Interview Survey

Rethinking the UK Census - just once this decade

Friday, April 1, 2011 by Joeline Cross

With the UK Census in the next few days, we thought we'd share a great article from Rachel Antony-Roberts, Research and Customer Insight Manager and Assistant Census Liaison Manager in Westminster Council’s communications and strategy unit:

http://www.research-live.com/4004783.article

The Census, particularly one completed only once a decade as in England, is fraught with issues about compliance and cost.

On one hand, paper surveys are expensive to print, transport, double enter for validation, potentially to read. The respondent is subject to question fatigue and the veracity of the information provided can be questionable. For example, during the last UK census, 390,000 people listed their religion as 'Jedi Knight', clearly using humour to distance their own personal information from the needs of the government to base social policy on their requirements. Subsequent construction of Jedi temples to meet the demand in high density Jedi Knight regions have so far gone unreported ;)

Perhaps personal interviews, face to face at the door step, are a better solution? With the interviewers armed with a portable device (PDA, Android tablet or even an iPad?) the paper and data entry costs would be obsolete and the information would be validated at entry and clarified with the respondent right away. Multiple choice answers could be randomized to prevent question fatigue or bias. There would be less data entry errors. But how would you arrange to have enough interviewers in field to interview the population that night, without omitting the interviewers themselves from the census count?

What would happen if we gave people the option to self-complete using CAMI/ MCASI, as well as online and paper ?

The number of mobile subscriber connections in the UK is expected to reach 88.8 million in 2012, it's one of the highest penetration figures in the world. A new report by IEMR indicates that 55% of total connections use the prepaid payment model. Two large brands (T-Mobile and Orange) have recently merged so that there are only 3 or 4 large telecoms players in the UK market.

The Q1 2011 report 'United Kingdom Mobile Operator Forecast, 2010 - 2015' expects that in the competitive UK market, wireless carriers are battling to attract and retain customers. Consumer research by The MMA and Lightspeed Research (October 2010) found that in UK 45 percent of consumers noticed mobile advertising. Of these, 29 percent responded to it and a whopping 47 percent of people went on to make a purchase. It's clear that consumers in the UK are saying that they want to use their mobile device to engage with offers.

So with such high mobile penetration, and only 3-4 key mobile operators vying to keep customers engaged, why couldn't you use mobile to answer questions about the census?

Rather than spending so much money on increasing compliance (even though there is a £1000 fine for not responding), why not incentivise the population by giving them credit for their phones? or credit for other mobile content?

The respondents could complete the survey while on the couch, or doing their usual evening activities.

Rather than the costs in printing, posting, completing, posting back, double entry and a delay in gathering the information (of those that are valid) using traditional print methods, why not incentivise people with a $5 credit against their phone bill, or a chance to win something that is compelling to the population to increase compliance?

Our surveys have shown that even an incentive as small as $1 (in points) rapidly increase compliance and response speed, even when the survey involves a task. The UK Government could even offer a coupon for a free fare on the public transport system, or points at the local supermarket loyalty program - of which there is huge adoption in the UK.

Perhaps with certain segments, like those over 40, they could opt in to use the traditional paper method or go online to complete. I'm sure for the majority of the population

respondents would prefer to complete it in a few minutes on the couch, avoid a £1000 fine and earn themselves an incentive. Using mobile apps, the UK Government would get higher quality information, validated, much faster than paper methods. And maybe a picture of these Jedi Knight worshippers ;)

There's nothing like mobile to get you an unfiltered, as-it-is photograph of someone's front door, and a GPS capture on the fly (55% of mobile users in the UK are taking photos with their phone on a regular basis). Mobile apps could give the UK government validated, valuable information about what's happening at people's homes for future social planning.

To see how we used mobile to gather pre-census data in the USA, click here.

Update on 14th April 2011: For more information about how Census data is being used, the MRS is hosting a conference on 4 July. More information here.

How will mobile OS wars & smartphone demographics impact your market research?

Friday, February 11, 2011 by Joeline Cross

We reported on September 30, 2010 that Android was gaining ground on iPhone’s marketshare.

Four months later, Nielson shows us that the three major mobile operating systems (mobile OS’s) are in a three-way-tie (fig. 1). The inevitable battle for leadership can only be good for end customers, where value and features will be more readily compared before committing to a handset and platform.

