Editor’s note: Merrill Dubrow is vice president, client development at Harris Interactive, Boston.

At the time of this writing in February, the country stands at the brink of war. The stock market has generally been in the dumps, bogged down by pre-war jitters and uncertainty. Businesses seem to be in two camps: they’re either standing pat and waiting to see if things pick up or they’re slashing costs and cutting jobs. To be sure, some industries are doing fine. Those whose companies aren’t tainted by financial scandal are quietly expanding, providing some welcome good news.

The research business certainly isn’t immune to all of these worries. To get a clearer picture of what the future may hold, I contacted eight experienced researchers by e-mail and posed a number of questions to them on topics such as the effects of emerging technology, the changing roles of various research methodologies, etc. A selection of their responses follows.

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Based on what I’ve been reading, they are predicting that with the tight economy, marketing dollars cannot be wasted. Marketers are going to have to make very smart decisions. This will fuel an even bigger reliance on research as a decision-making tool. (Good news for all of us!)

More and more companies are going to be doing their own side-by-side comparisons of telephone or personal data collection methodologies vs. Internet to determine whether or not they can take studies online. The excessive cost and long timelines to do some studies by telephone and/or in-person are creating this big push. If findings are consistent, companies will be moving more studies online.

Michelle Elster, vice president, Rabin Research, Chicago

The future will bring more scrutiny/layers of approval needed before dollars are spent. There will be more online research as Internet users become more reflective of the general population and sample of e-mail addresses becomes easier to obtain. There will be possibly more online custom panels and clients will continue to want everything faster and cheaper.

Sharyn Kail, senior group manager, TNSI, Paramus, N.J.

I think the biggest change over the next couple of years will be that Internet will replace RDD telephone as the “primary” data collection method. This will be driven as much by developments within the Internet data collection arena as by events in the RDD arena. The increasing refusal rates (50-60 percent ) and call screening/blocking technologies are making me ever more concerned about the validity of data we collect using RDD. I am rather surprised that there isn’t greater alarm voiced in the research community over this issue.

To my mind, the 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. I believe that adoption of Internet data collection methodology has been somewhat slow to date because we researchers tend to be a rather conservative lot - we would rather stick with a known devil than pick an unknown one. However, I am beginning to sense a growing acceptance of the legitimacy of data collected over the Internet. I think we may have already crossed the “acceptance” hump and that the risk/reward needle will swing in favor of Internet pretty soon, although it is hard to pinpoint the timeline. This phenomenon is akin to an economic recession: it can be verified only long after it has actually occurred. However, in order to become the standard bearers, respondent panels would need to be recruited and managed a bit more carefully than what is being done now. Having a panel of eight million out of which about five million never respond to a survey raises the same concerns as RDD. Perhaps we might move to more direct incentives - pay respondents for each survey (central location test model) rather than the sweepstakes/points model presently used.

Ravi Raina, director of client services, MMR, Atlanta

I guess the only thing I’d say is that it seems from my perspective that we’re facing a crisis of confidence. Clients have less confidence in traditional phone interviewing. They can’t imagine themselves responding to a survey call and so don’t believe that “normal” folks agree to respond. At the same time, clients look askance at online methods. Concerns about response rates in the online medium abound and, again, the solidity of the data is questioned. I think the next two years will be all about “research on research.” The industry needs to take a hard look at different methodologies and assess how “good” resulting data really are. When are data predictive of actual behavior? In what circumstances might conclusions be biased? When and under what conditions is nonresponse likely to skew findings? I think the only way to address clients’ concerns in this realm is with solid evidence.

Lynne Mobilio, partner, Lewis, Mobilio & Associates LLC, San Francisco

Across the board, and especially from the boardroom, there is recognition that informed decisions are better at creating success than those decisions from the gut. Decisions that use data from research can be superior. Notably, there are more instances of less concern with where the data comes from, as long as it is there when needed and didn’t really cost a hell of a lot. But that’s not always true. Here is an extreme prediction of where research is heading:

From my vantage point research in the future appears to be settling in two streams of activity. 1) Research that is tactical - answers are needed soon or yesterday, for immediate or short-term decisions. 2) Research that is strategic - decisions that have long-term effects or planning for years to come that have major corporate investments or major risks associated with them.

For strategic research, there is often an interest; in fact, it may have been initiated at the highest levels of management. Cost and time parameters of research can be correlated with the significance of the decision. Traditional research approaches in terms of methodology and execution will continue to play a strong part of this. Data collection methods will include historical approaches along with the Internet, but the method selected will be based on the appropriateness for the intended use of the study results. Insight, thoroughness, financial/investment impact, and soundness of decision-making support will be the criteria used to evaluate professional researchers who conduct strategic research.

