Site offers market and company reports for free
U.K. information firm Vertical Edge Limited launched its new market research service, Free Research, at www.free-research.com. The site provides free access to more than 5,000 market and company reports across 27 global sectors, in addition to country guides and other sources. The site currently contains over 3,000 market reports covering 27 sectors globally. Company information is provided in the form of annual reports, 10Ks, 20-Fs and investor presentations. Country guides provide information on the economic and political situation in many countries. Market Insight reports contain market news, regulatory updates, new tender notices, product standards and other market- and product/service-related information. Lists of the most significant country-specific trade associations for each sector are also provided.
New tools from MarketTools focus on virtual shopping, online moms
San Francisco research firm MarketTools Inc. is now offering Shopper Impact, a suite of tools incorporating virtual shopping technology, research methods and sales knowledge to provide customer management solutions to help brands achieve their business objectives. Shopper Impact is designed to improve retail performance by quantifying and understanding consumer behavior, not just tracking movement.
Separately, MarketTools has also introduced the Moms Insight Network, which synthesizes input from millions of moms’ online conversations to let marketers engage directly in ongoing conversations with moms to uncover needs and new ideas and turn those findings into products and services. The solution draws from a hosted proprietary community, ZoomPanel Moms. For more information visit www.markettools.com.
ORC services assist employers, electronics firms
Opinion Research Corporation, Princeton, N.J., has launched its Employee Research Practice, which offers tools for mid-size companies to measure employee engagement and alignment along several dimensions by assessing multiple drivers of performance.
Separately, the firm is also now offering its Out-of-Box-Experience service, enabling R&D engineers, product managers, software designers, support personnel and marketers to witness consumers’ first impressions of electronic equipment - ranging from computers, cameras and handheld devices to home entertainment products - as they are unpacked, assembled and put to use. Using a series of focus groups to test initial consumer opinions of new products, the service enables companies to modify or correct product prototypes before a public launch.
With guidance from Opinion Research Corporation, focus group participants are recruited according to a client’s pre-defined criteria, which typically include experience with the technology in question, whether they’re professional or consumer users and whether they are owners of particular technologies.
The sessions are conducted in a purpose-built viewing facility where clients observe the session behind a mirror and see firsthand how potential customers would fare with the company’s product. Moderators facilitate focus groups to understand how consumers navigate their way from opening the package to using the equipment. For more information visit www.opinionresearch.com.
Center provides ad word feedback from mobile kids
Regulus Communications Inc., a Lincoln, Neb., information research company, has created the WordCHECK Center for the study and analysis of key words associated with brands and products marketed to kids. The goal of the center is to provide advertising and consumer research companies with ad word feedback for evaluating message copy and marketing content meant for the mobile youth marketplace.
Studies will focus on measuring the positive or negative words kids associate to specific snack food, fast food, soft drink and energy drink brands to help determine the success or failure of online marketing messages. Data from the studies will be formatted into word association trend reports for media content developers, media buyers, marketing directors, advertising agencies and brand managers. Special reports will also be developed for parents, nutrition education professionals and consumer advocacy groups.
Word associations will be studied among kids from the more than 30 countries participating in the Young Author’s Magazine Anthology program for Internet classrooms. For more information visit www.regulus.com/wordcheck_center.htm.
Synovate practice focuses on market potential
The Chicago office of researcher Synovate has introduced a suite of models and simulators for quantifying the market potential of a product or service. The launch of the MVP - or Market Value Potential - solutions coincides with the creation of Synovate MarketQuest, the company’s newest practice, which evolved from its product design and development specialist division. MVP is based on a simulation engine, which allows marketers to experiment with marketing dynamics (awareness, distribution, promotion) and product characteristics (concept, features, packaging, price). The technology lets brand and product managers explore a variety of business scenarios and see their immediate impact in real time. For more information visit www.synovate.com/marketquest.
Study looks at value to home builders of adding electronic amenities
Dallas research firm Parks Associates and Washington, D.C.-based publisher Hanley Wood’s Digital Home magazine are releasing the 2007 edition of their ongoing Builder Insights study, an annual primary research study of U.S. home builders. Builder Insights 2007 calculates the marketing, sales and financial benefits of offering electronic amenities in homes. This research assesses and quantifies the higher profits and shorter sales cycles that builders report as a result of including electronic products in new homes. It also identifies the recommended sales process for reaching builders.
Builder Insights 2007 is a multiclient project in which sponsors participate in the design of the questionnaires and interview guides to address topics of special interest to them. Topline results of this study will be presented at Hanley Wood’s Digital Home Summit on November 26-28 in Las Vegas. For more information visit www.parksassociates.com.