FIG 1: SOURCE: NIELSEN 2010 http://mashable.com/2011/02/01/nielsen-smartphone-marketshare/

For Market Researchers this offers the hope of greater accessibility to the growing volume of people who can no longer be reached by traditional landline telephones.

The % of adults living in wireless-only households in the US in 2010 versus in 2007 (fig. 2) only enforces the need to consider adding mobile to their research toolkit.

FIG 2: SOURCE: ‘WIRELESS SUBSTITUTION: EARLY RELEASE OF ESTIMATES FROM THE NATIONAL HEALTH INTERVIEW SURVEY’, JANUARY - JUNE 2010 BY STEPHEN J. BLUMBERG, PH.D., AND JULIAN V. LUKE, DIVISION OF HEALTH INTERVIEW STATISTICS, NATIONAL CENTER FOR HEALTH STATISTICS

Nielsen has also offered some interesting information about the change in trends for the segments of the community who are actively taking up smartphones in America. As you can see from the chart below (fig. 3), uptake of smartphones was led by Asians in Q4 2009, then Hispanics purchased more smartphones, until they equalized at 45% of each demographic owning a smartphone last quarter.

FIG 3: SOURCE: ‘Among Mobile Phone Users, Hispanics, Asians are Most-Likely Smartphone Owners in the U.S.’, 1 FEBRUARY 2010, NIELSON.

And if you look at, for example, Internet penetration for Hispanics in the USA (fig. 4) you will see that the growth in internet use is greater than a non-hispanic US audience. They are proving themselves to be early adopters and market-ready for lifestyle technology solutions.

FIG 4: SOURCE: ‘HOW DOES THE U.S. HISPANIC MARKET LOOK IN 2020?’, DR NADIA ASHRATAN, ELECTRONIC RETAILER MAGAZINE, 21 JAN 2010.

You will need to continue to be relevant to this audience and reach them where they are in order to gather information about their behaviour and purchasing expectations that clients will want. But how big is the market?

Dr. Nadia Ashrafian, CEO of Electronic Media Group, said that: “The U.S. Hispanic market ranks as the third largest “Latin American economy” behind Brazil and Mexico. According to U.S. Census data, there are more Hispanics living in the United States (50 million) than the entire population of Canada at 32.5 million. [They] are like a country within a country.

U.S. Hispanic purchasing power will surge to nearly $1 trillion by 2010–nearly three times the overall national rate over the past decade. In most categories, Hispanics spend more money than the general market. The top areas are groceries, telephone services, furniture, clothing, household products, ingestibles or “wellness” products, fitness products, as well as weight-loss products and automobiles.

Hispanic advertising by U.S. companies has grown 30 percent in 2009, compared with 8.6 percent for the general market. By mid-century, 25 percent or one out of every four people in the United States will be Hispanic and will represent 25 percent of the total population.”

So if 45% of Hispanics own a smartphone and you want to reach anywhere from 5-51% of them who are otherwise unreachable, and tap into nearly 5-51% of $1 trillion then you may just want to consider some kind of mobile feedback mechanism.

The same point could be made for Asian and Pacific Islanders, or anyone else who lives in a cell-phone only household. As we see response rates for email opens decline and market penetration for smartphones rising we see opportunities with smartphones in recruitment , engagement and data quality sharply increasing.

Social Media & Mobile's impact on Marketing Research

Tuesday, February 1, 2011 by Joeline Cross

During 2010 marketers and market researchers watched the rapid uptake of social media and scrambled to introduce metrics and benchmarks to gauge the ROI of this new channel. They wanted to answer the question: “was public opinion more valuable if people spoke in an unsolicited fashion on directories like Yelp or Yellow Pages, business-hosted forums or consumer-to-consumer on social media channels?”

They wondered what motivated people to talk about their experiences with brands, products and services. Marketing and market research industries wondered how much clients would pay for the gathering, analysis, measurement and reporting of these conversations. Are unsolicited comments on social media a better indicator of intention to purchase or of brand loyalty? What impact would this ‘pulse checking’ information have on traditional methods of market research? What are the benefits of social media listening versus actively engaging a survey respondent for a digital ethnography, for example?

For example, Unilever employed Anderson Analytics software to “look for common themes throughout online posts and ... identify unique discussions that typically are likely to be dismissed by human analysts.”

People were commenting on forums about an ad which tastefully portrayed an older woman in a Unilever Dove commercial.

