••• new product research
Speed up concept tests with Idea Accelerator
Hours instead of weeks
San Francisco researcher Antedote has introduced the Idea Accelerator, an online qualitative research program that presents visual, written or video materials to participants on desktop, tablet or mobile devices. The platform tags the response data for analysis and adds heat maps for each individual idea or concept. A multiple-market concept study can be done in hours vs. weeks and months with traditional approaches. It is designed to: identify specific elements that are working and not working in a idea and concept and why; enable in-the-moment crafting of ideas and concepts with consumers; allow for immediate idea and concept testing and retesting; enable exploring and testing ideas and concepts in early development; and removes the “test, pass, fail and replace” model often used to craft concepts.
www.antedote.com/tag/idea-accelerator
••• text analytics
Program tests the quality of open-ends
Assigns scores from 0 to 100
Westport, Conn., technology firm Imperium has launched Real Answer, an automated program designed to ensure the authenticity and quality of open-ended survey responses. The program assigns a Real Answer score of 0 to 100, based on the quality of the response as it is evaluated against several critical factors, including having garbage words, profanity and sexist or racist terms, having responses that have been pasted from a respondent’s clipboard or are identical to previous answers or having responses robotically inserted.
••• media research
Starcom updates PACE Panel
Lets diary users add more detail
Chicago marketing and advertising firm Starcom MediaVest Group is updating its PACE Panel software, which provides media usage diary data, mobile usage data and custom research panel capabilities. The new features provide re-contact questionnaires and custom panels, allowing diary users to add detail or target particular groups for product development and concept testing. The panel is currently available in the U.K. and U.S. and will shortly roll out in Canada and Mexico. The company plans to add more than 15 additional markets by the end of the year, including Australia, India, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Ukraine and Poland.
••• usability research
Firms team to measure site visitor feedback
Qualtrics partners with Usability Sciences
Qualtrics, a Provo, Utah, research technology firm, and Usability Sciences, a Dallas research firm, are partnering to combine the Qualtrics Site Intercept product with Usability Sciences’ user research portfolio to help turn visitor feedback and behavior into actionable insights. Qualtrics customers who purchase Site Intercept and engage with Usability Sciences will receive a research engagement led by a Usability Sciences’ research specialist that includes: strategy sessions; survey design and implementation; design and delivery of interactive, storytelling dashboards that expose the causes of visit failure; and recommendations for improving the Web site experience.
••• restaurant research
What’s on the restaurant goer’s menu?
Service sketches patron profile
Technomic, a Chicago research firm, is now offering Consumer Narrative, a service that identifies key demographics of a restaurant chain’s typical patron, such as age, gender and average household income to uncover what that patron wants from the brand and from the restaurant’s segment as a whole, from how they compare the brand to the competition to which menu items they crave. It is based on more than 7.5 million consumer ratings per year compiled within the firm’s Consumer Brand Metrics tracking study. Consumer Narrative also reveals consumer attitudes towards a restaurant brand’s technology capabilities, including the integration of technology into the experience and the ability to pay for and order using mobile devices.
••• shopper insights
Vision Critical offers Retail Intelligence Suite
Measures loyalty, CX
Vision Critical, Vancouver, Canada, has introduced its Retail Intelligence Suite, a software platform which provides retailers with a dialogue with a secure, opt-in online community. Retailers can use the program to measure customer loyalty, improve customer experience and generate new ideas based on customer feedback. The Suite program is built on the Vision Critical customer intelligence platform. Users can: build member profiles for customers as they change over time; deploy regular customer engagement projects; leverage a customer intelligence library pre-programmed with activities designed to address common retail challenges; and share insight with stakeholders across the company.
••• customer experience
VoX marks the spot
J.D. Power service links CX and bottom line
Westlake Village, Calif., research firm J.D. Power has launched VoX (Voice of Experience), linking customer experiences and financial results to help companies spot trends in customer preferences, changing customer demographics and competitor responses. VoX displays interactive data for all levels of an organization, from executives to the frontline staff interacting with customers, to determine how to improve the customer experience and drive loyalty, advocacy, sales and service.
••• advertising research
Ace Metrix measures ad personality
What’s powering resonance?
Ace Metrix, Mountain View, Calif., has introduced the Ad Personality Profile, a framework designed to reveal which creative characteristics are most influential in powering ad resonance. Ad Personality Profiling provides a bridge to guide marketers from an ad’s holistic Ace Score to its relevant convergence points of viewer feedback. Combined, the Ace Score, Ad Personality Profile and an array of supportive data points can tell the story of each ad’s journey toward fulfilling the objectives of its creative brief.