For tactical research, the pressure will continue to provide data and/or insights fast and cheap with less emphasis on quality of research design and appropriateness for decisions and comprehensiveness. Indeed, wherever possible, buyers of research will be looking for Internet solutions that are simply sufficient. Less thought will be given to validity, reliability or thoroughness. More requests for proposals will be focused on timing and budget needs and less on deliverables related to corporate objectives. The reality is that decisions can be made this way, and those decisions won’t always be wrong. However, there will be less concern, much less time taken for an over-the-shoulder review of the relationship between the research, the decisions made and the outcomes. Speed, low cost and articulation of results will be the criteria used to evaluate professional researchers for tactical research.

Bottom line: There will be more dependence on fast-and-cheap research for tactical issues, while there is more investment for long-term strategic insight. Overall, there will be less research that was and is now in between the two.

Joan Treistman, senior vice president, Roper ASW, New York

I think from my perspective the MR industry seems to move very slowly when it comes to adopting technology and I think that for major research firms to maintain their market share they will need to move into the CRM and predictive analytics space. Become more solutions-oriented instead of project-oriented. The end-users like the P&Gs of the world want research suppliers to add value beyond providing survey results. For example, how can I use attitudinal and behavior data along with customer information to predict future events? That’s where I see the focus should be.

Also, 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 rates.

Mary Wang, eastern regional sales manager, SPSS MR, New York

I believe that we’ll see more partnering relationships for smaller firms like mine in the future. Marketing is difficult these days, taking much more effort than in the past to land good projects and new clients. Also, clients are less loyal; they’re shopping around for the least expensive supplier because of their own cost-cutting initiatives, and many are bringing functions in-house that were done on the outside in the past. Technology is making this easier for them. I have a client who recently purchased online survey software and is now doing his own online surveys. He would never have done this in the past.

So I’ve been looking for partnerships with firms that can land the clients because of their larger size and contacts. I sub-contract my services to them. For example, I’m working with two firms that are telemarketing/data collection services. They have clients that conduct surveys and then need someone to do the analysis and write a report. I also partner with a management consulting firm that offers my services as one of the many services that they have. I partnered with the Millard Group, a direct marketing list services firm. They want to offer marketing research services to their clients, and I do those projects for them. In some cases, I work anonymously or as an employee of my partnering firm, rather than as MindSearch. This way, the client believes that they are getting the research directly from the company they contracted with, oftentimes a company they would trust much more readily than someone they don’t know.

I know a few other small marketing research firms like myself who are also reaching out to establish partnerships with larger firms. So while I can’t say that this is a market trend, it seems to be one within my limited scope and experience. The advantage for larger firms who partner with small companies like me is that they have a pool of capable professionals out here that can provide the research that they need. I think it works to the advantage of everyone.

Julie Shaylor, president, MindSearch, Boston

I think the industry, with the use of technology and the Internet, has made some big changes and will continue to do so. Due to all the do-not-call lists and issues recently, I believe the industry is going to see an even greater decline in the traditional telephone surveys. Many research companies, even with the increase in online surveys, have not seen a large change in the amount of telephone surveys they conduct.

However, that is going to start to change in the next few years. Not only has the Internet opened up another means of gathering data but telemarketing calls have increased and consumers have increased their ability to screen calls through Caller ID, etc. Clients have seen quicker turnaround from the Internet and more and more people are accessing the Internet, making the pool to draw from that much larger. 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.

While traditional focus groups still seem to be the most preferred method of qualitative research many clients do see the need for online focus groups or the use of video streaming. Clients prefer to travel less and less these days and that may soon have an even larger impact on the industry. I also believe that the world events will help to change qualitative research in the next few years. Thus, depending upon what is to happen with wars and terrorism, it will greatly affect qualitative research in that clients and moderators will not be able to or want to travel.

I do believe the main thing that will keep shaping research will be our ever-changing and evolving technology. I do believe that we will probably even be conducting research via cell phones one day in the near future. Technology is changing so quickly, especially with cell phones, that it will only help to enhance the means by which to reach respondents quickly and efficiently.

I also believe the economy has and will continue to shape how research is conducted. I believe that clients will begin to really sharpen their focus in general and conduct research that is much more geared at satisfying consumer needs and the critical issues. Research costs may become more of an issue in upcoming years. Research methods may need to be less expensive.

- Stacey Hurwitz, president, Strategic Research Horizons, Needham, Mass.

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Now that you have read the thoughts of eight fellow researchers, let me add my own two cents.

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. Wouldn’t it be interesting if a client awarded a project of 500 completes and the data collection company used the mall, phone and Web to complete the quota?

My hope is that clients will not be as price-sensitive as they are today. Recently, I have had two clients mention that even though our quality and service might be better, they needed to award the project to the lowest cost vendor.

None of us has all the answers but I hope you enjoyed reading other researchers’ viewpoints.