They found that of those who did express an opinion, 97% strongly supported elder people representing the Dove product, and less than 7% indicated concern in regard to the nudity. By analyzing the social media comments, they came to the conclusion that the Dove and the pro-age brand were being viewed by many as a champion for the cause of women over the age 50.

Other topics emerged alongside the expected discussion about “aging, beauty and the appropriateness of the TV commercial”, such as inter-generational issues, comments on American society and the world at large, and “intense contrast and comparison between the US and European media were also prevalent on the forum.”

Would these issues and themes have emerged using traditional survey methods that use predetermined options for respondents to select? Is eliciting structured data more valuable than finding patterns in freely contributed, unstructured feedback? These are the questions facing forward thinking market researchers today, and are causing some people to predict a re-emergence and renewed focus on qualitative (and other unstructured) research techniques.

These kinds of questions will continue to be discussed and shaped this year and with the increasing penetration of smartphones worldwide, and 100 million people accessing Facebook via their smartphones, social media is being amalgamated with discussions based around mobile marketing.

We have seen that the intimacy of mobile devices can offer a more genuine response about behaviours, expectations and motivations from participants.

Sean Conry, VP Techneos, just presented a paper at MRIA’s Netgain Conference in Toronto, Canada where organizers of the event for the first time included a focus on how mobile and social media work can together in market research.

The paper showcased results from a recent Mobile ethnography (a form of MCASI - Mobile Computer Assisted Self Interview for the uninitiated) completed in collaboration with Ipsos, dubbed ‘The Great British Weekend’. In the study respondents were asked to note what they were doing at least four times a day over the course of a long weekend. The idea was inspired by how people perform social media status updates using their mobile phone, and was readily accepted by respondents of widely varying demographic segments.

The mobile phones respondents used in the 'Great British Weekend' study offered GPS tracking (validated data which was then visually mapped), instantly uploaded photographs at various locations across the weekend (capturing their environment & company), and included emotional ratings to compare and analyze. The respondents’ willingness to share and high level of engagement offered some rich real time user experience research data which is being used by the client for targeted brand decisions. As an example of the willingness for people to share, a particular respondent answered "What are you doing now?" with "I'm at the funeral of one of the top hells angels".

Great British Weekend Techneos IPSOS what are you doing

Respondents were not only familiar with the social media style approach, but they experienced minimal participation barriers on their own device and keenly participated. As you can see from the feedback graph below, 100% said that they would participate again and 77% said that they would recommend the study to their friends.

Great British Weekend Techneos Ipsos Feedback Score

If you’d like more information about this study, or you saw Sean present at NETGAIN, please get in touch or leave us a comment on this blog.

If you’d like more information about how social media is impacting marketing research you could register for this American Marketing Association webinar.

Techneos upgrades SODA mobile survey service

Friday, June 25, 2010 by Samantha Singh

The new 1.3 version gives researchers access to information such as addresses, database lists or results from other surveys to be pre-populated and assigned to individual participants or interviewers for completion.

Researchers can also keep in contact with respondents through an email-style messaging system, and a data-cleaning option corrects any fieldwork errors at the source, rather than at the end of the project.

See the original post:
Techneos upgrades SODA mobile survey service

Click here, to see the Techneos press release: "Techneos Announces Version 1.3 of SODA®"

Is Co-Creation the Newest Research Fad?

Monday, April 12, 2010 by Sean Conry

At the recent Mobile Research Conference in London, Mick Couper, methodologist extraordinaire and mode effects expert from the University of Michigan, reminded us to think about the "what's in it for them" when it comes to our respondents. The message I took was that if we don't, then we can expect mobile research participation to erode in very short order.

There may just be a groundswell afoot about making research more meaningful for respondents. Well I hope so anyway - for example, take this blog on Co-Creation of surveys. This post in particular focuses on cooperating with respondents to ensure the translations in your interview survey make sense.

That's a really great idea, but there's also a new future emerging where wireless survey participants will also help create and shape our research instruments over time - to actually influence the crux of the insight we're trying to gather. Some of the next innovations in research thinking will be to engage people over the long term, with functions of real value to them. Check out how the American Legacy Foundation is engaging people who are trying to quit smoking.

Sure they're doing diaries to collect valuable research data which will help society (maybe even their neighborhood) over time, but they are also providing real value to the participants by establishing a new social and support network of peers, and by providing access to their own trends and data. This could even provide compelling inputs to motivate changes to the research instrument over time.

