dust ourselves down and shape up.

And on that positive note, I’ll raise my glass to 2012 and look forward to an invigorating 2013!

Curious, as ever, as to others’ views.

Comments are moderated to ensure respect towards the author and to prevent spam or self-promotion. Your comment may be edited, rejected, or approved based on these criteria. By commenting, you accept these terms and take responsibility for your contributions.

Edward Appleton

49 articles

The views, opinions, data, and methodologies expressed above are those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect or represent the official policies, positions, or beliefs of Greenbook.

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Market Research Trends for 2012

Consumers will drive technology

Romi Mahajan, Chief Marketing Officer at Metavana and a former Worldwide Director of Sales and Strategy at Microsoft says that consumers will be driving technology instead of the other way around.  Expect to see the blurring between business and consumer applications of technology.

This is evident in our next big trend; Gamification , where surveys start taking on the look and feel of game apps.  Touch screens make it possible to interact with information in a more graphic and engaging way. Betty Adamou, the editor of the Game Access blog says that “We must utilize creativity, think about the way we use language and ask survey questions and start giving respondents feedback.   Gamification can allow us to mix qualitative and quantitative questions in a more interactive and engaging format which will force us to ask survey questions in a more natural, competitive-inducing way.

All things mobile   from apps to games to panels and even focus groups?  Absolutely.  Free up your market research or focus groups and instead of bringing them to your isolated sterile laboratory, let your panel bring you into their homes with the use of mobile sampling .  Now your respondents can upload pictures of the brands they use or how they interact with your brand and let you step inside their world instead of the other way around.  The SurveySwipe platform brings panels and interactive, engaging and fun feedback into one package.

Another trend that has expanded is this idea of location-based feedback.  Special technology allows our SurveySwipe mobile survey app to trigger surveys based on your respondents location WITHOUT sharing any private information.

LEARN ABOUT: market research trends

Panels are accessible to everyone

Community panels used to be exclusively in the domain of HUGE marketing budgets.  But that’s no longer the case.  Andrew Jeavons, from Survey Analytics says that recruiting, running and managing your own panel is within the realm of most small to medium sized businesses.

Shorter, more engaging, conversational surveys

The mobile sampling trend, consumerization as well as social media chatter have  all but wiped out the lengthy survey.  Shorter attention spans –even from avid panel communities will drive researchers to get more creative with how we collect data.  We will find ourselves integrating data from mobile, social and standard surveys more and more.

All of this speaks to another trend; Networked Intelligence .  Mobile panels allow businesses to get on-demand answers to questions from their respondents. Text analysis software allows us to pull social media information together with survey responses to get more meaningful information about our customers and how they interact with our brands.

Register NOW to Listen to the insiders talk about these trends and MORE on Wednesday, December 14, 10am PST/1pm EST

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[…] 2013 around the corner, we thought we’d look back on the trends our experts predicted over the last few years and give you an update on those past trends and let […]

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Revenue of the market research industry worldwide from 2009 to 2022, by country or region (in billion U.S. dollars)

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Research revenue of IQVIA worldwide 2013-2023

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The Handbook of Marketing Research Uses, Misuses, and Future Advances

• Rajiv Grover - The University of Georgia, USA, University of Georgia, USA
• Marco Vriens - Microsoft Corporation
• Description
• Appeals to users as well as suppliers of marketing research: Comprehensive topics in marketing research (such as philosophy, techniques, and applications) are delivered in a reader-friendly, applications-oriented, and non-mathematical fashion. 
• Covers many cutting-edge techniques of data collection and analysis: Traditional quantitative techniques, innovative qualitative techniques, and emerging online methods are presented. 
• Provides a broad range of current ideas and applications: The contributors address models of the impact of marketing mix variables, segmentation, brand equity, satisfaction, customer lifetime value, and marketing ROI. Chapters on international marketing research and marketing management support systems are also included.

