••• advertising research
New MediaInsights
InsightExpress debuts new media accountability platform for audience measurement
Stamford, Conn., research company InsightExpress has launched MediaInsights, an approach for audience measurement and post-buy campaign validation designed to help advertisers and agencies audit media purchases, optimize in-market campaigns and inform future campaigns.
MediaInsights aims to provide a summary of key audience accountability indicators, such as total impressions, unduplicated reach and frequency, GRPs and targeting efficiency; a profile of demographics; and behavioral data, including Web site visitation information and inventory run through ad networks, trading desks and data management platforms.
www.insightexpress.com
••• facial coding
Adding face value
Ipsos adds facial profiling to understand in-store shopper behavior
Milton Keynes, U.K., research company Ipsos Retail Performance has launched Shopper Profile, a solution that uses facial profiling technology designed to help retailers understand the makeup and behavior of their customers. Shopper Profile combines sensors and software to analyze shoppers’ faces in-store and allow Ipsos Retail Performance to provide data to retailers.
Detailed, non-personal information is collected on how consumers respond to visual messaging, how they move through stores and how they engage with messages throughout their in-store experience. The technology highlights several different facts about individual consumers, including gender and age range, as well as providing information on what content was viewed and for how long.
Shopper Profile provides data that is immediately actionable. It can also be used for immediate staff call-to-action to help customers shop.
There are two main aspects of Shopper Profile: Audience Counter and Opportunities to See (OTS) Counter. The Audience Counter is designed to automatically identify the profile of a person from a digital image or a video frame and convert it into anonymous analytical data. Video sensors categorize and log facial patterns of shoppers who are looking at any specified item. Data is then captured and logged, including demographic details (age and gender), viewing-time duration, face position and distance.
The OTS Counter is designed to use sensors to log shoppers as they move through specific areas of a retail environment. By analyzing this data, retailers can learn more about shopper demographics, footfall and time patterns, as well as the consumers’ overall opportunity to see messaging.
No personal image or data is stored in systems and the anonymity of shoppers is assured.
www.ipsos-retailperformance.com
••• mobile research
Stay Relevant
Improved platform offers panel access and geo-targeting
Research Now, Plano, Texas, has released version 3.2 of its Research Now Mobile platform, featuring its Mobile Access Panel and Relevant Movement technology.
Mobile Access Panels aims to allow researchers to tap into Research Now’s mobile panel while continuing to program surveys on the platform of their choice. Mobile Access Panels also allows users to take advantage of native app capabilities and launch mechanisms like geo-location.
Clients can include everything from mobile-only to a mix of mobile and online sample and control the percentage of mobile respondents. Qualified panelists complete each survey through an integrated, in-app window linked to the client’s questionnaire – enabling researchers to gather data from a global network, in real time, in their preferred formats, on their own system.
Additionally, Research Now Mobile has added Relevant Movement technology to its location-based research functionality. Recent upgrades made to its innovative geo-fencing technology and in-the-moment survey capabilities are designed to allow clients to target and engage respondents immediately upon entrance and/or exit of a fenced location; minimize false positives to help ensure that surveys are sent only to those who have visited a fenced location long enough to qualify for a survey – and not to those who have simply broken the fence; enhance consumer follow-ups so that only those who respond within a specified time frame are qualified to complete a survey upon exiting a fenced location; and segment by single or repeat trips within the same fence to help ensure that respondents only receive one survey invitation within a set amount of time and not each time they trip that location’s fence.
www.researchnow.com
••• qualitative research
Media for chat
Chat software added to itracks’ online qual
Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, research company itracks has added itracks Chat to its portfolio of online qualitative offerings.
Itracks Chat aims to allow feature-rich research tools to be used during live discussions to maximize interaction. The platform is designed to capture immediate reactions to concepts, media and discussion goals from participants and preserve the focus of research on interaction by minimizing content administration. Participants can use markup tools to provide feedback on images or videos streamed directly to the software whiteboard area. Chat transcripts are available immediately.
Other expansions to the itracks research toolbox include single- or multiple-choice polling in the live environment. In addition, discussion-guide programming supports the option of uninfluenced questions where respondents must post their responses before viewing the responses of others.
www.itracks.com
••• brand research
Looking to steal?