I do not envy the analyst who's job it will be to figure out how the evolving changes in the research, and respondent knowledge of their habits, might affect the data! Some companies already offer respondent-generated response lists that grow over the life of an Internet survey - For example, the first 10 answers are basically a 'specify other' which gets turned into a multi response option.

But WOW! What an exciting thought that people will actually drive the insight, rather than just be put in to pre-defined check boxes. I can't wait.

The Frustration of Mobility and Reach

Wednesday, October 28, 2009 by Sean Conry

In my last post, I wondered about device market share and it's affect on our ability to reach the right people for survey conducting.

I focused on the manufacturer / operating system, but another element also has a significant affect on reach. I guess you could call it Mode. We normally talk about mode in terms of whether we're collecting data over the web, over the phone, face-to-face, etc. Mobile is it's own mode, but there are choices within that mode.

Specifically, the primary mobile mode possibilities for a mobile survey system are text message, mobile web, and applications.

Check out this interview/podcast from a recent interview at a CASRO event. Heidi Dickert has some good points about how a different type of technology is required when looking at mobile surveys. The message? You can't just replicate the same old approach when it comes to mobile research.

Text messages give you ubiquitous reach, but the commonly held experience among those I speak with is that SMS surveys are good only for very, very quick polls. The burden on the respondent is high, and you can only squeeze in 3-4 questions before participation drops off - and if you haven't seen it yourself, believe me, it doesn't just stumble off the curb, it careens off the grand canyon.

Mobile web feels like it should be familiar since CAWI has taken over as the primary mode of choice in so many countries. However, the problem is that the mobile web isn't great yet for the vast majority of users. You still need a lot of patience. Think about a news page that requires 10 seconds to load, but then you spend 5 minutes reading. That's much more palatable when compared to refreshing screen after screen after screen of a mobile web survey. To reinforce this, check out Mobile Marketer's recent article about slow load time is the #1 performance issue on the mobile web.

Off course we believe in Applications (particularly Java where possible, native where needed). With iPhone App store just reaching it's 2 Billionth download in September, and Facebook's install base leaping from 2 million to 10.5 million in two months with the release of targeted Java versions, the path seems pretty clear to us...

Cheap Interview Devices Still Exist

Thursday, October 8, 2009 by Sean Conry

If you're a real cheapskate like me, and you've been biding your time before making a new hardware investment, then look no longer. The next release of inexpensive smartphone technology for MCAPI interviews and diary studies has arrived.

Check out the unlocked Palm Treo 500 for $119. Incredible.

Just make sure you're willing to live with a QWERTZ keyboard - (in Germany, they switch the Z with the Y.. go figure).

Some shameless promotion here, but with Techneos' new SaaS pay-per-complete options, there's never been a more affordable time to equip your field force or diary respondents with a world-class mobile interview system.

Market Research makes it in Hollywood

Wednesday, September 30, 2009 by Sean Conry

For many outside of our industry, Market Research has always been a fuzzy concept, and let's face it, a weird choice of career.

But no longer! A major Hollywood movie (Last Chance Harvey) features a market researcher as a main character.

Last chance Harvey Interviewer Screen capture

But what is she doing with pen and paper? What an antiquated approach! We would expect her to be using a computer assisted personal interviewing system or some kind of PDA survey software, of course. Where are these movie script writers doing their research?

Legal Note: This post in no way confirms that my wife convinced me to watch a movie which could be described as a Romance Drama.

The Affect of Social Networking on Research

Thursday, August 27, 2009 by Sean Conry

As it gets harder for businesses (and researchers!) to reach people, the buzz about the affect of social networking applications is starting to get louder in our ears...

Apparently some people are wondering if the rise of direct forms of customer interaction like voice of the customer programs will make the use of Mystery Shoppers for mobile data collection a thing of the past.

Judi Hess, president of MSPA calls mystery shopping "a means to measure customer service, product knowledge, and sales ability." More important, she says, it offers subjective, targeted feedback that companies just can't get from less structured kinds of feedback, like social networking tools or surveys.

Ok, I can buy that. Read more here (you'll need to sign up for a free account).

Tom Anderson in particular is pushing us to think about the role of Social Networks and what he's calling "next gen marketing research". He recently interviewed representatives from Facebook and LinkedIn. It's just a start, but you can see that the social networks are starting to think about the convergence of these worlds, too.

