HP launches resource site for high-tech marketers
Hewlett-Packard Co., Palo Alto, Calif., has launched DeepCanyon (www.deepcanyon.com). a Web site that channels business resources into one destination for high-tech marketers. DeepCanyon is designed to provide marketers in the computer and Internet industries individual market research reports for sale as soon as they are released, as well as aggregated market information, editorial commentary, and other tools to support business plans and assist in decision making. With its official launch, DeepCanyon adds e-commerce and extended search capabilities to the site's preliminary version, which has been live since June.
HP has signed licensing agreements with firms in the technology research field to provide affordable reports, ranging from free to $10,000. Market research firms currently offering content on DeepCanyon include ActivMedia, ARS. Institute for the Future, IntelliQuest, The Yankee Group and Zona Research.
DeepCanyon has established other alliances to provide additional services to the high-tech marketer. Market Calculator accesses Dun & Bradstreet data to give users the ability to quickly size a market or locate a company. An alliance with search-engine company Northern Light allows a broader range of on-site search capabilities.
On-line advertising information resource from ARF
The Advertising Research Foundation (ARF), New York, has introduced a new on-line resource, the World Advertising Research Center (WARC). WARC is a database of advertising knowledge, including thousands of published papers and case studies covering all areas of advertising, marketing and media activity from sources such as the ARF, the American Association of Advertising Agencies, Admap, the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising, the Canadian Congress of Advertising, and more.
Three new products from Pulse Train
U.K.-based Pulse Train has released three new products. Bellview Scan version 3 is a Windows package for scanning questionnaires and forms. Version 3 includes a new look-up dictionary that works with ICR technology to increase accuracy and efficiency. The dictionary is customizable, allowing brand and product names to be verified. A new grid wizard also enable a greater range of forms to be considered for automatic data capture.
Pulse Train has also released Visual QSL 2, a Windows-based software package that allows users to create questionnaires without spec writing knowledge. It has the look and feel of Microsoft Word. The new Presentation Editor allows users to type in a questionnaire while the QSL code is created behind the scenes. Plus, questionnaires can be directly imported to and exported from Microsoft Word. Bellview WEB 1.02 is a data collection system for designing Web surveys based on Bellview CATI software. Surveys can be created using any of 36 HTML formatting macros. A choice of colors and borders allows for further customization. This version of Bellview WEB offers an extra macro which improves the product's integration with third-party software. A Conversion Utility enables data to be stored in separate fields for each question, facilitating on-line analysis in any ODBC-compliant third-party software.
Track competitors with STRATEGY! 2.0
Strategy Software, Inc., Kirkland, Wash., has released STRATEGY! 2.0, software designed to help companies track, analyze and share information about competitors and their products. PC-based STRATEGY! shows a company exactly how their products differ from the competition. STRATEGY! 2.0 adds new functionality to help companies better track and outsmart their competitors on both a tactical and strategic level. Some of the enhancements include: a Key People module, which tracks individual personnel as they rotate between companies in the industry, showing past and present roles, background, education, personal interests and more; a Financial Ownership module, which lets a company track multiple levels of subsidiaries and parent corporations, investment stakes, and record individual stockholders. New modules can track manufacturing processes, construction projects, government programs and other real-world events and activities that influence the industry and competitors. The software also features enhanced HTML report generation for publication of product comparisons to corporate intranets/extranets for worldwide access by the sales force and thirdparty distribution channels.
Sponsorship data now available on-line
Companies interested in determining how sports, entertainment and event sponsorships worldwide affect their brand images can now obtain information directly from consumers over the Internet, thanks to a new partnership agreement between ROI Research and USADATA.com. Through the agreement, ROI Research, an international research company specializing in sports and entertainment research, will utilize a wide range of technological services from USADATA.com, a creator of Web-based marketing and business information solutions. USADATA.com will design, develop and promote a Marketing Information Portal that will give corporate clients Internet access to ROI's various U.S. and International Sponsorship and Entertainment Polls. In addition, USADATA.com will license technology to ROI Research enabling on-line data collection to gauge immediate consumer reactions - from anywhere in the world - to various sports and entertainment issues.
