Dave King joined Confirmit through the September 2011 acquisition of Canadian-based Techneos Systems where he held the position of CEO. He leads Confirmit's mobile solutions division and is in the process of establishing a Canadian Centre of Excellence for the development of mobile solutions.
Mobile is a key element of research programmes today - but can’t just be a standalone solution
17th June 2013
Analysts at Wireless Intelligence estimate that the number of mobile connections worldwide is now nearly six billion, which is more than three times the rate of ownership of PCs.
The ability to connect anytime, anywhere empowers individuals and makes them feel ‘in charge’. It therefore makes sense that they associate their mobile phones with their day-to-day experiences, whether it be work, hobbies, social or shopping related.
Reaching respondents wherever they are via their mobile devices clearly represents a great advantage for organisations and research agencies. And the fact that mobile research has increasingly proven its capability to deliver higher response rates suggests that participants also think of it as a convenient way to provide their feedback.
However, many businesses trying to exploit the mobile channel are forgetting a key factor: mobile research is not meant to replace more traditional methodologies. On the contrary, it works best when integrated with other survey types, as part of a comprehensive research strategy.
While market research agencies and organisations need to embrace mobile technologies, they need to do so as part of their overall research programmes if they are to be successful in the long term. This applies at every stage of the research process, from survey planning and design, to reporting and analysis.
Mobile needs to be treated differently
With mobile, the respondent is in charge. With traditional techniques, survey designers control the ways in which respondents can complete surveys. Now however, web completion doesn’t just mean via a PC – it can be using a mobile phone or tablet, and using an app or browser-based survey. And the survey designer doesn’t control that.
It is the respondent who decides which device they use. A recent report by ComScore shows that almost 2 out of 3 European smartphone owners use their phone to send and receive emails. And research by Knotice suggests that 28 percent of all email is opened on a mobile device, either a phone or a tablet. These statistics show the rate that the mobile channel is being adopted for communication that was once restricted to the PC.
So, to get the greatest benefit from mobile, online surveys must automatically be rendered in user-friendly formats for all types of mobile device. Whether they are subsequently opened on a smartphone, a tablet or on a PC will not affect the quality of the respondent experience.
Mobile is ideal for experiential research
Studies show a noticeable difference between how people respond in the moment versus when asked to recall an experience after an event. The mobile channel is ideal for capturing the true experiential voice of the customer, so is particularly suited to shorter research questions.
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A major theme park used mobile to track the experience of park visitors, who were able to record the rides they visited and their overall impressions of the park. Business managers were able to use the data to make instant micro-adjustments to their service levels, making sure that rides were clean and in good condition. What’s more, executives were able to tap into the data to understand foot traffic patterns in the park, leading to better marketing, branding and kiosk placement.
This means two things at the survey design stage. Firstly, surveys designed for mobile use must be concise, simple to complete using touch-screen techniques, and, most importantly, provide a high quality user experience.
Secondly, respondent groups must be segmented so you can target them using the most appropriate channels. Mobile comes into its own with traditionally hard-to-reach demographic groups including the youth market, emerging markets such as China where mobile penetration is high, and time-poor business executives.
However, mobile may not work well for other groups, such as higher age ranges or low-income families. Comprehensive research programmes must therefore employ other channels that can capture the same sorts of information from different groups in the most appropriate and engaging ways.
Multi-channel is essential to engage ALL respondents
Integrating mobile research with other channels also helps to add context to your research programmes. By using mobile alongside web, telephone or email, for example, you can augment the results your programmes deliver. This is because mobile feedback can provide the immediacy and accuracy that other channels can’t, adding value to or enriching the sentiment you collect elsewhere. What’s more, the fact that mobile devices are able to capture sound, video and pictures adds a unique richness to the research data you collect.
Taking the multi-channel approach
One retailer has developed a comprehensive Voice of the Customer programme. They use traditional web surveys for 'bottom of receipt' customer satisfaction surveys; of course these are built to render nicely on any phone or tablet if the respondent chooses those devices over a PC. Text message feedback is used for follow up on new mobile phone activations, IVR is used at the end of call centre interactions, and Apps on tablets are used in store by employees for face to face interviews. It’s truly a holistic approach, and much of it would not be possible without various mobile channels.
Another mode gaining popularity is mobile hybrid studies, where customers use apps to document in-the-moment experiences, and then a web survey follows up with them an hour, day, week or month later, depending on what was indicated in the app-based survey. The melding of in-the-moment with outcome analysis provides powerful linkages to determine what experiences are driving desired behaviours.
We are already seeing this hybrid approach working in a number of areas. For quantitative research, we don’t need to look any further than the Ipsos ‘multi-screen’ methodology, of which Google has made high profile use recently in its attempts to understand mobile search activity.
At the moment, mobile is more frequently used as an add-on to traditional qualitative research. Some focus group participants, for example, are now being given ‘getting to know you’ exercises, where they document their lives or experience with a product category over the week leading up to the focus group. In other situations, group participants are also given an App to do some mission-based work after the group completes their session.
This is a great way to combat situational biases – i.e. the fear that focus groups are held in artificial environments, or that the voice of the introvert won’t be heard when there is a strong group dynamic.
And yes, the application of using a mobile App to augment learning is a very powerful approach. As a qualitative tool, it can provide insights that form the foundation for a quantitative study. The opposite is also true, where a selection of respondents from a big quant study will be recruited into a mobile follow-up component to dig deeper in to the motivations and drivers that emerge from a traditional quant exercise.
At the data collection stage of your programmes, then, consider mobile as just one of multiple channels you implement. Where mobile is used, it must be device-agnostic in order to drive engagement and increase survey completion, ensuring you can gather enough evidence to support the data you collect from all channels.
Integrated reporting gives a holistic view
Mobile feedback augments existing research programmes – adding richness to, but not replacing, other forms of feedback. To work most effectively, it must be analysed in the context of wider programmes, to build a clear picture of respondents’ experiences at every stage.
To obtain this picture, your reporting must cover all channels in a single view. You should be able to review results in real-time to gain an instant picture of responses, as well as being able to create comprehensive, detailed reports of all the data you gather over the span of the programme.
Mobile is not the only answer
The opportunities offered by mobile, with its rich data, immediacy and accuracy, suggest it can provide all the answers. It can’t. Your mobile research activities must be governed by the same framework as all of your research programmes. As well as reacting to the immediate tactical benefits of mobile, you still need to address the longer-term, strategic goals of your research. It is only by doing this that you can really assess where mobile will and won’t work for you.
Mobile feedback must be reported on in the same way, and together with the data you collect from other channels. More than this, however, you must also regularly review what you are trying to achieve with mobile, and refresh or adjust your goals as necessary.
Organisations implementing mobile need to be wary of sample bias, and understand the implications of differences in response based on the type of channel used. However, one of the main dangers that researchers can run into is to treat mobile as merely another data collection channel. This will result in limited success and poses a very real risk of frustrating respondents.
The experience of the research industry already shows that mobile is much more than simply a channel. It is a dynamic and unique way of engaging customers and respondents in the moment, on their terms. Businesses that succeed in integrating mobile within their end-to-end research programmes will be able to achieve a holistic view of respondents and derive a clear understanding of the action they need to take based on the insight they gain - from all channels.