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A New Era in Customer Driven Marketing - Part Two

From Casual Contacts to Relationships...

Despite the many benefits, Internet research shares a common challenge with all forms of traditional survey research - how to solicit the cooperation of survey respondents? In the world of telephone research cooperation has historically been based on appeals to the fundamental "civility" of potential respondents. The social standards that were engrained into most citizens and consumers from an early age prevented contacts from being rude to an interviewer with a pleasant voice and polite manners. But today a combination of screening technology that provides a means of avoidance and the abuse of telephone interviewing by telemarketing organizations, which provides the desire for avoidance have made consumers far more likely to respond negatively to even the most polite stranger contacting them by phone.

In the world of Internet surveys the "link" between respondent and surveyor is potentially even more tenuous. With little more than the click of a mouse, unwanted surveys can be dispatched to the trash bin. Even worse the sender can be permanently blocked so that respondents never have to deal with them again. Resolving the issue of respondent cooperation is the most important challenge facing the new and exciting world of Internet research.

The "good news" is that unlike traditional telephone surveys, where almost all of the data collection dollars are invested in hiring interviewers, renting facilities and paying telephone charges; the minimal cost of "distribution" under the Internet model allows clients and survey companies to invest greater thought and resources in how best to secure respondent cooperation. For most categories it makes sense to repeatedly seek views and input from respondents who are willing to participate This is the central concept of a panel and panels are the key to unleashing the power of Internet research.

For some academics the idea of multiple surveys with the same respondent raises the usual chorus of quibbles about whether survey measurements will be tainted by "professional respondents". But in the world of real research, panels actually improve the quality of measures for most applications. That's because individual surveys are usually shorter since it's not necessary to continue re-asking demographic and other background questions. And shorter surveys don't produce the annoyance and irritation associated with marathon survey sessions. Panels also allow for measures which track changes in attitude, perception or behaviour over time thus providing a much more accurate measure than is obtained by comparing the results of successive surveys.

Think of a panel as a type of consumer advisory board made up of current and/or potential customers. An Internet panel can be as small or as large as is necessary with total size only having a relatively marginal impact on cost. Indeed the major driver of panel size is the frequency and scope of panel usage since it's important to involve consumers once their cooperation has been assured.

PART THREE

Reprinted with permission from Angus Reid. Read the full article at http://angus-reid.com.

Posted on October 28, 2004
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