Talk to the author! http://www.terry.uga.edu/%7Ergrover/hb_main.html

See what’s new to this edition by selecting the Features tab on this page. Should you need additional information or have questions regarding the HEOA information provided for this title, including what is new to this edition, please email [email protected] . Please include your name, contact information, and the name of the title for which you would like more information. For information on the HEOA, please go to http://ed.gov/policy/highered/leg/hea08/index.html .

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"This handbook comprehensively explores approaches for delivering market insights for fact-based decision-making in a market-oriented firm. Divided into four parts, it addresses: (1) the different nuances of delivering insights, (2) quantitative, qualitative, and online data gathering techniques, (3) basic and advanced data analysis methods, and (4) the substantial marketing issues that clients are interested in receiving through marketing research. It is a valuable resource for all studetns and instructors of marketing research."

"Grover and Vriens have blended the contributions of 48 well-qualified academics and professionals to produce a comprehensive, in-depth guide to modern market research. A unique feature of this work is its emphasis on the potential of market research as a generator of marketing insights, this positioning market research as a trusted adviser. This handbook can serve as an up-to-date reference for market research suppliers as well as a guide for users. Highly Recommended."

" In addition to discussing relevant content, the various contributors to the book are excellent communicators. Sentences are clear, paragraphs are coherent, and chapters fulfill the promise of their introductions, and readers will benefit from the diagrams, figures, and charts that are used to enhance the text.  I enjoyed reading this book and recommend it highly. This book will be of particular interest to advanced students, academics, and practitioners. Although statistical background is necessary to comprehend the advanced analytical techniques, most readers are likely to benefit from the overviews provided in this well-written book."  

                                                                                    — Guldem Gokcek, JOURNAL OF MARKETING

·         The contents will be articulated in a very reader-friendly, applications-oriented and non-mathematical fashion.

·         Promotes the current overarching business philosophy of customer/market focus by emphasizing the need for Market Research to provide the insights required for making decisions. 

·         Identifies such troubling current trends as biased sample answers on long questionnaires, and "professionals" whose job is to skew focus group responses.

·         Will employ top flight international researchers from both academia and practice to provide a broad range of ideas and applications.

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This book offers an easily accessible and comprehensive guide to the entire market research process, from asking market research questions to collecting and analyzing data by means of quantitative methods. It is intended for all readers who wish to know more about the market research process, data management, and the most commonly used methods in market research. The book helps readers perform analyses, interpret the results, and make sound statistical decisions using IBM SPSS Statistics. Hypothesis tests, ANOVA, regression analysis, principal component analysis, factor analysis, and cluster analysis, as well as essential descriptive statistics, are covered in detail. Highly engaging and hands-on, the book includes many practical examples, tips, and suggestions that help readers apply and interpret the data analysis methods discussed.

The new edition uses IBM SPSS version 25 and offers the following new features:

• A single case and dataset used throughout thebook to facilitate learning
• New material on survey design and all data analysis methods to reflect the latest advances concerning each topic
• Improved use of educational elements, such as learning objectives, keywords, self-assessment tests, case studies, and much more
• A glossary that includes definitions of all the keywords and other descriptions of selected topics
•  Links to additional material and videos via the Springer Multimedia App

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• Market Research
• Research Methods

Table of contents (10 chapters)

Front matter, introduction to market research.

• Marko Sarstedt, Erik Mooi

The Market Research Process

Getting data, descriptive statistics, hypothesis testing and anova, regression analysis, principal component and factor analysis, cluster analysis, communicating the results, back matter, authors and affiliations.

Marko Sarstedt

About the authors

Marko Sarstedt  is chaired professor of Marketing at the Otto-von-Guericke-University Magdeburg (Germany). His main research is in the application and advancement of structural equation modeling methods to further the understanding of consumer behavior and to improve marketing decision-making. His research has been published in journals such as Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Organizational Research Methods, MIS Quarterly, and International Journal of Research in Marketing. Marko has co-edited several special issues of leading journals and co-authored several widely adopted textbooks, including “A Primer on Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM)” (together with Joe F. Hair, G. Tomas M. Hult, and Christian M. Ringle).