App aims to identify brand growth opportunities
London research company TNS has launched an express version of its ConversionModel brand equity tool. ConversionModel Express is designed to allow businesses to quickly calculate exactly where they could steal market share by altering their marketing strategy.
ConversionModel Express, which TNS is launching in partnership with online market research platform ZappiStore, aims to enable brand owners to conduct rapid surveys of consumer behavior to gather topline insights on their growth opportunities. The app is available in the U.K., U.S., France, Germany, China, Australia and Canada, with other markets planned.
ConversionModel Express quantifies the gap between a brand’s equity and its market share to show the size of the opportunity the brand has to grow – or the share that is at risk. It also identifies which competitors pose the greatest threat or offer the biggest opportunity to gain market share.
www.zappistore.com
••• online communities
Is your community an IdeaHub?
Co-creation tool brings businesses and customers together for innovation
Vancouver, B.C., research company Vision Critical has released IdeaHub, a co-creation solution designed to capture, process and present meaningful consumer ideas to businesses looking to increase the pace of innovation and make customer-centric business decisions.
By using members of an existing insight community, market panel or internal online group, IdeaHub aims to enable organizations to generate new ideas from up to tens of thousands of customers, prospects and employees. Through IdeaHub, ideas are funneled down to the most actionable ones, reducing the time, effort and cost spent on concept creation for an organization.
The IdeaHub features a four-step process:
Generation. Existing communities of customers, employees or groups of interest are presented with an outline explaining the innovation challenge. From there, members generate and submit ideas via text, images, audio or video.
Evaluation. Ideas with potential are identified and sent back to the community to evaluate.
Refinement. Ideas with the highest IdeaHub index scores are presented in an online forum and the community is invited to comment and suggest improvements.
Selection. The revised ideas are presented to the community for reevaluation, rescoring and a final decision.
www.visioncritical.com/ideahub
••• concept testing
Profit from MarkUp
Dub debuts ad and concept testing tool for online qual
London research company Dub has released MarkUp, a concept testing tool designed to help researchers, designers and planners unearth emotional insight and improve ads and concepts. MarkUp is available as an add-on to IdeaStream, Dub’s online qualitative and insight community software.
To use MarkUp, clients can recruit their target audience. Then they can upload the stimulus (i.e., graphics, posters, ads, videos, etc.), program the questions they want to ask and select the style of response (including emoticons). Then, respondents weigh in via open-ended and/or emotive response and clients can review responses via heat maps and verbatims.
www.dubishere.com
••• survey software
Acuity4 gets V5
Voxco adds mobile and social to survey solution
Montreal research company Voxco has launched Acuity4 Survey V5, the latest version of its feedback management solution. The new version features intelligent rendering for mobile devices; mobile user statistics; integrated panel management; a user interface for end-to-end project delivery; new, advanced APIs for enterprise system integration; and the ability to send a survey via Twitter, Facebook and Web site pop-up.
www.acuity4survey.com
••• panel research
Beyond self-reporting
Tool targets panel members based on online behavior
Research Now, Plano, Texas, has launched Behaviorally Targeted Surveys, a solution designed to target members of Research Now’s U.S. research panel for surveys based on online behavior. Clients can target panel members based not only on what they say (self-reported survey data) but also on what they do online (Web site visitation data).
Over the past couple of years, Research Now has enhanced its profile information by passively collecting different types of behavioral data on a large proportion of its panel member base. Through collaboration with Experian Marketing Services, New York, Research Now has access to a regular data set that reports daily Web site visitation for members of its U.S. panel who have opted in to participate. The specific target sample can then be formed on the types and categories of Web site visits – defined by Experian Marketing Services – to gather survey insights.
