Voices: the CMB Blog

On April 1, 1984, Chadwick Martin Bailey was founded in Boston by Anne Bailey Berman and Dr. John Martin. What began 30 years ago on a day known for pranks, continues to thrive today as a Honomichl Top 50 market research and consulting firm.Staying true to our April Fools’ Day origins, we never take ourselves too seriously, despite our commitment to providing insights for confident, strategic, decision-making to a select group of the world’s leading brands.

While clients appreciate our rigorous approach to market science blended with our unique business decision focus and rock solid execution, it’s our genuine and collaborative approach to partnership that our clients tell us they value most. In fact, one of the greatest compliments we can receive is when clients tell us we're “fun to work with.”

Today we celebrate 30 years of helping our clients get the answers they need to grow, innovate, and stay ahead of the competition, and our co-founders who set us on the path toward success.

Thank you, Anne and John, fellow CMBers, and our fantastic clients!

Heather is VP of Client Services, she loves both a good April Fools' gag and birthday celebration!

Will big data destroy primary research? I’ve read dozens (hundreds?) of articles that argue both sides, but despite a lot of speculation, I see very little attention paid to what may be the real killer of a lot of primary research: the “need for speed.” The increasing velocity of business (compressed product development cycles, social media and the desire for real-time marketing) often means not having the 6-10 weeks a typical quantitative research project needs. For many, the availability of big data is seen as “good enough” given the time constraints. So big data may be an accomplice, but tightened timelines are what researchers really need to address.

It’s the research vendors who don’t specialize in more strategic research I see hit the hardest by this reality. Big data is already eating into their more basic projects—answering the “who,” “what,” and “where” questions. At least for now, clients are more comfortable with (or at least tolerant of) longer timeframes for the complex, strategic work that CMB focuses on. The good news for us and for our clients is that so many of those projects benefit greatly from primary and big data playing together. In our Segmentation work, for example, our modeling usually integrates third party data, our clients’ CRM data, and the need/preference/attitude-based data we get from primary research. The combination of these data sources nearly always results in a much more robust—and actionable—Segmentation for our clients. 

But the truth is we understand our clients are still looking for us to help them make decisions faster. Here are a few of the timesaving strategies we use to address this reality:

• For starters, we work with our clients to dig into the specifics of their timing needs. And for many projects, they don’t need a formal report to help inform their decisions—they just need to know the “answers” to guide their decisions. So we will hold “data parties” (they sound fun, don’t they? :)) where we all roll up our sleeves to review what the data is telling us and more quickly get to the answer together. We can then write up a focused summary before we put together the formal report.

• We’ve recently invested quite a bit of money in a technology solution that helps us move from questionnaire programming through to clean data (and even the inevitable PowerPoint slides) more quickly than we have in the past. This streamlined our processes and helps get us more quickly to those data parties.

• We also make sure we do a great job in delivering compelling and easy-to-understand deliverables that are “ready to use,” and don’t require lots of time for our clients to redo anything for their own internal use. 

So is the need for speed going to go away? Not a chance. Our clients face more and more pressure to get insights and results faster and we need to keep up. And although we’ll always keep looking for ways to leverage data and people to get our clients the insights they need, we’ll never do it at the cost of meaningful decision-focused insights.

Mark is a Vice President at CMB. He can't help but note that despite the between the increasingly fast speed of business he writes about and the increasingly slow speed with which he competes on the basketball and tennis courts. 

In Boston tomorrow? Join the women of CMB as we host a WIRe networking event at the Globe Bar & Café from 6 to 8pm. Register here.

Who says market research isn’t exciting? I’ve been a market researcher for the past sixteen years, and I’ve seen the industry change dramatically since the days when telephone questionnaires were the norm. I still remember my excitement when disk-by-mail became popular! But I don’t think I’ve ever felt as excited about market research as I do right now. The CASRO Digital Research Conference was last week, and the presentations confirmed what I already knew—big changes are happening in the market research world. Here are five key takeaways from the conference:

1. “Market research” is an antiquated term. It was even suggested that we change the name of our industry from market research to “insights.” In fact, the word “insights” came up multiple times throughout the conference by different presenters. This makes a lot of sense to me. Many people view market research as a process whereas insights are the end result we deliver to our clients. Speaking for CMB, partnering with our clients to provide critical insights is a much more accurate description of our mission and focus. We and our clients know percentages by themselves fail to tell the whole story, and can in fact lead to more confusion about which direction to take.

