The Research Playbook

Archive for the ‘Online Marketing Studies’ Category

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The Social Media for SMB Group is designed to help address the needs of small and midsize businesses. 

It is where business owners, and executive teams that run businesses ask questions on how to leverage social media marketing, social media research, and the broad area of internet marketing and business research to advance their opportunities.

Professionals with credentials to offer guidance, advice, how-to suggestions, resources, and other  information are invited to bring their expertise to the group.

Please join Social Media for SMB Group to learn and share your knowledge!

Special Report: Website Traffic Businesses and Experts Speak Out 2012

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Sales cycle analysis is a powerful tool to help you better understand your markets. Gaining a strong appreciation for the good and bad news about your market positioning in relationship to your competition isn’t always easy to do. Moreover, if there’s bad news it’s difficult to hear. However, not knowing where you stand is, at best, dangerous and could prove fatal.

Understanding why you do or don’t get on the short list of your prospects (or stay on the short list of your customers) is critical and sales cycle analysis helps to answer this very important question.  You need to know what will facilitate or impede your progress toward becoming a preferred supplier – the position we obviously all want. If knowledge is power than sale cycle knowledge is supremacy.

Clearly, there is more than one approach to achieving insights related to sales cycle dynamics and how customers and prospects perceive a business. We won’t try to explore the options here.

However, it is worth noting that a commitment to exploring these dynamics is not a one shot deal. If you and your company are serious about sales and the factors that propel your sales, you will be well served by tracking the metrics required at least annually.

We all know markets continue to evolve quickly. A very good way to stay informed is to track market activity systematically. Creating a baseline of information and measuring against that is a great starting point and an essential part of sales cycle analysis.

You can structure sales cycle studies to help maximize your reach tactics. Knowing how to best reach your audience is a function of understanding how they search for information. More precisely it is about how customers and prospects search for information at each stage of the buying process. In addition, the new reach equation includes social networking and social media, again fast moving targets.

In addition, studies on sales cycles, almost by definition, provide competitive insights. It’s not enough to know if you’re on the short list you need to know who’s on it with you.

Combining information on brand and product positioning with a continually updated view of reach dynamics is a powerful tool in the hands of a savvy marketing professional. What are you waiting for? Get started!

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Often when I recommend that a research team prepare a formal analysis plan the first response I hear is, “Why? The analysis isn’t due for weeks and I have too many other things to do.” Alternatively, I hear statements like, “That is too much extra work, I know what to do, I’ve done a lot of analysis work.”

An analysis plan is not extra work; it’s work that makes all the other project tasks flow efficiently. It will help you produce on-time project deliverables. Typically, you develop an analysis plan in parallel with your research instrument (RI). Like the RI the analysis plan is tied back to the goals and objectives of the study.

In addition to the obvious purpose of an analysis plan, producing a plan serves to improve the RI and manage project scope, these benefits alone will pay you for the time you devote to creating it.

The RI is referenced in an Analysis Plan (AP) and while there are no hard or fast rules and no one right way to structure an AP we can offer some guidelines. The approach presented here is as good as any and better than most.

The analysis plan approach described is specific to quantitative studies. The first step of the process will be familiar to those of you who read some of my other blog posts and publications.

Research has the greatest chance of success when the objectives are clearly stated and that is where we begin. Use these five (5) straightforward steps.

1. State the key study objectives clearly at the beginning of the analysis plan (AP) and refer to them throughout the process.

2. Describe the major comparisons for the analysis (e.g., major cross tabulations for the study such as: Customers versus Non-customers, Companies by size, Customers that are Satisfied, Neutral, or Dissatisfied).

3. State how each question is used to answer a specific objective of the study either on its own or in combination with other data points. Think through how you expect to present the results from each question. What statistics, if any, will you use in the analysis? Identify the independent and dependent variables.

4. Write a clear justification for including the information from the question in the study and perform a section by section “So what” litmus test.

5. When the analysis plan is finished, go back and make sure each key study objective has been addressed.

These five steps are the basic approach to the AP template. While it is straightforward it is not a trivial task. The key is to focus on objectives and think critically about how to execute on the primary goal of the study.