Click here for the Podcast

All three of them will be a highlight of an upcoming ESOMAR panel session. This will be one you don't want to miss...

These are great articles to get us thinking about engagement, the future of survey conducting and the way we deliver insight from the market... But one of my favourite approaches comes from a seasoned researcher right here in Canada.

More on that next week...

Is the future of research directly related to the past?

Sunday, August 2, 2009 by Mark Cameron

I've found myself pondering the effect of mobile technology on the future of research, and figured it warranted a blog post. I've been involved with both handheld surveys and wireless technology for most of my career, and throughout that time I've been amazed at both how quickly and how slowly things change.

Mobile technology itself moves incredibly quickly, but adoption of technology can range from lightning fast to incredibly slow. Market research professionals are analytical and pragmatic by nature, so it is understandable that researchers have been slower to embrace new technology than many other industries. Ironically, market research is often a key driver for decisions which drive technological advances, yet it can take years for those advances to be reflected back into the research process itself.

Methodology is central to any decision relating to survey research methods. When new techniques are introduced to "improve" tried-and-true processes, it is important for researchers to understand all of the implications of the potential change before implementing it en masse. So research about research, or more specifically about new techniques for conducting research, is very important. But this is easier said than done, as most researchers are so busy generating revenue through existing methods that they lack time to explore new ones. The academic community breaks a lot of ground in this regard, but it takes time for academic research to reach--and to be embraced by--the commercial market research sector.

Recently I have seen mobile research being embraced as a reasonably mainstream approach for survey data collection. It is still "leading edge", but it is no longer "bleeding edge" -- at least for face-to-face interviews and diary studies. While the application of mobile survey software is still a niche play today, we are about to see it extend beyond its traditional application to touch every other aspect of survey research -- including web surveys, phone surveys, mystery shopping and other methods.

What intrigues me more than anything is where this bottom-up thinking will really lead the research industry. While we are busy planning for the evolution of survey research to involve mobile technology, I believe it is equally important to see things from the top-down: i.e. to realize that researchers are losing control of people's attention, and consumers are increasingly recognizing the value of their opinions. Will the methodologies of today be effective in the future, or do we need to reshape our thinking to embrace emerging realities?

I believe the future of mobile survey research looks a lot different than the past. We will not simply see old methods enhanced by new technology; entirely new methods will emerge around the cultural phenomena that shape our societies around the globe. There is no limit to the opportunities that will be enabled by social networking and location-aware technology, which will be bundled into mobile technology that will make today's most impressive devices seem as archaic as early PCs appear today.

Those of us who wrap our arms around the cultural changes that emerge as a result of new technology, rather than just trying to shape new technology to meet old and tired methods, will realize amazing new opportunities for mining insight from consumer opinions. There will be many false starts and a lot of experimentation, but in a few years we will look back at the way we did things in 2009 and be amazed by how dramatically human communication -- and in turn market research -- have changed within a very short time.

I'll share some of my predictions on this blog over the coming months. Today I just wanted to get the thread started with some background thoughts...

Summing up the cell-only problem for market research

Thursday, July 16, 2009 by Sean Conry

It seems as though reseach online has recently reinvented themselves. They were always a great source for information, but they seem to be exploding with news and original content lately.

A recent article titled "Survey Geek vs. The Cord-Cutters" offers an audio interview with self-confessed 'survey geek' and blogger, Reg Baker. There are also great links to relevant articles on the cell-only population and the affects on research. You can listen to it here:

This interview is great in my opinion, particularly in that he begins by describing the "cell-only" problem in terms of the sampling frame. He also eloquently yet concisely descsribes the issue of bias due to undercoverage, and how the target group of the research and the topic may affect results. Not to mention cost and data implications of doing a survey on mobile phone. Reg also identifies the "wireless mostly" problem. I won't replicate every point here in text, but here's a researcher who knows his stuff.

Brilliantly, he surmises (and hopes) that researchers will adapt to the problem by matching the method to the problem - execute "fit-for-purpose methodology decision", to paraphrase slightly.

But one thing stuck out to me... there's no mention of three significant and growing ways to conduct a mobile device survey, cellphone survey, mobile marketing survey (mobile research by whatever name you choose): WAP, SMS and Survey Applications.