ESRI updates ArcGIS Survey Analyst, releases ArcView workbook
Redlands, Calif.-based ESRI’s new ArcGIS Survey Analyst 9.2 has capabilities to enable users to record and maintain survey data and continuous parcel layers as elements that are part of an integrated dataset and data model, called the cadastral fabric. ArcGIS Survey Analyst enables surveyors and geographic information system (GIS) professionals to create and maintain survey and cadastral data in ArcGIS. With this application surveyors can centrally locate, process and manage their data, enabling them to work more efficiently. GIS professionals use ArcGIS Survey Analyst to manage and enhance the accuracy of their data using existing survey methodologies. With the latest release, record data can be held in a continuous database supporting a GIS system for complete spatial data management and analysis. These and other new features and capabilities for ArcGIS Survey Analyst 9.2 are released as part of the ArcGIS 9.2 Service Pack 3, which can be downloaded at www.esri.com.
A new workbook published by ESRI Press teaches basic to complex aspects of using GIS technology, providing lessons in everything from creating maps to using models for advanced analysis. The second edition of GIS Tutorial: Workbook for ArcView 9 provides updated exercises for ArcView 9.2 and is designed to help both beginners and experienced users become better versed in GIS software functionality. Fundamentals such as adding layers to a map, zooming and panning, measuring distances and labeling map features are presented. The book also offers more advanced lessons in creating pin maps, building a personal geodatabase, geocoding data and conducting spatial analysis. It is available at online retailers or at www.esri.com/esripress.
Lightspeed gets U.K. sports panel rolling
London-based Lightspeed Research has launched its Great Britain Sports Panel, an online specialty panel which pre-identifies consumers on their participation in 70 different sporting activities, from basketball and boxing to tennis and triathlons, as well as those they watch. Also included are: media chosen for following sports including TV, radio, newspaper, Internet, as well as live; British football (soccer), rugby league and rugby union team supported (international and domestic); if the respondent is a sports volunteer, referee or coach; interest in the summer and winter Olympics; and brands of sportswear, footwear and equipment used. For more information visit www.lightspeedresearch.com.
New information product from Euromonitor
London-based information firm Euromonitor International now offers Passport, its new industry information system designed to support multinational organizations with strategic decision-making. Passport brings together all of Euromonitor International’s intelligence on industries, countries and consumers in one system. The full Passport system contains 115 million internationally comparable industry, country and consumer statistics, future-focused analysis from a global, regional, country and company perspective, daily comment from Euromonitor’s analysts and RealTime News, Euromonitor’s online industry news monitoring service. For more information visit www.euromonitor.com.
Itracks builds on online focus group platform
Saskatoon-based Itracks announced an update to its Online Focus Group platform. The latest version contains changes designed to streamline the upload and display of media, probing questions and the moderator’s guide. A new service, called Media View, allows moderators to display and control images, Web sites and audio and video files to respondents as they conduct one-on-one interviews over the phone. The firm also added breakout rooms, which allow moderators to conduct friendship or stranger-pair conversations or small-group exercises and then bring the breakout groups back to the main discussion. Moderators can decide who to group together in advance or on the fly. They can group participants by demographic or put people of like mind or oppositional opinion together. For more information visit www.itracks.com.
Two new services from Synovate Healthcare
London-based Synovate Healthcare has launched the Synovate Healthcare Psychoses Therapy Monitor, which will cover the treatment of patients diagnosed with schizophrenia and bipolar 1 and 2, incorporating doctor demographics, attitudinal data and patient records. Initial waves of the Psychoses Therapy Monitor will cover the U.K., France, Germany, Italy and Spain (with expansion into the U.S. soon to follow) and results will be available twice a year.
Separately, the firm also introduced the Synovate Healthcare Diabetes Therapy Monitor in China. It is a syndicated study combining patient medical records with doctor and patient perceptions, providing data on the diabetes market. It currently offers clients access to some 4,000 patient records and 200 diabetes specialists in the country. It will be extended to other Asian markets over the next year. For more information visit www.synovate.com.
System estimates concepts’ in-market potential
New York research firm Ipsos is now offering InnoScreen, a global concept screening system that provides an estimate of in-market potential. InnoScreen tests concepts in any category in any country and provides a validated market potential estimate along with guidance on how to improve concepts.
InnoScreen can be applied to any sector and utilizes a modeling framework specific to that sector. For consumer packaged goods, InnoScreen runs on the Ipsos Novaction modeling engine. For the services, durables and technology sectors, InnoScreen uses Ipsos Vantis, which has a normative database of more than 8,000 services, durables and technology concepts. For more information visit www.ipsos-na.com.
