Internet Ethics And Best Practices In The Online Research Industry

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Internet Ethics And Best Practices In The Online
Research Industry

• Presented to
• May 9th, 2003

New York/Northeast and Philadelphia Chapters
IMRO / KL Communications
2
Online Research in the U.S. Lessons Learned
1995 to 2003
IMRO / KL Communications
3
US Internet Usage

• DATE - April 2002
• NUMBER - 165.75 million
• POP - 59.1
• SOURCE - NielsenNetRatings

Internet usage doubled in just three years March
1999 / 83 million / 30.7 - Millward Brown
IntelliQuest
4
Evolution of Web-based Surveying

• The research industry in the U.S. began actively
  working with Web-based surveying around 1995
• In the early years, online research was met with
  skepticism from academic, business and
  traditional research agencies
• Key Concerns
• Web penetration was too low to be
  representative and projectable
• Identity of online participants was difficult to
  verify
• Significant minority communities of the
  population were not online
• Ethnic Groups
• Low Income
• Low Education
• Fear of changing from traditional methods

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Benefits Now Outweighing Concerns

• Over time, many of the issues causing concern
  have been either corrected or determined to be
  less important
• Numerous studies have shown that Web-based
  surveys (when done with similar demographic
  groups) yield virtually the same results as
  traditional methods
• Other benefits have superceded procedural
  concerns
• Cost
• Speed
• Cooperation Rates (gt45)
• Quality of Data
• At the same time, the response rates to
  traditional requests have fallen sharply
• Random telephone response rates (lt12)
• Cooperation rates (lt40)

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Model of U.S. Adoption of Web Research
Many U.S. companies projecting more than 60 of
research to be switched from traditional
to online
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U.S. Online Populations

• U.S. Online Populations are beginning to match
  broader population statistics
• Consumer Demographics Similar
• Gender
• Race/Origin
• Age Groups (lt50)
• Geographic Dispersion
• Household Type
• Business Firmographics Similar
• 86 Web penetration
• Equal distribution across major SIC categories
• E-mail/Web preferred method of communication by
  Business Decision Makers

Recommendation http//www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/d
n/index.html
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Growth in U.S. Web Research Revenue

• Web-based research is expected to grow at an
  average of 30 per annum over the next two years
  to 45 of U.S. research revenue in 2005

Source Inside Research, March 2002
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Online Research Economics
lt4 Hours
Productivity enhancementsdrive down costs and
time-to-field.
32/hour
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Online Research Economics

• Most traditional research costs are
• driven by marginal, variable costs
• Interviewers
• Online research costs are mostly fixed,
• up-front charges with low variable costs

For larger sample sizes,Web can be half the
costof phone.
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Online Research Industry Profile
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Some of The Major Players

• Greenfield Online
• Current panel of 1.2 members plus access to the
  MSN database of 65 million subscribers
• Harris Online
• Multimillion members and growing, our online
  market research panel is one of the largest in
  the world. Features custom offshoots.
• NFO Interactive
• The largest representative panel of online
  households in the U.S.
• Knowledge Networks
• The only Web-enabled panel founded on the science
  of probability sampling. Employs WebTV to build
  its random database

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Some of The Major Players

• LOW COST ALTERNATIVES
• Market Tools / Zoomerang
• Need a robust survey and panel system? Learn how
  zTelligence can work for you or your company
• Insight Express (An NFO Offshoot)
• The world's leading provider of fully automated
  market research

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Online Qualitative/Not Catching On

• The online qualitative market is small and not
  gaining
• Only 3 of all qualitative is online
• 1st generation online groups (glorified chat
  rooms) havent caught on
• 2nd generation online options
• Bulletin Boards (e.g. www.qualtalk.com) have
  received favorable buzz
• Typically 3 to 5 day discussion
• Traditional moderators favor this option
• Audio / Visual enhanced (WebEx / Pixion) are a
  better mouse trap that hasnt made a dent in the
  market
• Considering resistance to travel nowadays, youd
  have to think online groups will eventually make
  inroads