Check out the latest numbers from CASRO. You might find it's worth getting ahead of the curve by adding other mobile techniques to your methodological tool box.

A sum of parts: a quick review of what we've added since Entryware 6.0

Thursday, July 9, 2009 by Mark Cameron

Today marks the release of our latest mobile survey system, Entryware 6.4. While it carries the numbering of an "incremental" upgrade, it is a significant milestone in terms of the new capabilities that it provides. We chose to release it as v6.4 to focus on increasing capabilities rather than going through the onerous task of re-labelling this as a "major" release, but the impact is indeed major!

Entryware 6.4 brings diary research, including the rich photo diary capabilities enjoyed by some of our key customers on Palm devices today, to Windows Mobile users. It also provides some significant improvements to the look-and-feel of Entryware on both Palm and Windows Mobile devices, which improves usability for both face-to-face interviewing and self-completed surveys.

For those who are in the field every day working on a handheld device, using the 5-way navigator to page through long questions or proceed to the next question can significantly improve efficiency. And for those respondents who are just being introduced to mobile survey technology, automation to auto-start projects eliminates unnecessary steps for the user while providing added security for project managers.

I took a look at our release notes today and realized that since our last "major" upgrade, Entryware 6.0, we have added a number of key features in the various v6.x upgrades we have posted:

Sliding scale questions
Photo capture on Palm OS, Windows and Windows Mobile
Encrypted and compressed data transfer
SPSS v13+ export
Improved user-selectable missing
Ability to launch external Windows Mobile applications
Improved CSS formatting on Entryware Mobile for Windows
Improved string handling in scripting
Additional African language support
Support for Palm Pre devices
5-way navigation
Improved searching capabilities in Data View Report
Project automation to auto-start questionnaires
Improved graphics quality including hi-res Windows Mobile screens
Diary survey engine for Windows Mobile
Printing capability for Bluetooth printers
Ability to convert Multiple Response questions to a series of Single Response questions
Various other small enhancements

And that doesn't even touch on everything that was new in v6.0... this is just what has happened since then.

I thought is was worth sharing all of the key v6.x enhancements in one combined list, because many people are unaware of everything that can be done using Entryware today. We find that many of our clients are still happily using older versions of the software, which is great to hear... but in some cases significant efficiency gains could be made by adopting the latest and greatest.

Why conduct landline-only surveys when 1 in 5 households are cellphone-only?

Friday, May 29, 2009 by Susan Bilczo

I ran across this article recently that highlights the results of a report that the Center for Disease Control put out on wireless substitution (aka canceling your land line for a cellphone).

There were some very interesting results:

Over one in five U.S. households (20.2%) are cellphone-only, an increase of 2.7% over six months ago.
One in every seven homes (14.5%) took all their calls on cellphones despite having a landline.
More than three in five adults living only with unrelated adult roommates (60.6%) were in households with only wireless telephones. This is the highest prevalence rate among the population subgroups examined.
Nearly two in five adults renting their home (39.2%) had only wireless telephones. Adults renting their home were more likely than adults owning their home (9.9%) to be living in households with only wireless telephones.
Men (20.0%) were more likely than women (17.0%) to be living in households with only wireless telephones.
Adults living in poverty (30.9%) and adults living near poverty (23.8%) were more likely than higher income adults (16.0%) to be living in households with only wireless telephones.

This information is certainly handy to market researchers as it helps them figure out the best groups of people to use mobile marketing surveys on rather than other survey methods.

But then I began to wonder, why would the CDC need to do such an in-depth study on mobile phone usage? Shouldn't they be focusing on health-related data collection?

Well, it turns out that most major survey research organizations, including the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics, do not include wireless telephone numbers when conducting random-digit-dial telephone surveys. Therefore, the inability to reach households with only wireless telephones has potential implications for results from health surveys, political polls, and other research conducted using random-digit-dial telephone surveys.

So, to combat this problem, the CDC conducts in-person surveys to collect information on health-related issues. During this interview they also take the opportunity to collect information on household telephones: is your family wireless-only or landline. This information is released via the report above twice a year.

I think it is great that the CDC is aware of this problem, but why keep conducting random-digit-dial telephone surveys if you've already proven with your own study (not to mention all the other mobile phone vs. landline statistics that are out there) that you will get biased results?

