This month marks 24 years since Ask for Research opened its doors.
Since 2002, the way we communicate, gather information, speak to customers and share findings has changed considerably.
Back then, fax machines still sat in the corner of offices. Reports were printed, manually punched, spiral bound and sent through the post. Connecting to the internet involved a dial-up modem, a telephone line and a strange combination of screeching, buzzing and hopeful waiting.
Today, reports can be sent anywhere in seconds. Target audiences can be reached online. Vast quantities of information can be accessed without leaving a desk. Artificial intelligence can search, collate and summarise material at a speed that would once have seemed firmly within the realms of science fiction.
But has market research itself fundamentally changed?
In many ways, the answer is no.
The questions businesses need to answer remain familiar
The focus of market research has always been to help an organisation move forward based on the experiences, views and behaviours of the people who matter.
Businesses still need to understand how customers became aware of them, what motivated them to make contact, how easy they found the process and what encouraged them to buy.
They still want to know what customers value, what frustrates them, whether they are satisfied, whether they will return and whether they would recommend the organisation to somebody else.
They still need to understand competitors, changes within their industry, the external operating environment and the expectations of the market.
The questions remain broadly familiar. What has changed is the world in which those questions are being asked.
Products have changed. Delivery models have changed. Communication channels have multiplied. Customer expectations have increased. A buying journey that may once have involved a telephone call and a printed brochure can now span websites, search engines, social media, review platforms, email, online meetings and automated systems.
Market research has had to keep pace with that change.
The internet transformed access
In my view, the internet has been the single biggest technological development affecting market research.
It has transformed both primary and secondary research.
Primary research involves gathering information directly from the people or organisations being studied. Online communication has made it possible to reach audiences across wider geographical areas, gather responses more quickly and offer people more ways to participate.
Secondary research involves using information that already exists. The internet has opened access to company information, industry reports, competitor activity, published data, customer conversations and wider market intelligence.
More recently, artificial intelligence has created another significant shift. It can help identify, organise and summarise existing information, making secondary research faster and more accessible.
But faster access does not remove the need for professional judgement.
Information found online may be outdated, incomplete, biased, irrelevant or taken out of context. A summary may appear convincing while overlooking an important limitation in the original source.
The internet has made information easier to find. It has not made every piece of information equally valuable.
More information does not automatically create better intelligence
There is now an enormous volume of information available to organisations.
That can be extremely useful, but it can also create problems.
It is tempting to gather information simply because it is available. A business might collect website data, customer comments, survey responses, competitor activity and industry statistics without first deciding what decision the information needs to support.
The result can be a large quantity of material but very little clarity.
Information should not automatically be treated as intelligence.
Information is what has been collected. Insight comes from understanding what that information means. Intelligence is created when the findings are considered in context and used to support a decision.
This is why a clear research objective remains essential.
Before gathering any information, an organisation should be able to answer a straightforward question:
Why do we need to know this?
A precise objective influences every part of the research. It determines who should be involved, what should be asked, how the information should be gathered and how the findings should be analysed.
Without that objective, research can easily become an interesting collection of facts that does not help the organisation decide what to do next.
Technology has not solved the challenge of engagement
One of the hardest elements of primary research continues to be engaging the target audience.
Research relies on people being willing to give their time, share their experiences and provide honest views.
That goodwill should never be taken for granted.
People are now asked for feedback almost constantly. They may receive a request to rate a delivery, review a purchase, score a service, complete a survey or comment on an interaction several times during an ordinary week.
At the same time, there are greater demands on people’s attention. Work, family responsibilities, messages, notifications and social media all compete for the same limited amount of time.
There may also be greater caution around sharing information. People are increasingly aware that organisations collect data through websites, cookies, apps, transactions and online behaviour. Some may be wary of providing yet more information to an organisation they do not know.
This makes thoughtful engagement more important, not less.
Questionnaires need to be relevant. Interviews need to respect the respondent’s time. People need to understand why their views are being requested and, where possible, what difference their contribution may make.
Technology can distribute a survey. It cannot force somebody to care enough to complete it properly.
The human side of research still matters
Some of the greatest skills in market research are human ones.
A skilled interviewer can approach a stranger, create rapport, explain the purpose of the research and encourage a thoughtful response without influencing the answer.
A researcher can recognise when a finding needs further exploration.
Quantitative research may reveal an unexpected pattern, but qualitative research can then help uncover the reasons behind it.
Numbers may show what is happening. Conversations can help explain why.
Professional analysis also means understanding limitations, recognising context and avoiding claims that the findings cannot support.
Technology can process information, identify themes and produce summaries. It cannot automatically understand every organisation, customer group, commercial pressure or research objective.
Twenty-four years on, the fundamentals remain
The tools have changed dramatically since Ask for Research began in 2002.
I do not miss manually feeding pages into a fax machine. Nor do I have any desire to renew my difficult relationship with the spiral binding machine still standing at the back of a cupboard.
I am grateful for email, online communication, digital data collection and immediate access to information.
But the principles of good research remain reassuringly consistent.
Start with a clear objective.
Ask relevant questions.
Engage the right people.
Treat their time and information with respect.
Analyse findings carefully.
Connect the evidence back to the decision that needs to be made.
Technology has transformed how research is delivered. It has not replaced the need for curiosity, judgement, experience and human connection.
After all, nobody has yet had a coffee and a good laugh about the weekend with their computer.