Service captures doctor recall of detailing visits
The Verbatim Analysis Service from Scott-Levin, a Newtown, Pa., pharmaceutical consulting firm, captures the messages physicians are receiving from detailing activities in the doctors' own words. The verbatim statements come from the 10,000 physicians whose comments are recorded in Scott-Levin's Personal Selling Audit and Hospital Personal Selling Audit. The Verbatim Analysis Service can supply insight into how physicians are perceiving detail messages, helping companies optimize their primary research efforts.
Database integrates findings from single surveys, tracking studies
Horsham, Pa.-based Taylor Nelson Sofres Intersearch (TNS Intersearch) has launched MIRIAD (Managed Integrated Research Information And Database), a new marketing information database and analysis system which integrates findings from single research surveys with continuous tracking investigations to help marketers make better, more informed business decisions. MIRIAD is a single tool that catalogs, analyzes, examines and presents survey data. MIRIAD integrates all continuous tracking data, such as brand awareness, customer satisfaction and advertising campaigns into one single information tracking database.
The integration of the data analysis tools saves time in processing new tables and graphs as MIRIAD produces them instantly. TNS Intersearch will offer MIRIAD desktop installations for all clients so that they can incorporate historical data, highlight significant changes, produce trend lines, run slide shows of graphs, download into spreadsheet format, integrate PowerPoint slides and run multimedia materials. In addition, all reports and charts are automatically updated each time the database is updated, which ensures that clients always have the latest information at hand.
SPSS releases Server 10.0
SPSS Inc., Chicago, has introduced SPSS Server 10.0, a new release of the data analysis software which now features a server version for increased performance and scalability. XML model exportation to assist front-line decision makers and a new data editor for simplified data handling. The latest release of SPSS 10.0 is available for the first time in a distributed analysis architecture (DAA), SPSS' DAA provides users with a scalable, enterprise-level analysis product. SPSS Server eliminates the need to copy and convert the data used in analysis, so all data can stay on the server where it resides. SPSS Server 10.0 also eliminates file size limitations, facilitates data access from many sources and allows administrators to maintain a high level of data security.
New version of Quancept Web
New York-based SPSS MR, the market research business unit of Chicago-based SPSS Inc., has introduced Quancept Web 1.2., a software package for designing interactive, multimedia Web surveys. The newest version is designed to let users handle a higher volume of Web survey data collection with greater reliability. Quancept Web allows researchers to administer interactive surveys to the general public or to a select password-protected sample. Users can customize surveys to be consistent with a company's image and designed to keep respondents interested, promoting more complete surveys and more collected data.
ESRI updates ArcView
ESRI, Redlands, Cali f., has released ArcView Business Analyst 1.1, an update of its desktop GIS (geographic information system) software. The new release will feature 1999 data sets from information providers and ESRI's GIS tools designed specifically for business applications. It includes 1999 business listings with SIC codes. locations, employees, and sales from Dun & Bradstreet; demographic data from either Applied Geographic Solutions or CACI with 1999 current-year estimates and five-year projections: a current-year national household consumer file of more than 100 million households from Experian: and an updated ArcView StreetMap in the NAD83 coordinate system with a nationwide street database from Wessex that enhances TIGER 1997 source data.
Subscription service helps build on-line questionnaires
QuestionBuilder.com, East Quogue, N.Y., has released QuestionBuilder.com, a subscription-based on-line questionnaire authoring and management tool. The service provides a complete software and hardware solution for creating and managing questionnaires and viewing the results on-line. Questionnaires are created and previewed in real time. The data can be viewed in a number of ways. Subscribers have unlimited access to their questionnaires and data, Updates can be made as often as needed and there is no limit to the number of questionnaires a user may have.
New version of EZSurvey 99
Raosoft Inc., Seattle, has released version 3 of its EZSurvey 99, a 32-bit electronic data collection pro gram that lets end users build questionnaires on Web sites and distribute them over the Internet, intranets or any standard e-mail system. After a questionnaire is designed and posted on a Web site, responses are saved into the DBF EZSurvey database. For e-mail the questionnaire is sent out in text format, and when the data returns Raosoft Postmaster saves the data into the DBF database file, Analysis and reports are immediately available from EZSurvey itself, from the Raosoft EZReport or SURVEYWin program, or from any DBF-standard reporting package. If ASCII format is desired, the data can be exported from EZSurvey in fixed, tab-delimited, or comma-delimited format.