Seems pretty obvious here that the best answer for the CDC, as well as the other major survey research organizations, is to switch to mobile data collection.

Mobile devices are the next breakthrough research environment

Friday, May 22, 2009 by Susan Bilczo

I ran across this article in the most recent MRA Alert! magazine, discussing how Smartphones, and the desire for a richer mobile service experience, are changing how we look at the mobile phone.

MOBILE PHONES ARE SO MUCH MORE THAN JUST A PHONE

From text messaging to GPS to online banking to social networking to web browsing to gaming to online coupons to watching videos to, well, almost anything.

A quote from this same article says it really well:

"...the most dynamic and important technology platform today is mobile technology, and that from a marketing research perspective, it is becoming clear that mobile devices will be the next breakthrough research environment."

MOBILE RESEARCH GETS GOOD REVIEWS

Contacting people through their mobile device to conduct your mobile market research will also ensure a good response rate.

Robert Manchin, managing director of Gallup Europe, has found that respondents embrace mobile interviews. In a recent article, Pragmatism Over Ideology?, in the May 2009 Research World magazine, Manchin says:

"'We have quite a bit of evidence now that it's more personal because you are not losing someone at the first stage of sample selection (recruitment).' And people seem more likely to give up time on their mobile because 'dead time' is easier to find, such as while commuting or during breaks."

Survey conducting via mobile phones is certainly coming into its own. Why not look into mobile survey software for your future marketing research needs?

More device updates for CAPI Software for mobile survey

Wednesday, May 6, 2009 by Sean Conry

I recently wrote about the Wild West of mobile devices - that was within the context of self-completed surveys and survey software on respondent devices. But what about mobility in terms of more traditional CAPI / MCAPI for a mobile device survey?

Netbooks and their equivalents are some of the only hardware projected for sales growth this year, and when I look at some of these entrants, I can see why. Check out the CTL 2go. Windows and a touch screen for $499? It even has a handle and is semi-rugged (tested for 50cm drop)! It's almost as if they had interview research in mind when they built this thing.

The popular Asus eee will also soon be available in a touchscreen..

Some other cool devices like this super keyboard computer can be found at PC World's "10 Most Anticipated Ultraportables and Netbooks of 2009" (Thanks to Mike for the forward)

Excitement builds about running surveys on the Palm Pre Smartphone

Friday, April 17, 2009 by Mark Cameron

As a follow-up to my previous post about the Palm Pre Smartphone, we are increasingly excited about bringing mobile research to this exciting new hardware platform. More news is emerging about the ability to run Palm OS applications on Pre devices--such as this Youtube video showing some flashy gaming examples, or this FAQ that provides more technical information about exactly what features are supported.

Planned for release in the US later this quarter, Entryware software running on the Palm Pre should be a great solution for mobile surveys. A beautiful screen, slide-out keyboard and both WiFi and 3G wireless options make the Pre an ideal device for conducting surveys in the field. And its multi-tasking operating system will enable researchers to get very creative with third-party applications.

The Pre's interface operates like a deck of cards, so you can run a questionnaire on one "card" while running other applications (e.g. videos or location-based services) on different cards. Palm's new Synergy communication infrastructure and built-in GPS system also open up innovative new ways to manage your interviewers, respondents, mystery shoppers, etc.

We plan to turn this amazing new platform into an ideal solution for mobile market research. Stay tuned for more information as it becomes available.

Devices with promise for CAPI and MCAPI Wireless Surveys

Monday, April 13, 2009 by Sean Conry

I recently wrote a post about a client who asked me about Palm, Market share of mobile devices, and what device to choose for their PDA Survey Software. Hopefully that helped spur thoughts on the state of the market today, but what's in store for the devices researchers will choose for tomorrow's Mobile Research?

In September 2008, professor Randall Stross from San Jose State University did an interview with the CBC where he noted that devices are getting ever more capable.

"There's no question that Google sees the biggest opportunity for growth is mobile access to the internet. Phones are becoming ever more capable of performing the same work that we use our desktops for. There's a whole new category of phones now, beyond the smartphone, that is designed from the ground up to interact with web services"

There's no doubt in my mind that hardware is converging...

Regular laptops are on the decline, but take a look at the proliferation of Netbooks (or mini-PC's, as they are sometimes called). One client of ours just decided to go with the Dell, although some other clients are also using the Asus EEE with great success.