••• cosmetics research
L’Oreal app lets users try on makeup
Results can be shared to social media
The L’Oreal Pariscosmetic firm has designed an augmented reality makeup mirror,Makeup Genius, which uses facial mapping technology to allow users to virtually try products. The platform, available as an Apple or Android app, turns the front-facing camera of a smartphone or tablet into a virtual mirror.Users can scan a L’Oreal product or advertisement to “try on” individual products or an entire look from a makeup artist and then share the result on Facebook. The app was developed with help from Santa Monica, Calif., Image Metrics, the Oscar-winning firm responsible for the visual effects of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. With some modifications, the app could well be useful in other product testings.
www.lorealparisusa.com/en/brands/makeup/makeup-genius-virtual-makeup-tool.aspx
••• retail research
Snap a pic of that for me, will you?
Visor app fields requests for on-site images
Want to see how the cereal is displayed in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles supermarkets? Compare checkout lines at Home Depot and Lowe’s? Visor, a New York technology company, has an app for that, allowing users to see what’s happening anywhere in the world. The process begins with a user making a request (“Take a picture of the garden center at Home Depot”) and putting it out via the Visor app. A message is sent to a Visor user near your selected Home Depot store, who opens the app and takes a picture. You are then notified that your request has been completed. Currently, all photos are free. The feedback may not be exact but could be used by marketers and researchers to check on brands or projects.
••• Briefly
Stamford, Conn., researcher FocusVision has released its Discussion Engine for its Revelation qualitative mobile and Web platform, designed to work with mobile diaries, bulletin boards and insight communities. It provides an activity engine which can post images, provide quick interactions and facilitate moderator communication with the participants.
Seattle insurance company ATG Risk Solutions is developing assessments of driving behavior, described as the equivalent of a FICO score for an individual driver, by utilizing data from state departments of transportations, self-insured fleets, collision data and other traffic services. The company has received about $1 million in seed funding.
Oslo, Norway-based research software firm Confirmit has invested in a dedicated SaaS site located in Sydney for its Horizons product, which enables clients to conduct surveys on various platforms and channel them into a single feedback tool. The dedicated site will provide faster delivery and more effective use of time-sensitive CATI interviews and mobile surveys. In addition, the site will address the need for in-country data storage in accordance with the Australian Privacy Act. Separately, Confirmit is partnering with Language Connect, a London translation specialist, to develop Connect Survey, which can translate surveys and feedback into multiple languages. The program has been used on a trial basis by a number of mutual customers, with early results showing a reduction in translation time of 90 percent. Also, Confirmit has introduced a CAPI interviewer based app for Android built on the Confirmit Horizons platform which will allow companies to create one survey and deploy it across multiple channels. The app supports all the question types of the Horizons platform including multimedia support and is available in 42 languages.
Port Washington, N.Y., researcher the NPD Group has launched a home automation advisory service which includes reports from consumer panels, POS data, qualitative reports and expert analysis. Home automation areas include centralized control of lighting or heating, appliances and locks on gates and doors.
San Francisco software firm GinzaMetrics has introduced an analytics product, the Social Intelligence Suite, designed to help marketers tie social media campaigns to overall revenue. The suite includes Marketing Channel Performance, Competitor Social Landscape, Content Insights and Social Engagement Analytics.
Sawtooth Software, Orem, Utah, has released its Discover platform, which designs, executes and analyzes choice-based conjoint studies. The software is browser-based and works on touch-screen mobile devices in addition to desktop and laptop computers.
Palo Alto, Calif.-based SurveyMonkey has launched a benchmarks tool which creates indexes by industry, location and company size by aggregating and anonymizing some of the company’s 3 million daily survey responses. It will let customers determine how they compare to peers and competitors by providing information on Web site feedback, customer satisfaction, employee engagement and customer loyalty.
www.surveymonkey.com/mp/benchmarks
Vivisum, a Durham, N.C., research firm, has launched Brand Builder, a platform combining qualitative and quantitative methods to provide strategic market insight for pharmaceutical brands. It includes a diagnostic tool that examines brand characteristics across five dimensions and then designs a customized plan for the brand development process through to post-launch.
Reston, Va., research company comScore has introduced its Mobile Metrix platform into Colombia to provide audience figures for smartphone and tablet users via both apps and browsers and across both iOS and Android mobile platforms.