Erik Mooi i s senior lecturer at the University of Melbourne (Australia). His main interest is in business-to-business marketing and works on topics such as outsourcing, inter-firmcontracting, innovation, technology licensing, and franchising using advanced econometrics. His research has been published in journals such as Journal of Marketing, the Journal of Marketing Research, the International Journal of Research in Marketing, and the Journal of Business Research. He is also program director at the Centre for Workplace Leadership, a fellow at the EU centre for shared complex challenges, as well as a fellow at the Centre for Business Analytics at Melbourne Business School.

Bibliographic Information

Book Title : A Concise Guide to Market Research

Book Subtitle : The Process, Data, and Methods Using IBM SPSS Statistics

Authors : Marko Sarstedt, Erik Mooi

Series Title : Springer Texts in Business and Economics

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-56707-4

Publisher : Springer Berlin, Heidelberg

eBook Packages : Business and Management , Business and Management (R0)

Copyright Information : Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2019

Hardcover ISBN : 978-3-662-56706-7 Published: 28 September 2018

Softcover ISBN : 978-3-662-58592-4 Published: 11 January 2019

eBook ISBN : 978-3-662-56707-4 Published: 18 September 2018

Series ISSN : 2192-4333

Series E-ISSN : 2192-4341

Edition Number : 3

Number of Pages : XVII, 396

Number of Illustrations : 69 b/w illustrations, 109 illustrations in colour

Topics : Marketing , Management , Statistics for Business, Management, Economics, Finance, Insurance

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The Types of Market Research [+10 Market Research Methods]

• Market research

Jaclyn Robinson, Senior Manager of Content Marketing at Crunchbase

Market research can help startups understand where they should be placing their resources and time. It can tell you everything from how people are perceiving your company, as well as which features to drop or continue developing. And while there are plenty of ways to conduct market research, not every market research method is right for every situation.

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Market research can help play a major role in developing your product, marketing, and overall business strategy. Understanding the different market research methods can be the difference between wasting months of engineering time or exceeding your ambitious revenue targets.

We review the types of market research as well as the market research methods you can pursue based on your primary objectives and business goals.

The 2 types of market research

All market research falls under two distinct categories: primary research and secondary research.

Primary research looks at any data you collect yourself (or someone you pay). It encompasses analyzing current sales, metrics, and customers. It also takes into account the effectiveness of current practices, while taking competitors into account.

Secondary research looks at data that has already been published by others. It includes reports and studies from other companies, government organizations, and others in your industry.

10 market research methods

The type of data you need will decide which market research technique to use. Here are the most commonly used market research methods:

Primary research methods

These primary research methods will help you identify both qualitative and quantitative data. Qualitative data is information that cannot be measured while qualitative data is taken from a large sample size and is a statistically significant mathematical analysis.

1. Interviews

Great for: expert advice

Consisting of one-on-one discussions, interviews are a great source of qualitative data. You can either perform interviews by telephone, video conference, or face-to-face. Interviews are great for an in-depth look for target audience insights.

In-depth interviews are great when expert advice is needed or when discussing highly complex or sensitive topics. Interviews are usually 10 to 30 minutes long with 25 to 75 respondents.

Great for: understanding brand awareness, satisfaction and loyalty analysis, pricing research, and market segmentation .

One of the most commonly used market research methods, Surveys are an easy way to understand your target audience and allow you to test a large sample size to determine if findings are true across a larger segment of your customers.

3. Questionnaires

Great for: Customer feedback and satisfaction surveys (NPS surveys), and when you want more detail on your target audience and customer base.

Do not confuse questionnaires for surveys !  While surveys are aggregated for statistical analysis, questionnaires are a set of written questions used for collecting information.

