This past weekend I finally got around to watching the first few episodes of "Mad Men" at the suggestion of friends.  I nearly shed a tear when a scene in the first or second episode involved the company's market researcher presenting their findings to Don Draper (the leading man and ad executive), who then promptly discarded the report into the trash.  It left me with the sinking feeling that this has probably happened at some point over the course of my career (although likely not nearly as dramatic :-)  It also made me think of the state of research now, and how we can make ourselves more visible and strategically relevant to organizations.  

Fast forward to this morning, when I caught a recent article from Adweek on how "Clients Could Make Better Use of Research." The article points to a recent BCG study suggesting that most companies are approaching their market research from a largely tactical perspective, while missing the strategic insights that are possible through research.  I've seen this play out in market research online communities (MROCs), where the initial objectives are very much on a strategic level, but slowly start to move toward quick hit tactical activities once internal clients realize that the community is an excellent resource for these types of insights.  It can be difficult to keep the focus on the strategic once this start to happen, although it can definitely be done.  Here are a few suggestions for how:

1. Set aside a set of activities each week for "big picture" objectives - A big advantage of MROCs is the ability to get tactical insights quickly and cost effectively, and this benefit shouldn't be ignored...  However, it's important to set aside time for "big picture" objectives each week.  Consider ways of carving out time in the facilitation plan to address these objectives weekly, and standing your ground when tactical activities start to encroach on these strategic exercises.  
2. Review the objectives whenever possible - Use weekly community meetings or weekly/monthly webinars as an opportunity to review the objectives.  While internal clients might get sick of hearing the same message over and over, they'll eventually get the point that there are strategic objectives in play and the time must be spent to uncover these types of insights. 
3. Clearly tie findings with strategic objectives - Whenever possible, try to tie back specific summaries and insights to the initial objectives, rather than just reporting on them as standalone summaries.  For example, in a recent community we made a separate section of the report that was dedicated to one specific strategic objective, and were sure to include this in each monthly report.  This helps communicate how these objectives are being addressed, and stresses the importance of them as well.  

MROCs represent a new opportunity for market researchers to gain visibility across our client's organizations.  However, it requires that we all take a leap of faith and change the way we uncover findings, deliver them and ultimately rally internal stakeholders around research findings.  This is something that we're working actively on here at PluggedIN...  Be on the lookout for a new product we're launching in January that will help companies move from Stage 1 of BCG's scale (the tactical research organization) to Stage 4 (strategic).  In the meantime, I hope these suggestions help!

--Matt

With community members available at your fingertips 24/7 (and a portion of your budget dedicated to a MROC), it can be tempting to want to launch as many topics relevant to internal customers as possible.  However, it's critical to balance moderated activities each day/week between topics relevant to your organization and topics relevant to the community members.

This may sound like a fairly obvious tip, but the temptation can be strong.  The risk is higher attrition rates among members, who become frustrated with the lack of attention to their needs and eventually leave.  

We recommend trying to keep a 2:1 ratio of company-relevant to member-relevant topics in order to ensure there is sustained interest from community members.  Otherwise, you'll end up spending more money and time constantly recruiting new members due to high attrition rates.

Just another tip from your friends at PluggedIN.  If you'd like more, check out our paper on "10 Tips for Creating Successful Online Research Communities."  Happy MROC'ing :-)

In previous blog posts, we've talked about how it is important to have a shared purpose or background for members in a research community.  The stronger that shared purpose is, the more vibrant the community will (likely) be.  For example, a research community of iPhone users is likely to be a really vibrant group...  However, even if you don't sell a "sexy" product like the iPhone that people naturally talk about, you can still build a successful online research community...  You just have to be a little "creative" in the way you define your shared background.

One relatively easy way of defining the shared background for just about any industry is to invite a targeted group of customers to a branded community and position them as trusted advisors to the company.  The shared background in this case is merely the fact that they are all customers, which is usually sufficient for establishing an ongoing research community.  While they may come from all walks of life and may represent any number of target segments, they at least know why they are there and what they share in common with other members. 

Of course, this post is for anyone looking to create an ongoing market research online community.  If you're using a MROC on a very short-term basis (e.g., a few weeks or months), then finding a shared purpose is far less critical to the success of the initiative.

I recently came across an online community for online community professionals called "Commania" and just had to share what they did for their profile pages with readers of this blog...  

