The Landmark Blog

Adventures in Grunge and Social Media Market Research

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Frequent readers of this blog have probably picked up that I enjoy a good adventure.  I like to travel, see new things, and enjoy hearing and telling a good story based on real-world experiences.  I also enjoy watching...people watching, watching things evolve, watching the world grow and change, watching "things" develop and contract, and watch how people react to changes to their environment.  I'm a sociologist at heart.  The most vivid memories I have typically revolve around where I was when...some major social event...occurred.

I was in my early 20's when rock music changed dramatically.  I was able to experience a music evolution that turned into a music revolution of sorts.  What I'm talking about is the revolution from New Wave, Punk, Ballad Rock, and Hair Bands of the '80's to the Grunge movement of the '90's.  I know exactly where I was at the time and bought into to it with every ounce of energy I had.  I grew up in a household with little money for designer jeans, preppy clothes, and high end labels.  The grunge movement was aimed straight at me.  Every thrift shop in every city had trashed jeans, hammered t-shirts, flannels, and destroyed work boots.  A new pair of Converse All-Stars cost less than $30.  Starting with Nirvana, and moving along to bands like Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam, Temple of the Dog, and Stone Temple Pilots the music reflected who I was and where I was in life.

On September 17, 1990 two of my buddies and I decided to hitchhike from Idaho Falls, ID to Salt Lake City, UT (about 225 miles) to see Soundgarden and Alice in Chains in concert at a small venue in the downtown Salt Lake area.  We actually had the chance to see these two bands in concert before they started playing big stadiums and got fairly famous.  At the time, I'm not sure exactly what we were thinking.  We were looking for a story and an adventure, what we got was a bit of a scare.

Three long-haired guys, in beat up clothes, standing out on the freeway with our thumbs up were kind of a risk to the passing family in the minivan.  After some time standing on the side of the road with no luck, we tracked down some cardboard and a marker, and wrote a big sign that said "WE'RE NICE GUYS!"  The creativity did the trick.  A big, gruff, grizzly-looking guy in a humongous beat up truck stopped and told us to "hop on in".  After a mile or two, of driving, he turned to us and said "See that on the dash."  We looked and he had a handgun on his side of the truck, right in front of where he was sitting.  He said, "I once picked up a hitchhiker who pulled a knife on me.  You don't have any knives do ya?"  We told him that we didn't.  He said, "Don't make any funny moves or try anything.  Ever since that guy pulled the knife on me, I've carried around this gun.  I'm not afraid to use it and I'll shoot you if you try anything."  We hadn't intended to "try anything" to begin with, but were effectively scared enough to say very little (certainly nothing funny), and felt lucky to get out of the truck without any further incident.  The hitchhike home was much easier...riding in the back of a college student's truck who was headed past our city to his school.  The concert was awesome, loud, and the experience...the adventure...definitely one to remember.

I believe that in the market research industry, we are sitting on an evolution of sorts that could turn into a revolution (if it hasn't already).  New methods of market research are emerging and evolving in ways that would have been very difficult to predict five to ten years ago.  Emerging and growing technology like mobile devices, increased internet penetration, and social media, are improving the ability for consumers to be heard in less intrusive ways.  I'll write more about mobile research in the coming weeks, but would like to turn some attention to some things I've learned from some of "Rockers" of social media market research over the past couple of months.  "Rockers" like Annie Pettit (@lovestats) from Conversition Strategies, Ray Poynter (@RayPoynter) from The Future Place, Jim Longo (@LongoMR) from Itracks, and Ben Smithee (@SpychResearch) from Spych Market Analytics who have done recent MRA presentations and webinars on this subject.

Some time ago, I wrote an article for this blog titled "Social Media Market Research Methods are REALLY Unevolved."  It's funny, and probably indicative of how fast this is evolving, because at the time (April 22, 2010), I really felt like they were.  Now I think I'd have to change that statement somewhat to  "Social Media Market Research PLATFORMS are REALLY Unevolved." Allow me to clarify the difference. 

The "Rockers" of social media research, have really opened the doors and spent a lot of time developing social media research methods and establishing best practices over the past (year?).  They continue to develop ever strengthening methods for this work.  And, their documentation, best practices, and methodological considerations are starting to look more like those in other parts of the market research industry. What doesn't seem to be evolving as quickly are the platform capabilities to conduct this research on behalf of YOUR clients.  Don't get me wrong, companies like Radian6, Scout Labs, and even the companies that these "Rockers" are associated with have developed sophisticated platforms that are very capable of meeting or exceeding the needs of THEIR client base.  What I'm referring to is a technical platform for the rest of us...If you look at other areas of our industry, affordable technology solutions have been created for conducting just about any type of market research, online surveys, telephone surveys, online focus groups, focus group video streaming, diaries, panel management, MROCs, data dashboards, the list goes on.  These technology research solutions are customizable, skinnable, and brandable to the researcher that is providing the service and doesn't rely on the end user of the research to "do it (her)himself."  It allows "the rest of us" to provide the services without having to spend significant resource developing the technology platform for our companies.  The question is, where does this exist for social media research...what about the rest of us?  I've spent significant time looking for a platform much like my other software solutions.  Maybe I'm just slow (which could be true), but I can't seem to identify a platform for social media research that would allow the "rest of us" to provide this service to our clients without getting a third party (researcher - not software provider) involved.

That said, the "Rockers" of social media research, have provided some very useful information over the past few months at conferences and webinars.  The upcoming MRA First Outlook Conference even has a full day of training related to the subject.  Here are some things I've learned about social media market research over the past few months that are worth passing along:

• Social media research is NOT using social media to recruit respondents to focus groups, surveys, or other research methods.
• Social media research has its own set of defined rules, methods, and best practices.  It's not just "looking stuff up".  The market research industry is currently in process of documenting these methods and best practices through IMRO.  Contact @LongoMR to contribute or to get suggestions.
• Social media research is scientific and has both quantitative and qualitative methods associated with it.  Producing responses that can be statistically analyzed is possible, while at the same time, approaching the data qualitatively, doing sentiment & content analysis, following historical qualitative philosophy can also be accommodated.
• Like any market research program, in social media research, it's important to sample.  Know who your target audience is, and know where and how to find them, and how to get an accurate statistical representation.
• In social media research, there are limitations in the ability to identify demographic and geographic characteristics and in some cases, find the answer to very specific questions.  These are the "risks" of social media research, the gun on the dashboard as it were.
• The ethics of social media research are a big consideration.  Though consumers are posting their opinions in a public sphere, do they really want to be heard by researchers?  What are the "funny moves" that researchers can do that would lead to the use of the gun on the dashboard?
• Gathering social media research is easier and more available than you'd think.  And, the amount of information and attention that's being paid to social media comments (listening) is growing very quickly.
• An N=1 is more important than ever before.  Through the use of social media, individual customers have a voice, they influence others, and their individual voices are LOUD...just like the Grunge music movement of the '90's.