2. “Big data” means different things to different people. If you ask ten people to define big data you’ll probably get ten different answers. Some define it as omnipresent data that follows us wherever we go. Others define it as vast amounts of unstructured data, some of which might be useful and some not. Still others call it an outdated buzzword.  No matter what your own definition of big data is, the market research industry seems to be in somewhat of a quandary about what to do with it. Clients want it and researchers want to oblige, but do adequate tools currently exist to deliver meaningful big data? Where does the big data come from, who owns it, and how do you integrate it with traditional forms of data? These are all questions that have not been fully answered by the market research (or insights) industry. Regardless, tons of investment dollars are currently being pumped into big data infrastructure and tools. Big data is going to be, well, BIG.  However, there’s a long way to go before most will be able to use it to its potential.

3. Empathy is the hottest new research “tool.” Understanding others’ feelings, thoughts, and experiences allows us to understand the “why behind the what.”  Before you dismiss this as just a qualitative research thing, don’t be so sure.  While qualitative research is an effective tool for understanding the “why,” the lines are blurring between qualitative and quantitative research. Picking one over the other simply doesn’t seem wise in today’s world. Unlike with big data, tools do currently exist that allow us to empathize with people and tell a more complete story. When you look at a respondent, you shouldn’t only see a number, spreadsheet, or fancy graphic that shows cost is the most important factor when purchasing fabric softener. You should see the man who recently lost his wife to cancer and who is buying fabric softener solely based on cost because he has five years of medical bills. There is value in knowing the whole story. When you look at a person, you should see a person.

4. Synthesizers are increasingly important. I’m not talking about the synthesizers from Soft Cell’s version of “Tainted Love” or Van Halen’s “Jump.” The goal here is to once again tell a complete story and, in order to do this, multiple skillsets are required. Analytics have traditionally been the backbone of market research and will continue to play a major role in the future. However, with more and more information coming from multiple sources, synthesizers are also needed to pull all of it together in a meaningful way. In many cases, those who are good at analytics are not as good at synthesizing information, and vice versa. This may require a shift in the way market research companies staff for success in the future. 

5. Mobile devices are changing the way questionnaires are designed. A time will come when very few respondents are willing to take a questionnaire over twenty minutes long, and some are saying that day is coming within two years. The fact is, no matter how much mobile “optimization” you apply to your questionnaire, the time to take it on a smartphone is still going to be longer than on PCs and tablets. Forcing respondents to complete on a PC isn’t a good solution, especially since the already elusive sub 25 year old population spends more time on mobile devices than PCs. So what’s a researcher to do? The option of “chunking” long questionnaires into several modules is showing potential, but requires careful questionnaire design and a trusted sampling plan. This method isn’t a good fit for all studies where analysis dictates each respondent complete the entire questionnaire, and the number of overall respondents needed is likely to increase using this methodology. It also requires client buy-in. But it’s something that we at CMB believe is worth pursuing as we leverage mobile technologies.

Change is happening faster than ever. If you thought the transition from telephone to online research was fast—if you were even around back in the good old days when that happened—you’d better hold onto your seat! Information surrounds every consumer. The challenge for insights companies is not only to capture that information but to empathize, analyze, and synthesize it in order to tell a complete story. This requires multiple skillsets as well as the appropriate tools, and honestly the industry as a whole simply isn’t there yet. However, I strongly believe that those of us who are working feverishly to not just “deal” with change but to leverage it, and who are making progress with these rapidly changing technological advances, will be well equipped for success.

Jared is CMB’s Director of Field Services, and has been in market research industry for sixteen years. When he isn’t enjoying the exciting world of data collection, he can be found competing at barbecue contests as the pitmaster of the team Insane Swine BBQ

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Eight years is a long time to be in a relationship with someone. When you’ve been with the same person for that long, chances are you either put a ring on it, or throw in the towel. If you have a solid foundation, an even balance of give and take, and you genuinely enjoy each other’s company, how do you go about keeping that spark alive, rather than just going through the motions? The answer: you get creative and find ways to surprise and delight your partner. The same is true for tracking studies; if you have a strong partnership and you want it to last, you want to find ways to surprise and delight your client rather than letting your tracker go stale.  For the past eight years, CMB has been working with a global cruise line on their guest satisfaction study, delivering quarterly reports each year (that’s 32 reports in case you’re rusty with your times tables). I’ve had the pleasure of being a part of this team for nearly half that time, and I’ve learned a few things about adding that "special something" to keep things fresh in the relationship.  