When you click to sign-up for the community, the default avatar is one scary looking hybrid human-pig-mouse thing.  If you don't change it, you're stuck as the "pig guy" for the rest of your time in the community.  I think this is a brilliant little trick.  Granted, it's a little extreme, but it helps address a real challenge in online communities - getting people to take that initial step in customizing and sharing something personal.  If you can get your members to upload a custom profile picture, fill out a bio and at least introduce themselves to the community, you're going to have much better odds of keeping them around (provided, of course, you don't drop the ball as a moderator after that).   

Compare this to the current default avatar we use for the PluggedIN Platform...  Still annoying to have as a default, but downright benign compared to the "pig guy."  A better approach might be choosing to use your company's logo as the default avatar, or perhaps use a simple text message to indicate the profile picture needs to be change.  Nonetheless, I like the "creative" approach of the "pig guy" if you can get away with it :-)

-- Matt 

In today's environment, there is a huge demand for "cost effective" research. Multi-Client communities are one of the most cost effective ways to use market research online communities. Here are a couple of tips for those of you thinking about setting up a multi-client community that several clients can tap into at once.

1. Identify a Shared Issue: The best communities are those that involve a shared passion around an issue, topic, or brand. It may be environmental responsibility, volunteerism, or some other issue that several clients can be involved in. The more the community purpose is focused around an issue, the better the experience.
   
2. Identify a Cohesive Audience: In the absence of a shared issue, you can also build a community around a similar set of people. This could be teens, boomers, college students, or chronic illness patients to name a few. The more your members have in common, the better the experience.
   
3. Address Privacy & Exclusivity Directly: It can be challenging to convince clients to share a research resource with other clients, but if you can setup private groups of members and reserve certain people exclusively for clients, they will be more willing to take part.
   
4. One or All: Either choose one client per industry to target for your shared community or target them all. Though clients are more likely to share with those outside their industry, they also don't want to get left behind if all their competitors are part of something.
   
5. Partner Up: Target clients that have pre-existing relationships and partnerships with other brands. It can be brands under the same portfolio, or those with a shared interest (e.g. Target & Starbucks).

- Ben

I've blogged a bit before about the importance of the participant experience in online communities, but what about the client experience?  A great post over at the Yellow Submarine blog on "The use of pictures in qualitative research" got me thinking again about how important the experience of the client is in qualitative research (or really any type of research).  After all, what use is research unless it causes people to think or act in some meaningful way as a result, and a great way to get them to do that is to put the data in the most compelling/accessible format possible. 

The question, of course, is how exactly do you go about making that experience compelling?  How do you engage your direct clients (and their stakeholders) around your research?  Here are a few ideas (among many) to consider:

• "Bite Size" Findings - Most people just don't have the time to read through exhaustive research reports.  They need the here and now, as quickly as possible.  With the popularity of Twitter, why not think about the "140 character insight."  Challenge yourself to distill the finding or recommendation into 140 characters or less... 
• Reconsider the Delivery Mechanism - Speaking of Twitter, why not consider ways to continually deliver these insights through a "Twitter-like" mechanism.  We use a really useful application called "Co-op" here at PluggedIN to stay connected with each other.  Why not try something like that for findings?  
• Building Community Around Community - OK, so I'll admit that most people are already too busy to participate in a separate community, but to what extent can you get them to engage around the community by using many of the same strategies used to build a vibrant customer community?  Why not try games, friendly competitive activities, sweepstakes, awards, individual recognition, etc... to engage stakeholders and encourage them to interact with research findings in a meaningful way?

These are just a few strategies, but there are obviously many more...  Feel free to share any ways that have worked for you in the comments to this post.

-- Matt 

Market Research Design

As a researcher, one of the most important jobs we have is to craft research exercises (e.g., survey questions, discussion guide questions) that absolutely address our client needs. It sounds simple enough, but it can be hard to really know where you clients are coming from. We may know the client's objectives, but we sometimes don't have their level of knowledge about the product, the brand, or even the audience at times. Also, it can be difficult to completely understand their internal challenges (e.g., product limitations, executive pressure) that research needs to address in some way.