Questionnaires are used to collect information rather than draw a conclusion.  Surveys can include a questionnaire, but a survey must aggregate and analyze the responses to the questions.

When writing questionnaires for market research, keep the number of questions in mind.

In one study, SurveyMonkey found that questionnaires with 40 questions have about a 10% lower response rate than questionnaires with 10 questions . The more questions, the less likely people will finish your questionnaire.

4. Focus groups

Great for: Price testing, advertising concepts, product/messaging testing

Even with the rise of big data, focus groups have remained an integral part of how companies build their products, strategy, and messaging. Focus groups are intentionally compromised by a group of purposefully selected individuals. Above all, the collaborative setting ensures that members of the group are able to interact and influence each other.

Typically these open and interactive groups are composed of around five to 12 screened individuals . Make sure that your participants are diverse so you can get a range of opinions and you have enough representation from several segments of your market.

Many smaller startups will conduct DIY focus groups and will use video conferencing technology, which is one of the most cost-effective and time-efficient market research methods.

This is a great resource to see some good questions to ask your focus groups as well as what topics focus groups should touch on.

5. User groups

Great for: Feature testing, UX and web design feedback

User groups are used to gather UX data and provide insight for website design. User groups usually meet regularly to discuss their experience with a product, while researchers capture their comments.

Here’s a great guide on how to format questions for user groups .

6. Test markets

Great for: Testing new marketing campaigns

Test markets represent a larger market. Using a test group as well as a control group can show you the success of a new landing page, messaging copy, or CTA button. We particularly like the free version of Google Optimize to get quantitative data on how your experiment is performing based on a specific goal.

Secondary research methods

Secondary research can help establish a starting point prior to diving into more expensive primary research techniques. While there is a lot of data on the web regarding basic statistics, you may have to purchase a distinct data provider for a more in-depth look at your market.

Crunchbase Pro and Marketplace partners are a great and inexpensive way to start your secondary research directly on Crunchbase.com.

7. Competitor benchmarks

Great for: Understanding your revenue, churn, operating costs, sales, profit margin, and burn rate.

Competitor benchmarks are the most valuable and widely used of the secondary research methods. Moreover, competitor benchmarks measure specific growth metrics or key performance indicators in comparison to business within the same industry and of a similar size.

You can use Crunchbase Pro to find how much companies in a certain industry are raising and who are the leading players with our global coverage on companies ranging from pre-seed to late-stage. So, as one of the most informative of the market research methods, competitive benchmarks are a great way to inform your business strategy. 

Free Crunchbase registered users have access to revenue estimates as well as web traffic data.

8. Sales data

Great for: Understanding your audience and where to place marketing efforts.

Taking a look at internal sales data not only reveals profitability but also helps market researchers segment customer trends.

However, taking a look at competitive sales data is a great way to make sure that you’re meeting the numbers you should be targeting as well as capturing the full potential of the market

9. Government publications and statistics

Great for: General demographic information and larger trends

The U.S. Census Bureau is a great resource of national demographic data. You can also review patents as a preview of industry trends and future innovation.

Also, you can find additional data and research from Data.gov , The World Bank , as well as the Pew Research Center to help inform your market research decisions.

10. Commercial data

Great for: Greater insight into industry trends and reports

If you’re interested in purchasing secondary market research, commercial data is available. For comprehensive reports, Mintel and IBISWorld are both traditional market research companies that provide commercial data.

Additionally, to choose which type of market research method is best for your goal, follow this graph from Relevant Insights. Begin with the metric you’re trying to move and then backtrack into a targeted market research method.

How can Crunchbase help with my market research?

Crunchbase gives market researchers flexible access to Crunchbase’s complete company data. Innovative teams and leaders in market research rely on Crunchbase’s live company data to build powerful internal databases and research insights in respective industries. Learn more about how Crunchbase can help you with your market research .