Other information available on Research Now’s behaviorally-targeted survey respondents includes any top-level URL or customized set of URLs; Web site category levels; URLs visited for a group of segmented respondents; and delivery of a count and list of anonymous member IDs who have visited in the last 30 days. www.researchnow.com
••• customer experience
E-mail mining
Using e-mail data to identify and reengage loyal customers
Experian Marketing Services, a New York marketing information company, has introduced Email Insights, a retention-based e-mail solution designed to give marketers a more holistic view of their customers by linking traditionally-siloed databases and insights (e.g., in-store shoppers, loyalty program members and mobile app users) to their e-mail marketing list. Email Insights is compatible with any e-mail service provider (ESP), offering members access to a more comprehensive database of e-mail activity information.
The Email Insights model aims to allow marketers to gain insights about their e-mail subscriber database through access to a broader, privacy-protected database consortium to verify inactive and active subscribers. With this information, marketers can focus on reengaging these subscribers.
A key feature is the ability to append additional data in a privacy-protected platform for an omni-channel perspective of e-mail subscribers. Marketers can link online and offline purchasing patterns, e-mail response behavior (open activity and recency of engagement), category-level interests, demographics and attitudinal or life stage information to improve the relevance of product recommendations and upsell opportunities.
www.experian.com/emailinsights
••• television research
TV meets Twitter
Solution to measure TV-related Twitter activity
New York researcher The Nielsen Company has launched Nielsen Twitter TV Ratings, a measure of the total activity and reach of TV-related conversation on Twitter. Nielsen Twitter TV Ratings measures “authors” – the number of people tweeting about TV programs – and the “audience” of people who view those tweets.
Nielsen Twitter TV Ratings aims to enable TV networks to measure the full Twitter engagement surrounding their programs, to measure the effectiveness of Twitter TV-related audience engagement strategies and to better understand the relationship between Twitter and tune-in. Additionally, Nielsen Twitter TV Ratings assists agencies and advertisers in making data-driven media planning and buying decisions that incorporate the full impact of Twitter TV.
Built on the SocialGuide platform, Nielsen Twitter TV Ratings are available for TV programming across 215+ English-language U.S. broadcast and cable networks. Nielson is working with Twitter to measure and report Spanish-language networks.
www.nielsen.com
••• diy research
Video with VID-OE
Software puts video to use for online research
Toronto research software firm Q-FI Solutions has launched VID-OE, a DIY software tool designed to allow users to integrate Webcam videorecordings into Web surveys, Web sites and online communities. The solution can also be used to verify the identity of participants, obtain testimonials, conduct interviews and recruit and screen panelists and focus group participants. The tool’s reporting module provides access to the resulting videos and organizes the captured recordings.
www.qfisolutions.com
••• shopper insights
Follow the shoppers of mini-America
Free beta for analytics dashboard
InfoScout, a San Francisco research company, has launched the free public beta of InfoScout.co, an analytics dashboard designed to showcase consumer insights collected from 125,000+ panelists who represent a mini-America. Panelists use InfoScout’s smartphone apps Shoparoo and Receipt Hog to submit pictures of receipts from 40,000 shopping trips per day and answer trip-specific surveys about items they’ve purchased. InfoScout then converts the receipt images and survey responses into purchase data associated with products and retailers.
http://infoscout.co
••• qualitative research
Live interpretation on-demand
Tool helps manage global and multilingual online focus groups
InsideHeads, a St. John, Virgin Islands, research company, has partnered with New York human translation company VerbalizeIt to offer clients the opportunity to hear live audio interpretation of online chat-based discussions.
For as low as $2.50 per minute, InsideHeads offers backroom observers of online focus groups an audio line to hear a professional from VerbalizeIt interpret, word-for-word, as live participant chat scrolls on the screen. VerbalizeIt interpreters are available in nearly a dozen languages, including Arabic, French, German, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Portuguese, Spanish and more.
www.insideheads.com
••• mobile research
An app for TV analysis
Kantar debuts audience analysis app
London research company Kantar Media has rolled out the first in a suite of applications designed to allow broadcast audience data to be viewed on mobile devices. The mobile app version of InfoSys+, Kantar Media’s TV audience analysis software, aims to provide 24-hour access to TV-viewing analysis on the move.
The app provides overnight TV ratings information, as well as top-level historical analysis of specific program and channels for comparison. Predefined reports are also available, allowing users to demonstrate analysis trends whenever they require.