Background & Context

One way to achieve this understanding is to ask clients to associate a goal and a hypothesis with every research objective. For example, if they want to evaluate a concept, it is helpful to know why they are evaluating it. What decisions will be made as a result?  Also, it is helpful to have them share a hypothesis about what they think people will say. The purpose is not to prove a hypothesis true, but to give our questions/method a certain context that will address the hypothesis directly.

Actionable Research

The more specific goal/hypothesis we have, the more insightful our research activities are going to be, and the more actionable the result will be as well. Our method of choice happens to be market research communities, so this has a tremendous implications for long-term customer communities and managing client expectations over time. However, I think this has merit for all types of research methods from qualitative research to quantitative research, even extending to secondary research.

 -Ben

At some point during a pitch there is always the inevitable question - how much does it cost?  When designing an approach to a market research online community (MROC), a few key variables play the greatest role in deciding the ultimate price of the initiative, including:

• Community Size - As you can imagine, the more members in your community, the higher the price, as the costs for incentives, recruiting and overall community management scale with the number of members.  Building smaller research communities can help keep your costs down, while offering a number of advantages over larger communities.
  
• Length of Time - Running a MROC over many months (or years) is going to be more expensive, although the average monthly cost tends to decrease over time due to certain economies that result as the community progresses.
• Activity Level - Some research communities are highly active (e.g., daily research-related activities), while others tend to be moderately active (e.g., weekly or bi-weekly research activities).  As you can imagine, the costs for incentives, community management, moderation and reporting will scale accordingly.
• Sample Source - Recruiting from client-provided sample will result in significant savings over purchased sample, as will using an online recruiting method over phone-based recruiting. 
  
• Frequency and Type of Reporting - Last, but definitely not least, are the reporting requirements for a MROC.  Weekly memo community reports can be less expensive than a comprehensive summary report, although they may lack some detail. 
  

As you can imagine, the actual amounts for each of these categories will vary by the vendor, objectives of the community, etc...  However, I hope this provides you with a starting point for the variables to consider when outlining a MROC approach for your organization.

--Matt

eMarketer recently posted an article citing findings from a study about why people go online.  To check out the article, click on the link below:

Why people go online

The reason I'm posting this is because it has implications for anyone running a market research online community (or really any online community for that matter...).  The way a moderator or community manager structures activities should try to appease as many of these motivations for going online as possible.  Here are some examples as it relates to MROCs:

• 92% go online to "connect with others" - The community environment is a natural place for this to happen...  Consider creating a specific part of your discussion forums for a "water cooler," where members can connect with each other on any topics they want to talk about.  
• 96% go online for education - To appeal to this motivation, try pulling in RSS feeds or posting relevant content from blogs/twitter that will help the audience learn more about the given topic. 
  
• 82% go online to "be entertained" - While MROCs tend to have a focus on a given research objective, there is no reason why you can't make the experience entertaining for participants.  For example, start a discussion asking people to post their favorite YouTube videos.  That will get members talking and keep them entertained, far beyond the research activities.

Of course, these are just a few of the ways to appeal to the motivations for people going online while moderating an online community.  There are ways to appeal to almost all of the motivations on the list using online communities if you're willing to be a little creative...  

- Matt 

Let's imagine you're walking down the street in a fairly busy neighborhood full of restaurants (Boston's North End comes to mind first for me, but you pick the location...).  All of the restaurants look to be fairly decent, so you start to look for differences in other ways.  If you're anything like me (and most people), you'll probably avoid the empty restaurant assuming the lack of patrons is a statement on the quality of the food...

The "empty restaurant syndrome" is pervasive, especially in online communities.  To avoid this, it's important to have a critical mass of seed content prior to launching any online community.  This is especially the case in market research online communities, since they are slightly less conventional than traditional online communities.  Don't worry if it's just "filler" activity at first - it just has to be something to get people talking to each other.  Depending on who you talk to, the rule of thumb is anywhere from 4-5 posts per high-level forum topic area, but will vary based on your community size and audience.

We also recommend a "soft launch" for most MROCs, whereby you invite a handful of members first and then slowly roll it out to your entire group of recruited participants.  That way the late arrivals will feel like there is something of an established group once they arrive. 

These are just two tips for anyone planning to launch their own MROCs on the PluggedIN Platform.  Think of these ideas as this "virtual" way to avoid the empty restaurant syndrome.  Anyone have other tips to share?  Comments are open!