For a more detailed description of how to develop an Analysis Plan see Analysis Plans Made Easier, which is on the www.AtHeath.com Resource tab (scroll about halfway down the page).

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Here are five ideas for leveraging LinkedIn

This is not rocket science, but if you put these ideas into practice, you will see results.

# 1- LinkedIn is a network and a database. The network is structured primarily around profiles and group memberships and the information is stored in a database. Once you realize this, you can approach LI with an eye toward understanding how to leverage the vast resources it offers.

For example, if you have a solution (product or service) that can help CPG companies where else can you search for professionals in this industry, connect with them, discuss CPG related issues in discussion groups such as the CPG Supergroup! and find potential new hires? Don’t stop there. Ask questions through group discussions, use the Poll feature, and message your contacts fifty (50) at a time.
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Situation
Recently a unique business specializing in helping companies develop communities and networks asked if we could help them improve the value and performance of a Twitter account they started more than 2 years ago. While they wanted help, the business owner was skeptical about Twitter. True they had a sizable number of followers [approx 4,000], but they attributed that to the success of their blog, which was syndicated and had over 30,000 readers.

We discussed options and suggested starting slow to give the owner time to become comfortable with our approach. It was clear that the Twitter account had benefited from the blog. However, the more typical path is for a blog to benefit from a Twitter account, that is, followers are introduced to the blog, rather than the other way around. With that in mind, we began our campaign to grow the number of targeted Twitter followers. We went about the work of providing useful and interesting tweets, some of which pointed followers to the blog where a much richer library of information was available.
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We typically think of social media sites such as LinkedIn as places for networking and sharing ideas, which is certainly their primary function. Over time, however, sites like LinkedIn (and to varying degrees other networking sites) have developed an enormous global reach. The sheer size of LinkedIn’s membership has resulted in the creation of groups on nearly every topic imaginable and discussions within these groups touching on thousands and thousands of subjects.

This “user” created content has propelled networking sites and LinkedIn in particular into a realm, which transcends networking. A listening opportunity for market researchers has emerged and not just for passive listening. The opportunity to conduct active listening (a.k.a. market research studies) is possible. In fact, it is already a reality, available to anyone with the skill to extract the information.

Here are three ways to access marketing information from LinkedIn:

Discussion Groups

Discussion groups offer a wealth of content. While you may rush to start your own discussions to capture content, you might find that the information you seek is already out there. Finding the group(s) and discussions with the content you are looking for can take some time and skill. However, if you find relevant content much of the work has been done for you (assuming the topic generated a large number of comments). The trick now is to synthesize the information and pull out the themes, trends, and other pearls of wisdom.

Of course, you can start your own discussion threads within a group. The advantage is you can design the specific question or topic you want to explore. In addition, as the author of the discussion you have a little more latitude to steer the discussion, allowing you to simulate an asynchronous focus group.

Answers

LinkedIn has additional functionality such as “Answers” which allows a user to pose questions and offer them up to the LinkedIn membership (Go to the main menu click on More and select Answers). The person asking the question can grade the answers and select a “best answer.” This is the motivation for taking time to participate.

Again, you don’t necessarily need to ask a question to glean value from this function. You may find that someone, and in some cases a number of people, have already asked a question that is close enough to the question you want answered. Once again, all you have to do is synthesize the content. Well that is the hard part, but the data are often there awaiting your analysis.

Polls

The Poll function also offers a simple but potentially powerful mechanism for collecting data on an individual question. Used creatively Polls can provide market intelligence, albeit with a very limited scope. You can search existing Polls or write and launch your own. Either way there are answers to questions waiting to be discovered. For no cost or low cost you can reap a great deal of market intelligence from LinkedIn using Polls and other functions either individually or in combination with one another.

Conclusion

These and other avenues for exploring the marketplace, listening to your target audience, and performing both qualitative and quantitative market research are available to anyone who wishes to use them.

Need help with questionnaire design ? Go to http://questionnairedesign.tatepublishing.net/
 

Create Email Groups
Experience has shown that one highly effective method of communication is to create and use email groups (Reply to All lists). Include everyone involved in the project on the project communication email. This semi-automates the process of keeping team members informed of progress, decisions, and issues, allowing them to react accordingly. 