Additionally, Kantar Media has launched Kantar Media Audience Advisor, a syndicated television audience measurement service that aims to provide second-by-second data projectable to a national footprint of nearly 100 million households representing subscribers across multichannel program distributors.
www.kantarmedia.com
••• customer experience
Follow the Customer Journey
Mopinion launches online retail insights tool
Rotterdam, Netherlands, research software company Mopinion has launched its Online Customer Journeys Program, which aims to enable companies to capture, analyze and act on direct feedback from customer’s online activities.
The program is designed to analyze what information is searched for and highlight what is missing; monitor why customers may be leaving retail pages and flag any ordering or registration difficulties with the online channels; monitor the customer experience of online services to make them easier to optimize; integrate with existing self-service and event-driven tools such as FAQ pages, chat facilities, forums and contact forms to gather data; and assess behavioral data.
www.mopinionlabs.com
••• Briefly
Windsor Heights, Iowa, research company Quester has added social media listening to its language analytics capabilities. Quester linguists will analyze thousands of consumer verbatims and pair them with the fundamentals of social media listening, such as sentiment analysis, media influence and geographical location.
www.quester.com
Boston research company Millward Brown Digital has launched Conversion Tracker, a tool designed to allow marketers to see competitors’ on-site activity; identify and learn from best-in-class performers; isolate key issues impacting their own performance; and manage resources.
www.millwardbrown.com
Norrköping, Sweden, research software company Dapresy has made its Dapresy Pro research reporting solution mobile- and tablet-compatible. This latest release automatically detects when users are viewing reports on a mobile device and takes them to a mobile-optimized version of the Dapresy Pro reports page.
www.dapresy.com
New Orleans research company Federated Sample has optimized Fulcrum, its sample management and exchange platform, Fulcrum, to detect, route and render on almost any device, including desktop, tablet and mobile.
http://bit.ly/mobilerouting
Burbank, Calif., firm ThinkNow Research’s Hispanic Research Panel has been verified by San Francisco third-party validation company TrueSample.
www.thinknowresearch.com
Chicago research companies IRI and SPINS have partnered to create SPINS NaturaLink, a segmentation of the total U.S. population, focused on how shoppers think about, purchase and use natural/organic/eco-friendly products.
www.iriworldwide.com
Waban, Mass., research company Temkin Group has published a series of posts called 50 CX Tips: Simple Ideas, Powerful Results on its blog Customer Experience Matters. These tips are available for free download as an infographic and e-book, both called 50 CX Tips.
http://experiencematters.wordpress.com
Golf Datatech LLC, an Orlando, Fla., research company, has released the results of the second Serious Golfers and Modern Media Study. The study includes attitudes toward monthly and weekly print publications, network and cable golf television, Internet usage, digital golf weeklies, social networking and newspapers.
www.golfdatatech.com
Chapel Hill, N.C., research company Best Practices LLC has released its Consumer Marketing Research Innovation: Assessing New Tools, Technologies, and Approaches to Understand and Communicate with Consumers report, which presents data on three segments: pharmaceutical companies, non-pharmaceutical companies and the total benchmark class.
www.best-in-class.com
The CASRO Institute for Research Quality, Port Jefferson, N.Y., has awarded certification to Buenos Aires, Argentina, research company TNS Argentina for compliance to the ISO 20252 standard for market, opinion and social research. Processes outlined in ISO 20252 are designed to produce transparent, consistent, well-documented and error-free methods of conducting and managing research projects.
www.casro.org
Ipsos Healthcare, a London research company, has launched its syndicated Hyperlipidemia Therapy Monitor, the latest addition to its Global Therapy Monitor Portfolio.
www.ipsos.com
Research Now, Plano, Texas, has launched its Diabetes Panel, designed to offer access to over 336,000 profiled panelists in the U.S. and Canada who have been diagnosed with either type 1 diabetes, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure or obesity.
www.researchnow.com
Research Panel Asia Inc., Tokyo, has launched a panel in Taiwan.
www.researchpanelasia.com
Greenwich, Conn., research company Civicom has rolled out its Qualitative Text Analytics service for clients in the U.K. and Europe.
www.civi.com