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Negotiating Power Shifting to Buyers

• Prior to 2001, most of the research industry had
  not invested in the infrastructure required to
  execute sophisticated online surveys
• Currently, all of the top research agencies in
  the U.S. claim to have some form of Web
  interviewing technology
• The industry has now somewhat over-invested in
  Web capacity and some are using the Web as a
  loss leader in order to get more familiar,
  traditional business (particularly phone) for
  which they have heavy equipment and know-how
  investments
• Do it yourself (DIY) software is making deep
  inroads into companies targeting decision-makers,
  not researchers
• This tends to disintermediate professional
  research departments who traditionally use
  external resources ? effectively lowering demand
  somewhat
• More about the DIY issue later

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Online Ethics

• No Spamming Allowed

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Online Ethics

• Rights of Confidentiality
• By default and design, confidentiality shall be
  granted for all information collected from
  customers and individuals and will be used for
  the clearly stated and intended purposes only.
• All personal data will be secured against access
  by third parties and/or unauthorized individuals
  or organizations.
• Rights of Privacy
• The right of the individual to be free from
  unsolicited contact is duly recognized.
• By default and design, customers and individuals
  will have the right to opt out of the research
  process.

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Opt Out / Standard Language

• KL Communications is an independent market
  research firm conducting this study on behalf of
  a major publisher. This study is for market
  research purposes only. Your identity and
  answers will remain strictly confidential.
  Contest drawing is void where prohibited.
• If you do not wish to participate in future
  surveys, please respond to this e-mail with
  REMOVE in the subject line and we apologize for
  any inconvenience.

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Online Ethics

• IMRO members will abstain from the following
  types of surreptitious sampling and unsolicited
  or unethical recruitment techniques, known
  collectively as "spamming

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Online Ethics / Surreptitious Sampling

• Collection of respondent emails from Web sites,
  portals, Usenet or other bulletin board postings
  without specifically notifying individuals that
  they are being "recruited" for research purposes

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Online Ethics / Surreptitious Sampling

• The use of Spambots, Spiders, Sniffers or other
  "agents" that collect personal information
  without the respondents' explicit awareness

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Online Ethics / Surreptitious Sampling

• The purchase of bulk email addresses from sources
  that have not provided verifiable documentation
  that the individuals on the list have opted for
  contact for the purposes of research

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Online Ethics / Surreptitious Sampling

• The use of client customer lists that have been
  assembled without the express consent of the
  individual for future contact for the purposes of
  marketing research
• Last part of the above phrase was struck from
  IMRO Code of Ethics for being too restrictive
  (The Lonnie Amendment)

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Unsolicited/Unethical Recruitment (Spamming)

• Unsolicited e-mail recruitment of potential
  respondents
• Misleading or off-topic newsgroup postings
  designed to "trick" a potential respondent into
  participating in research
• Junk mail sent in bulk to recruit for studies or
  panels

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Unsolicited/Unethical Recruitment

• Scamming
• The practice of recruiting under false pretenses
  (e.g. recruitment for research that is in reality
  a sales or contribution solicitation pitch)
• Spoofing
• The practice of putting in a false or missing
  return e-mail address
• Chain or "buddy" letters
• Aimed at recruiting respondents' friends,
  relatives or colleagues for studies or panels.

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COPPA COMPLIANT

• IMRO members will at all times conform to the
  1998 Children's Online Privacy Protection Act
  (COPPA) and not collect personal data from
  children under the age of thirteen without the
  express approval of their parents or guardians.

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Best Practices

• The Evolution of online research
• Whats the buzz?