Even if you don’t think the information is relevant for them at the time, it probably will be. For instance, if a team member is responsible for writing cross tab (banner book) specs, he or she can begin this process as soon as he learns the questionnaire has been finalized. The email communication alerts him or her along with the team members responsible for working on the questionnaire design.

In addition, she or he may learn a few days later from the email chain that the client changed their mind on about one or more questions and revisions to the questionnaire are in progress.  The team members can act accordingly with the information communicated through this email or at least know to talk to the team member responsible for the questionnaire development. 

Pick up the Phone    
This may seem obvious, but too often, we can avoid unhappy situations if someone simply picks up the phone. It could be to check on changes to project priorities, clarify a specific task, address confusion about a deadline, or confirm someone’s vacation plans (which will have an impact on the project).

Whatever the means of communication, it is up to the project manager to keep track of the latest developments and communicate those developments with the appropriate team members and vendors. A good practice is to over communicate – just a little!

Research dissemination provides an audience with results through reports and presentations designed to help clients assimilate the information as quickly as possible. Graphical formats are emphasized over tabular data and an executive summary is nearly always provided. 

However, that is often not enough. Dissemination does not guarantee assimilation and is far removed from action.  Remember the purpose of market research is to solve a business problem or provide direction for business initiatives. Simply dropping off the report on the (internal or external) client’s desk does not fulfill that mission.

The research stakeholders will only gain value from the research if they use it and to use it they need to see its relevance to the decisions they make (hence, at a minimum, the need for an executive summary). 

The next question is how far should you go? Do you present only results? Should you make inferences and provide implications from the research? What about providing conclusions?

Finally, should you be so bold as to make recommendations? Are the data compelling enough and do you know the business of the executives’ you are presenting to well enough to recommend what the company should do?

These are judgment calls you’ll be faced with, but the one sure thing is you will be better armed to bring insights to your client (whether external or internal) if you implement ideas and lessons discussed throughout this blog. Moreover, you can increase your knowledge by using AtHeath’s Resource Center content and the services offered.  www.atheath.com

Written in Collaboration with Andrea Lacroix

In real estate, there are three important considerations location, location and location! Project management also has three important considerations they are: communication, communication, and communication! 

Before we go further in our discussion of project management, let’s discuss communication. Communication with team members, vendors, and clients throughout the project is vital. Okay, you knew that – right!? 

The frequency and type of communication will change throughout the course of the project, but establishing consistent meeting times and consistent communication patterns will ensure that the client and team members are aware of the latest progress and issues as they occur.

Documentation is also critical.  So much happens on a project before it goes into the field changes are bound to happen and equally true the reasons and approvals can be forgotten – don’t let that happen. Create a clear and friendly paper trail.  You should, as a best practice, always follow-up meetings and phone conversations with an email.  Summarizing the conversations that took place as well as noting decisions, next steps, and approvals will all help to keep the project on track.

Written in Collaboration with Andrea Lacroix

Simply put, project management is the process of completing a project from beginning to end within a specified budget and timeline. Without proper planning significant details are easily overlooked and projects can get off track or worse; such as missed deadlines, budgets exceeded, and/or not meeting intended project goals. These are all possible outcomes of poor project management.

Good project management is the key to a successful project of any size, especially one that is complex or launched across numerous geographic regions. In addition, high quality project management will ultimately have a positive impact on the entire research organization.  By using good project management techniques and tools, an organization can track trends and costs, which will help to plan for proper resource allocations on future projects.

For organizations that handle a large number of projects at one time, the most efficient way to do this is with a packaged project management solution such as MS Project Manager or Fast Track9.  These and other software programs allow you to track the individual tasks involved in the project, the number of days to complete each task, resource allocations, and milestones that affect deliverables. 

Because these packages are typically server-based, they allow all who need project planning access to use the information to manage resources and client expectations. Project management software varies in features and functions. The best software package “fit” will also vary from company to company. 

Whether a project is conducted by an individual or by project teams the concepts of project management are the same. However, the use of structured project management becomes increasingly necessary as the size of a project and the team conducting it expands.

We will explore other aspects of project management in the future so stay tuned to this channel!