One of the most dreaded tasks for a market researcher is the prospect of having to break bad news to a client and their invested stakeholders. For a good researcher, this goes along with the territory.
There has been plenty of talk over the years about how the millennial generation is different from the rest and why it's important for companies, politicians - everyone to care about them. We partnered with The Agency to create a unique research community
By Bob Relihan, Senior Vice President
Leonard Murphy has just posted a preview of the latest GRIT Study. In it he identifies the top emerging trends in Marketing Research. The top five are:
1. Online Communities
2. Mobile Surveys
3. Social Media Analytics
4. Text Analytics
5. Big Data Analytics
What, exactly, is a "sample panel," and what will one look like tomorrow?
The holiday season has become a benchmark for the forward progress of online and mobile shopping activity. Pew has reported that 58% of cellphone owners used their phones in a store to get information to guide their shopping.
Walt Dickie had done a very nice job of knitting together the trends in the adoption of various electronic devices. Certainly PCs are flattening out and will eventually decline. And, I agree there will be a time when virtually every cell phone is a SmartPhone. Walt also plots a curve that predicts exponential growth in the tablet/e-reader market, but backs off from the implications. "I've gone with a growth curve that can't be right in the long term - it has to flatten out - but might be okay in the short term."
I am not so sure.
I love the Pew Research Center, especially their Internet & American Life Project. I can always find something interesting to think about on their website, and I admire their invariably solid methods. We use Pew data to make strategic decisions, but we also go to Pew for inspiration when imagining future scenarios.
The torrent of shopping data from Black Friday and Cyber Monday is coming in. Although their names suggest a first person shooter game involving Robocop in some futuristic battle, these two days are the now-traditional kickoff to the U.S. Christmas shopping orgy, and a clarion call to the armies of the commentariat and blogosphere.
And, once again, in what appears to be as much a part of the new American Christmas tradition as the shopping experience itself, the big headlines are all about the massive growth of online shopping.
