Will your research have any real effect?

When it comes to your market research, is there a time when you believe that all of the hard work amassing all of that data will be worth it to your bottom line? On a larger scale, many companies of all sizes are calling upon market research companies to fill a gap in their intelligence gathering. How well trusted are these marketing data companies? In a search for answers, the Global Research Business Network published a survey which encompassed eight countries trying to determine how consumers see market research. The following are excerpts from their report:

• Out of the 11 different types of organizations surveyed, market research companies are ranked 6^th overall. Not bad, but not good. People have a similar level of trust in internet search engine (e.g. Google / Bing) providing companies and mobile phone operators.

• It is well documented from other research into the issue of trust, that we live in a low-trust world: Low trust in institutions, big business, experts… Our own survey shows, for example, that the level of trust in government across these countries is alarmingly low. Firstly, we see a low level of trust concerning how market research companies are collecting and using personal data. Market research companies collect a lot of data, of course, including a large amount of personal information, much of which we know from earlier research that people consider to be sensitive personal data. Somewhat alarmingly, we continue to find that many people (who are taking surveys) do not consider the use of their personal data as appropriate.

• Surveys are perceived to be too often too long. Data we have received from colleagues on the sample supplier side shows that the average length of the surveys people are asked to participate in continues to be over 20 minutes. We would argue that those people who aren’t regularly taking surveys, would be even more likely to find these 20 plus minutes surveys to be too long. Secondly, we are too often not giving people an enjoyable survey experience. From our earlier research into the online survey user experience, we found many factors contributing to the fact that we are giving people a poor user experience.

• Thirdly, a lack of design for mobile is causing a poor use experience to the increasing number of people who are taking surveys on their smartphone. People are used to getting great user experiences on their smartphones when they use other apps / access other websites, so they are no doubt even more frustrated and disappointed when they get a poor experience when trying to take a survey on their smartphone.

-Written by Kevin Sawyer