Netbooks don't have a touch screen, and you have to be aware that you might be buying the linux version, but you can't beat the price and battery life.

The UMPC (or ultra mobile PC) never quite took off with widespread appeal among consumers, but they

can make a great survey device. Samsung, the main player in this space, is coming out with the next iteration of their popular Q1 line. Our company used the first release in the Q1 line, and I have to say, it was pretty nice.
You can't get a durable touchscreen device running Windows for much less.

And of couse there is the highly anticipated Palm Pre... (read more about this in other posts on this blog).

I am personally excited to see the Touch Book by Always Innovating (even though you can't get it with Windows). I understand offering linux, but they came up with yet another operating system (Touchbook OS). Sigh.

What about Android, and LiMO (or Linux Mobile) the open-source mobile operating systems?

Choice is good for consumers, but at some point, the vast proliferation of operating systems and technology standards make it tougher for business users to decide what platform to standardize on.

The shining ray of light in the chaos of these mobile phone wars is the first hint of collaboration amongst the main competitors. It's a green initiative, but incredibly, at least 17 cell phone brands will be sharing the same universal charger by 2012. Of course Apple isn't going to cooperate, but they'll probably come up with their own way to solve the problem.

For researchers, it means you need to consider your mobile software and hardware in tandem. For more on this, Techneos has a great whitepaper I can recommend ;) - check out the last page for "10 tips"

Entryware on Palm Pre: mobile surveys never looked so sexy!

Thursday, April 2, 2009 by Mark Cameron

In January, Palm took the world by storm by announcing both its new webOS and the Pre smartphone, which have been touted by many as setting a new bar for mobile phone functionality. Planned for release sometime this quarter, the Pre has leapfrogged Palm from a once-prized but aging provider of PDAs and smartphones, to an innovative leader with the coolest mobile device to hit the market since the iPhone. With a new team of superstars at the helm (many of whom came from Apple), Palm's recent announcements have impressed techies and investors alike.

But the question we have all been asking for the past couple of months is... what is the future of Palm OS applications like Entryware?

Today we heard the news we've been waiting for... that Palm OS applications will be supported on Pre devices. We had reason to believe that some form of Palm OS support would be available on webOS devices, but we've been in a bit of a holding pattern awaiting confirmation.

Palm devices have always been ideal for survey research, because Palm OS offers a simple, elegant interface that is consistent and easy to use. Although Entryware software also runs very well on Windows devices, as long-time Palm fans we are thrilled to see that a whole new generation of Palm devices will continue to be turned into best-of-breed wireless survey systems.

Techneos is committed to ensuring customers a smooth transition from existing Palm devices to the next generation of webOS phones. In the meantime, existing Palm devices like the Centro, Treo and TX -- all of which are excellent tools for mobile research applications like face-to-face interviews, diary studies and mystery shopping -- should be available at bargain prices while Palm makes room for new inventory.

Good going Palm! We knew you had it in you...

The not-so-overnight phenomenon of mobile surveys

Friday, March 27, 2009 by Mark Cameron

Mobile surveys might be the hottest topic in market research today -- and I've been waiting a long time to say that!

Since I developed my first survey software for Mobile Computer Assisted Personal Interviewing (MCAPI) in 1991, I've been waiting for mobile research to hit the mainstream. From bleeding edge to leading edge, mobile surveys have always been viewed as an "opportunity of the future". If PDA surveys generated a bit of a wave back in the late 1990's, then Internet surveys were surely a tsunami... and now it's the marriage of mobility and high-speed wireless Internet access that is opening a whole new word of possibilities.

I had an opportunity to speak at the Mobile Research Conference in London last month. It was billed as the first ever conference dedicated to mobile research, and it was a very promising sign for this niche that Techneos has been working to fill for more than a decade. (In fact, it was at least the second such conference, as I also presented at the Association for Survey Computing conference on Mobile Computing in 2005).

While Techneos has been proving for many years that you CAN do serious research on a handheld computer, a much bigger opportunity for mobile surveys is emerging -- at long last! Ranging from photo diaries to mystery shopping to funky new ways to conduct customer satisfaction questionnaires--and lest we forget the good old face-to-face interview--surveys on mobile phones, Netbooks and other mobile devices will no doubt play a major role in the future of market research.

Hold onto your hats and join us for the ride! We're looking forward to the future that we first envisioned almost 20 years ago. Yikes, how time flies!