One of the ways we keep our trackers fresh, compelling, and above all useful, is with “Special Chapters.”  For our cruise client we deliver these Special Chapters—mini-reports on hot topics, in addition to the typical brand tracking slides. We work with our client each quarter to decide on the topics of interest at that point in time, or we find new stories in the vast amount of data we have from our questionnaire. To make them truly "special," we have to get creative, so we look to other sources of data rather than just our single study to pull in what customers are saying on social media and review sites like cruisecritic.com, and we work with our client’s database team to append customer information to our data in order to run more in-depth analyses.

Here are a few other ways we help keep trackers fresh:

Provide a snapshot on a new product or service

• In the case of our cruise client, over the tenure of the study, two new ships were introduced in the fleet, so we created a chapter detailing each ship's performance during their inaugural years

Deep dive into a particular segment of customers

• Our cruise client, like many of our clients, is a global company, giving us the opportunity to look into differences between many types of customer groups, for example:

§  Country profile scorecards on guests from different regions

§  Customer journey maps on guests with different levels of experience with the brand

Compare pre- and post-data surrounding key company initiatives

• Based on recommendations we may have given in a previous quarter, our client makes necessary adjustments to improve guests’ experiences onboard, and we have the ability to compare pre- and post-data to determine whether these adjustments have improved their perceptions.

 …and that’s just to name a few.

Don’t let the monotony of a brand tracker make your relationship go stale. Get creative, surprise and delight, and you’ll be walking hand-in-hand into the future for many more years to come.

Caitlin Dailey is a Project Manager for the Retail/Travel/Entertainment/Finance/Healthcare/Insurance practice. Outside of work she is a company dancer with DanceWorks Boston.

In Orlando for the Loyalty Expo next week? Drop by our booth to talk about refreshing tired Brand Trackers, Segmentation, Customer Experience, New Product Development, or just to say hello!

I recently traveled to Sochi, Russia for the Winter Olympics (check this off the bucket list!) and after all the media attention focused on Sochi leading up to the games, I was interested to see firsthand if the games were going to be considered a success for Russia or not.Russia went into their Olympic bid with the mindset that they would be showcasing, and essentially re-branding, their image to the world (and turning Sochi into a top tourist destination in the process). Re-branding an entire country is no small feat (and in the west many would argue that Russia faces a particularly difficult battle) and the Olympic stage is indisputably the easiest way to gain national exposure and leverage a positive image.

• Pre-Olympics: Sochi got off to a bit of a rocky branding start in the media (with security and hotel/lodging concerns taking the spotlight away from the positive aspects of the games) and #SochiFail being the most prominent twitter tag in the weeks leading up to the event. Strolling through the Olympic Park a day before the Opening Ceremonies, many aspects were not yet set-up and ready to go (e.g., the souvenir store, sponsor houses, food stands). Nothing like last minute!

• Olympic Moment: After the Olympic Ring debacle during the opening ceremonies, Sochi brought its A game. The international media had little to complain about (besides the sunny weather!), as events went off without a hitch and portrayed Russia in a positive light.

• Post-Olympics: From purely a spectator’s point of view, the games for Russia were a success. The venues were state-of-the-art, Sochi provided wonderful scenery, volunteers were friendly and focus was centered on what mattered: the athletes and bringing the world together for these two weeks. Russia also achieved their ultimate branding goal as a nation: coming out on top of the medal count. But in an illustration of the limits of Olympic spirit, Russia’s current political actions may taint any positive goodwill they gained from Sochi.  

In the wake of the Games, will Sochi become the ultimate tourist destination that Russia hoped for, or will it suffer like other Olympic cities have in the past? Speaking to other spectators who had been to multiple Olympics, many expressed these were the best Olympic Games yet…but only time will tell if that positive experience was felt throughout the world (or if it never made it outside the ring of fans and athletes in Sochi). 

Jen is a Project Manager at CMB. She’ll never forget her Olympic experience and is now preparing herself for PyeongChang 2018.