• Originally published March 14, 2019, updated April 26, 2023

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Visiting Russia - Nalchik, Capital of Kabardino-Balkaria

By Koryo Tours

Nalchik, capital of Kabardino-Balkaria

Visiting Russia – Nalchik

Yoshkar-ola | cheboksary  |  astrakhan | elista | stalingrad (volograd)  | abakan  |  nalchik  | validkavkaz  | makhachkala  |  grozny.

Nalchik is a small city of around 240,000 people and serves as the capital of Kabardino-Balkaria, one of the lesser-known republics spread across the beautiful North Caucasus area of Russia, the mountain range that separates the former soviet states of Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan from the Russian Federation.

This region has incredible diversity in ethnic groups and is a melting pot at the edge of empire. While there have been civilisations in the Caucasus for millennia Nalchik as a city is only a century old, having been a Russian fort since 1724. Today’s Nalchik is a mostly peaceful and relaxing place, being in the foothills of the mountains it has many areas of great beauty and multiple sanatoria for people looking to take the waters, over the last century it has certainly had its share of turbulence though, being occupied by Romanian troops fighting on the side of the Nazis, who embarked on an effort to exterminate the ancient community of Mountain Jews in the area (unsuccessfully), plus a 2005 Islamic militant attack on Russian security forces.

These days Nalchik is known as a clean city, a place for relaxing, and the starting point of expeditions to summit Mt. Elbrus, the tallest mountain in Europe, which lies within Kabardino-Balkaria.

Kabardians make up the largest ethnic group at just under 50% of the city’s population, followed by Russians, Balkars, other Caucasian nationalities as well as Ukrainians, Mountain Jews still live in the area but in very small numbers now, most having emigrated to Israel.

Arriving/Departing

Nalchik Airport (NAL) is a small one but is fully functional for getting in and out, usually the foreigners arriving here will be mountaineers heading for Elbrus.

The Airport is only 3km from the city centre so you could even walk into town from here, otherwise, there are taxis and marshrutkas waiting for arrivals. Flights arrive only from Moscow and St. Petersburg usually, the Caucasus has other larger airports for other international flights (such as those to Sochi). Nalchik has a railway station, dating from 1915, with links to Moscow and across the Caucasus. A good option for travelling around the region in a relaxing manner (usually slower than taking a marshrutka between cities though) For getting around inside Nalchik there are public buses all over the place, easy to use and very cheap. Otherwise most of the centre is very walkable, the main ‘high street’ is Lenin Avenue, which runs for several km through the centre of the city.

Concord Square

The centre of Nalchik and a good place to start a walking tour of the city, with the Kabardino-Balkaria parliament building on one side and Lenin stands at the other, fountains in the middle and Lenin Avenue cutting through the square

Religious Buildings

The central buildings of the main religions practised in Nalchik are both fine examples of their respective architectural styles; the Central Mosque and the Cathedral of Mary Magdalene are both worth visiting. Dress codes apply.

Not actually in Nalchik, but only 50km or so away so the city is the ideal base for starting an expedition. This is Europe’s highest mountain and a dormant volcano. There are cable car/chairlift options to get t the top for those who don’t wish to do it the hard way. It is possible to get up and down this mountain n a single day, making it certainly the simplest of the 7 continental highest peaks to climb.

Museum of the Kabardino-Balkar Republic

Great for explaining where you are and the history of the area. Mostly in Russian only though and does tend to assume some knowledge in advance. Still a good stop to get some intro into the complex history of this city and area in general.

Atazhukin Garden

A large park complex running for more than 2km along the eastern side of the city, alongside the Nalchik River. A very pleasant place with so much to see and do. The basic Nalchik Zoo is here, walking trails, restaurants and cafes, theatres, a very retro funfair, and a rickety but reliable cable car running up to a lovely viewpoint to see over the city and out to Mt. Elbrus.

Topped by a restaurant building built in the shape of a Kabardian warrior. An excellent few hours can be spent exploring this park and mingling with the locals of all ages who do their relaxing here.

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