New York research company Millward Brown has launched LinkNow for Digital, a tool which helps brands evaluate their digital advertising across multiple executions. LinkNow measures the performance of online video, display, Facebook and mobile creative in less than six hours, allowing marketers to determine the strongest edits for particular markets and how a final ad will perform in-market. The solution is available through Millward Brown partner ZappiStore.
Portland, Ore., firm Dialsmith has added features to its online survey and media dial testing software, Perception Analyzer Online, which enable researchers to conduct testing on iPads and other tablets as well as using the PA Online media testing interface.
www.dialsmith.com/products/perception-analyzer.html
People Pattern has launched its Audience Insight platform which allows users to attach unstructured data (public posts, tweets, blog comments) to structured data, such as customer or transactional data. The Insight data can then predict audience segments using demographics, interests and media behaviors.
Lightspeed GMI, a Warren, N.J., researcher, has introduced its Quick Turn Insights solution, which allows clients to include up to five digital media files and open-end questions in their surveys. The clients can reach pre-screened consumers for fast feedback, with turnaround time of 24 hours.
San Francisco technology firm Wizeline now offers a software product that provides information on the status and performance of products in each stage of their lifecycle. Enhancements to the platform include CRM integration and tools for managing product requests, releases and roadmaps.
NeoGrid, a Joinville, Brazil, software provider, is partnering with New York researcher Nielsen to introduce two products for the Latin American supply chain market. They are Supply Chain Insights, which provides information on products at the point of sale, and Supply Chain Benchmark, which allows manufacturers and retailers to compare their performance with the market averages of their industry.
New York social media technology firm Sprinklr has introduced Experience Cloud, an integrated platform to help brands deliver a consistent experience over all social channels and Web sites.
Germany-based GfK Group plans to expand its point-of-sale pet specialty data collection to Canada and create a point-of-sale panel to capture sales data nationwide for retailers and manufacturers. It currently has a similar data collection program in the U.S. of over 11,000 pet specialty outlets. Separately, GfK has released an enhanced version of its Spex Access platform which provides manufacturers with structured and unstructured A+ content to construct enhanced marketing and brand pages for consumers. Online shoppers will also have access to 57 million product reviews.
New York researcher Nielsen has renamed its digital measurement tool Nielsen Digital Ad Ratings. Formerly called Online Campaign Ratings, the tool provides information on a campaign’s audience across computers, tablets and smartphones. Nielsen has also enhanced the tool’s user interface, adding a dashboard with an overview of the client’s set of campaigns, alerts and status and exportable charts and graphs.
Atlanta telecommunications company Intelliverse has introduced Email Tracker, allowing e-mail marketers to track their campaigns. The tool provides information as to the time an e-mail is opened, the device used to open the message and the recipient’s location.
Appboy, a New York marketing software firm, has added a tool for retention data analysis. The software tracks both short- and long-term retention data, giving brands information as to how customers are using their mobile apps.
Verbatim-VR Ltd., Israel, has updated its voice recognition software to incorporate corrections of voice recognition errors into the knowledge base of the software. The ongoing updates will improve the accuracy of the voice recognition of every user.
In Manila, the Philippines, Tekibears Software Solutions has launched Winkbee, a social network app billed as welcoming everyone but “especially the LGBT community.” The flexibility of the app allows it to be used for interaction with friends, colleagues or family.
Netquest, a Barcelona, Spain, online data collection specialist, has launched NiceQuest, a mobile app that collects responses to online surveys as well as data on the online behavior of the respondents. Panel members can answer surveys, access incentives, manage personal data and share their geolocation, while researchers will be able to see their habits and consumption decisions.
SERMO, a New York medical social network site exclusively for physicians, has expanded to the U.K. It will add 38,000 U.K. physicians to the current network of 305,000 U.S. doctors and plans to expand to additional countries by the end of 2015.
New York marketing and advertising firm xAd has launched its Blueprints software solution, which provides specific consumer location information. The technology indicates the consumer place data based on the physical boundaries of retail businesses rather than the street address, providing more accurate counts of store visits. The Blueprints solution already has physical boundaries marked for more than 12 million U.S. business locations and uses a visual mapping algorithm to update address listings as processed by the U.S. Postal Service.
YouTube is planning to offer a subscription-based service which allows consumers to pay for an ad-free version of YouTube for a monthly fee. YouTube Partners will receive 55 percent of the total net revenues from subscription fees that can be attributed to the monthly views or watchtime of their content. YouTube did not disclose the price of the subscription or when it will launch, although it is expected to go live this year.