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Online Research BUZZ

• I think the biggest change over the next couple
  of years will be that Internet will replace RDD
  telephone as the primary data collection
  methodthe only long term solution is having
  high-quality respondent panels. And I feel that
  Internet is a more effective and cost efficient
  way to manage panels
• Ravi Raina, director of client services, MMR,
  Atlanta
• Clients have less confidence in traditional phone
  interviewing. They cant imagine themselves
  responding to a survey call and so dont believe
  that normal folks agree to respond. At the
  same time, clients look askance at online
  methods.
• Lynne Mobilio, partner, Lewis, Mobilio
  Associates
• Companies realize they need something to bridge
  all of the long used research methods together
• Deborah Yeh, senior product marketing manager,
  Vividence, Inc.

Source Quirks Marketing News
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Online Research BUZZ

• I think that the Internet is here to stay and
  that research will continue to grow in the area
  as the increase to broadband continues to grow.
  We will need to be creative in gaining
  respondents beyond sweepstakes in order to
  maintain response rate
• Mary Wang, eastern regional sales manager, SPSS
  MR
• As the Internet keeps getting larger and larger
  and people become that much harder to reach via
  the phone, I believe that the Internet is going
  to become more of the norm in reaching
  respondents.
• Stacey Hurwitz, president, Strategic Business
  Horizons
• The Internet is definitely here to stay but I
  think a new technology will emerge, something
  like the handheld BlackBerry devices that have
  Internet access. This will result in many more
  mixed-methodology studies (mall, phone and web)
• Merrill Dubrow, vice president, client
  development, Harris Interactive

Source Quirks Marketing News
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DIY Online Research Epidemic
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Research Business Report

• DIY Online Research Epidemic
• Our tale is less horror and more slowly unfolding
  tragedywe have discovered 20 different
  organizations within our company have purchased
  various types of survey tools
• Research Director - Fortune 100 Durable Goods
  Company
• More than 95 of corporate side researchers
  admitted to varying degrees of DIY within their
  organizations
• Marc Dresner / executive editor, Research
  Business Report

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Online Research Industry Profile
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Achieving the Top Right Quadrant

• Need to commit continual resources to
  technological commitments
• Differentiate from low-end (DIY) alternatives
  through research expertise (e.g. Multivariate
  analysis)
• Offer clients a complete package of data
  collection options
• Not just online, not just phone
• Partner, as necessary

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Achieving the Top Right Quadrant

• Have to offer analytical techniques (e.g.
  Conjoint)
• Interestingly enough, this capability implies
  both research and technological expertise
• Either offer this in-house or use firms
  specializing in online analytical software
• SOFTWARE OPTIONS SPSS MR, Sawtooth Software
• VENDOR OPTIONS Critical Mix, Moskowitz

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Overall Research Concern

• Confront the declining response rate issue now
• Clients...cant imagine themselves responding to
  a survey call and so dont believe that normal
  folks agree to respond
• This is an industry wide issue, impacting all
  methods of offline online data collection
• Need to regain the publics trust
• Play up to our audience, not just a few minutes
  more when we know better

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Whats in Store for Market Research in the Future

• Data collection will increasingly come from
  pre-recruited communities / panels
• Service levels will rise to meet the demands of
  an interactive community
• Most interactive communities are actually managed
  databases
• Traditional panel companies will increasingly
  segment into specialty panels with exclusivity
  options

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Whats in Store for Market Research in the Future

• The definition of full service has changed
• No longer means qualitative quantitative
  capabilities
• Full Service now implies all facets of offline
  and online data collection combined with top tier
  analytical techniques report writing skills
• Firms viewed as primarily online or offline
  will be considered niche vendors
• Niche vendors will receive RFPs for tactical
  research but be shut out for the more
  prestigious strategic research partnering
  opportunities

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Whats in Store for Market Research in the Future

• A copy of this report will be posted on the KL
  Communications web site next week
• http//www.klcom.com/calendar.html
• Sign up for IMRO at
• http//www.imro.org/mem.asp
• Feel free to e-mail me with your thoughts
• Kevin Lonnie
• kl_at_klcom.com