Perfect Crowd

Online research panels vs. social networks

There is a lot of discussion these days in the research community about incentives (points, money, coupons, possibility to see the results of surveys etc.) for respondents participating in online research panels. I think that the most interesting alternative would be the possibility for a respondent to take her incentives, quit her participation in an online research panel and join a social network instead.

The transition from an online research panel to a social network is similar to the transtion from a totalitarian society to a true democracy - this is how I see it, with my Eastern European mindset. Online research panel are built top down. Respondents are neatly segmented and kept in their cells to emerge only to do the tedious tasks of checking boxes in research questionnaires. Then they collect their wages and go back to their isolated cells. Misbehaving, dissident respondents are thrown out of the panel.

Social networks are built from the bottom up by individuals with faces and personalities. People aren’t paid to join social networks – they do it because they want to participate.

Facebook, one of the largest and most successful social networks, has recently launched their own polls, enabling anyone to do her own research. At the moment, the design of the research is very narrow: it is possible to create one closed-ended question per poll with a maximum of five answers. The site charges for the research depending on how quickly the results are provided and how large the sample size.

The polls maybe simplistic, but it’s only the beginning... I also think that the best research on Facebook in the future probably won’t be polling but rather research done with groups, those small communities built around common passions and interests. There is no charge for the researcher to join, participate and listen. However, one has to ask what a researcher could charge a client for such work.

Let’s consider two scenarios for the future. In the first, online research panels become more important in the future as they offer a two-fold incentive to respondents – more money and the means to participate and see the results of the surveys. In the second, online panels will gradually disappear to be replaced by social networks which will offer research as an added product to generate revenues, similar to the way that advertising is now added to social networks.

If I had to bet money on one of these scenarios, I'd put my money on the side of the social networks

I tried to do my own poll on Facebook  yesterday, asking the Russians on Facebook question about major religion in Russia in 2100.

This is the intro screen.  You can then type in your question plus 5 answers and pay for the survey:

Once you have paid (this poll cost me $11), your poll goes live and you can start checking the progress:

I have received the results (100 completes) in about 8 hours:

The Coast of Utopia

The Coast of Utopia is Tom Stoppard’s new trilogy about 19^th century Russia and its radicals: Bakunin, Belinsky, Herzen. Nina Raine has joined Stoppard for rehearsal of the trilogy in Moscow and has written an article for the Guardian. Nina Raine describes a scene that happened during the rehearsal:

Herzen, his wife Natalie and their friend George are discussing Marx:

H: But Marx is a bourgeois from the anus up.

N: Alexander! I won't have that word . . .

H: Sorry, middle class.

‘I don't understand when you're having fun and when you're being sincere,’ Stoppard interjects.

Ilya [the actor playing Herzen] is baffled: "Is it a joke?"

The Russians then explained to Stoppard that the joke doesn’t work because they until recently they didn’t use the phrase “middle class”. There are no spaces between the opulent palaces and the old, dilapidated factories on the banks of th Neva River in St. Petersburg. However, materialism is on the rise in Russia. The Russians (and the Czechs) have successfully distanced themselves from the communist propaganda in the past. They paid lip service to it only when needed: in public, at work - and then they laughed about it and its promises of happiness and future paradise, in the privacy of their homes. During communism people took refuge in jokes, alcohol and classic Russian literature.

The Russians also laughed later on when they saw, in the beginning of the 1990’, the first TV ads and the promises of happiness through shining hair, miraculous yoghurts and life-transforming fruit juices. And then they succumbed. It was stronger then them, their minds were invaded by shining hair and radiant skins. The image of artificial woman with applying anti-aging cream with an empty smile, strangled the subtle portrait of the lady with a dog. They have their Chekhovs and Tolstoys on the bookshelves but I bet that the jars with the anti-aging creams get opened hundred times more often than the books. (The bottles of vodka seem to get opened at the same rate through the centuries).   

Actor and director Sergei Kokovkin says, in the Guardian article, that something is missing in the Russian actors. “The spiritual fire has been blown out,” he says.

The spiritual fire burned through Russian literature. The literature and theatre have always been about passions and excesses – high and low, heaven and hell (sorry, middle-class).

Most of the Russian (and Eastern European) advertising has no fire or passion in it. It is boring and obvious. Unlike in the UK, there seems to be thick, dividing lines between the academic, artistic and the advertising/marketing communities in Eastern Europee. The advertising community alone is not willing or able to challenge their clients and create engaging, emotional and unique communication that would tap into the “Russian soul”.  Ads are being created mechanically, according to old formulas; divorced from the wider and deeper circle of culture (There are exceptions to this, obviously).

This is an example of a crude and obvious ad that exploits passions without creating any:

(via Russian marketing blog)

Lego and rules of cocreation

This video is a couple of years old but I think that the "do's and donts'" of cocreation are still spot on:

• Understand what is consumers' perception of value
• Interact frequently; be open and honest
• Sound like yourself and admit mistakes
• Encourage conversations amongst consumers
• Find your advocates and invite them inside
• Formalize what can be formalized
• Participate: you get what you give
• Inspire, don't manage your community
• Don't sell; show your passion and share passion
• It is ok to say "I don't know"

Mark William Hansen LEGO Co-Creation
Uploaded by henkjan

Facebook and virtual networks

I used to believe that development of smart and new research methodologies was the way forward for market research. Since then I have worked on number of projects that required real insight into people, their lives and the lives of the things that people buy. The key insights for these projects came from individual people: Greg Rowland provided insights into culture; understanding of the interaction between people and things came from Richard Seymour; great insights came from Daniel Dumoulin, who conducted qualitative research and Matt Hart helped us to transform the observations and insights into ideas for products and communication. Yes, some of these guys have their own agencies but the agency name is a secondary tag; their individual skills are the real added value.

This is the age of endless possibilities for creative individuals in research, marketing, design and increasingly in advertising. Instead of losing their identity inside faceless agency, the individual can use some of the social networking sites, such as Facebook, and create their own global network, their own virtual agency - across regions and across specializations. The network can come together on a basis of common interest – the given project - and the individuals can disperse after the project is finished and form another, different network when needed.

It is easy to apply these rules to consumers and establish a community/network of consumers around common interest using existing sites (Facebook or a blog) as platforms for discussion and co-creation; or one can just look for existing community that consumers have established themselves, and listen. It is about people, not about methodologies.