US Monitor, a New York mail monitoring specialist, is introducing a mail condition reporting service, providing businesses with information if their envelopes arrived ripped or creased, with smudged or misplaced addresses or missing inserts. Direct mailing companies can have scans of the damaged mailers sent to them or have the mailings returned. Information on problems can help the firms decide on production methods for future mailings, including printing and addressing methods.
RetailNext, a San Jose, Calif., retail analytics specialist, has launched its Accelerator Kit, which utilizes video analytics, shelf sensors and point-of-sale data to analyze in-store shoppers. Using the RetailNext software platform, retailers can measure pass-by traffic and capture rate, repeat and unique visitors and the frequency and duration of store visits.
http://retailnext.net/products
Cambridge, Mass., social media research firm Digimind has launched a Social Analytics tool which can analyze multiple social media accounts in a single interface. The platform automates all repetitive types of analysis, from data collection to information management to compilation and sharing. The tool provides an aggregate analysis of all social media accounts to help firms determine what is working best to engage their online communities. It will also provide competitive benchmarking to help brands examine how to increase their market share.
Kinesis Survey Technologies, Austin, Texas, and Tango Card, a Seattle technology firm, are partnering to offer an integrated platform that provides a fully automated redemption solution for online research panels. The platform allows panel managers to deploy rewards instantly through a single environment. Kinesis had begun offering the reward solution to its clients in early 2015.
Translation Cloud, Jersey City, N.J., has expanded its services to offer translation for practically any audio and video format. Customers receive a detailed transcription with each speaker clearly delineated and time stamps provided at requested intervals. The transcription can also be translated into additional languages as needed.
Shelton, Conn., researcher SSI has partnered with Westport, Conn., research company Imperium to launch Real Answer, an automated technological solution which authenticates the answers to open-ended surveys. The solution can detect answers which are gibberish, inappropriate, pasted or robot-generated. It also evaluates engagement by comparing the relative length of responses to a question. Results are available in real time with no interruption to the user.
Neustar, a Washington, D.C., information and analytics specialist, and Marketo, a San Mateo, Calif., software company, are partnering to create a new B2C program to increase marketing campaign precision. Neustar’s platform will link online and mobile profiles as well as offline information, identifying shoppers who are most likely to purchase the product. Marketers can then engage the prospects at the right time with the appropriate message and using the best method.
Forbes Media, New York, has agreed to work with rFactr, a social communication management software firm, to create the Forbes SocialPort. It will allow companies to share their marketing content on social platforms, with users utilizing the SocialPort to write, schedule and publish content across all social networks. User dashboards can track the effectiveness of campaigns and provide insights across the social networks.
Provalis Research, Montreal, has integrated WordStat7 with Stata, combining the numerical analysis of Stata with the text analysis features of WordStat7. Current WordStat7 users can download and activate WordStat for Stata for free.
Jon Gumbrell and Mike Hall have joined with Paris survey software specialist Askia to launch Platform One, a customer feedback platform. The software is designed to handle customer feedback scenarios from both qualitative and quantitative panels of any size, as well as voice of the customer programs.
Primesight, a London outdoor advertising company, has partnered with On Device Research, London, to create Primemobile Live, a real-time reporting software for outdoor ad campaigns. The online portal will provide data on campaign awareness during the campaign period. Clients can access performance data while the campaign is active, allowing digital display advertisers to make creative changes or adjust the weight of exposure. The data can be analyzed by audience segment, individual treatment and GPS location.
London technology provider OnePoint Global is offering a new pricing model, allowing a single named user to create unlimited branded apps, mobile Web, online and SMS surveys for a flat rate of £45 per month.
YouEye, a San Francisco technology firm, has launched the Experience Analytics Platform, which is designed to analyze unstructured and semi-structured data such as focus group videos. It includes five components, including a behavior metrics module, a highlights compilation feature, a survey results component, a demographic segmentation section and a tasks module which guides the analysis.
In Boston, text analytics specialist Lexalytics has expanded its language capabilities to include Arabic, Russian and Dutch, bringing the total of its supported languages to 16.
Qzzr, a Lehi, Utah, software firm, has rolled out Pollcaster, a platform which allows users to create and embed social media polls on their Web sites. With the software, researchers or companies can launch mobile-first, responsive online polls, post them online and track results through a choice of analytics. Pollcaster can also display a breakdown of any opinion by region, age and gender.