Harris adds Advanced Strategy Lab in Europe; Web-based research platform
Harris Interactive, Rochester, N.Y., has launched the Advanced Strategy Lab (ASL) in Europe. ASL is a qualitative research technology that provides simultaneous, anonymous input from up to 24 participants, from any location. Developed by WirthlinWorldwide (now Harris Interactive), ASL has been in place in the United States for more than a decade. Using dedicated facilities, mobile and Web-based labs, ASL facilitates brainstorming, idea generation and solution development through networked computers in a moderated group setting.
Separately, Harris Interactive has introduced GlobalSynch, a Web-based synchronized research platform. It is designed for quick turnaround projects where fast access to results is important; situations that require access to integrated, enterprise-level business intelligence; and studies using multiple sample sources, including customer data. For more information visit www.harrisinteractive.com.
New eye-tracking tools, service from Tobii
The new T/X Series of Tobii Eye Trackers and the Tobii Studio software from Sweden-based Tobii Technology provide a system to collect and analyze gaze data. Tobii Studio offers a new toolbox of visualizations, statistics, reporting and other tools. Features like demographic filtering/questionnaires, logging and remote viewing have been added to create a complete platform for marketing research. Tobii Studio is suited for evaluating all visual media such as print advertising, TV commercials, direct marketing, out-of-home, Web sites, software, e-mail campaigns, online advertising, computer games and interactive TV, as well as physical elements such as shopping shelves, packaging, store planning etc.
New hardware characteristics such as a much larger head movement allowance, higher speed and automatic optimization of bright and dark pupil tracking make it easier for marketing researchers to add eye tracking to their services and perform tests efficiently and accurately.
In addition to the new products Tobii has introduced a new business model. Tobii ForSight is a subscription and pay-per-use offer allowing clients to get a full eye tracking lab in-house without an upfront investment and with the right to change configuration or to cancel at any time. The subscription also gives access to new training services, Webinars, user meetings, test designs, methodology and more. For more information visit www.tobii.com.
Briefly
The National Food Laboratory Inc., Dublin, Calif., has launched the Innovation Group, a 30-member in-house organization devoted to assisting companies in creating, developing and commercializing new food and beverage products. The Innovation Group brings together individuals with experience in new product strategy, ideation, market intelligence, consumer design and execution strategies to help clients translate culinary concepts into commercial products. For more information visit www.thenfl.com.
Online social networking site Facebook now offers Facebook Polls, a function which allows users to ask detailed questions, target them to specific user segments and receive real-time responses from Facebook’s 31 million users based on gender, age, school, location or profile keyword. For more information visit www.facebook.com/polls.php.
A joint venture of market research firms Latin Pulse and AcuPOLL Research has created a new U.S. Hispanic consumer testing service offering the ability to conduct quantitative research among less-acculturated Hispanic consumers online. For more information visit www.acupoll.com.
ComScore Inc., Reston, Va., has debuted comScore Segment Metrix, a new tool that works with a variety of consumer segmentation schemes to give marketers the ability to track, analyze and report Internet activity by consumer groups. The product integrates behaviorally-defined segments, geo-demographic segments, and proprietary, client-defined segments with the comScore online panel. For more information visit www.comscore.com.
Denver research firm iModerate is now offering its Optimum!nsight product, which offers clients real-time qualitative consumer feedback within 36 hours on stimuli during the development phase of new ads, products and concepts. Utilizing iModerate’s proprietary methodology and IM-based chat platform, the firm’s moderators conduct one-on-one interviews to garner commentary from consumers. For more information visit www.imoderate.com.
Nielsen//NetRatings, New York, has added both “Total Minutes” and “Total Sessions” metrics to NetView, its syndicated Internet audience measurement service. While NetView has always reported average time per person and average number of sessions, the new metrics deliver increased perspective on total engagement across sites.
Separately, Nielsen//NetRatings has debuted VideoCensus, a syndicated online video measurement service that combines panel and census research methodologies and provide an end-to-end accounting of audience size, demographic composition, engagement and competitive activity. For more information visit www.nielsen-netratings.com.
NSON Opinion Research, Salt Lake City, has formed a new division to provide research services to companies and their agencies in developing products and services for consumers in their 50s and 60s. Leslie Harris will head the new division. For more information visit www.nsoninfo.com.
Dulles, Va.-based research services firm Vovici is now offering the Market Research Edition of its EFM (Enterprise Feedback Management) Community product today. EFM Community MR provides an integrated solution including questionnaire authoring, client collaboration, panel/respondent management, flexible deployment and real-time results reporting and analysis. At press time, the EFM Community Market Research Edition was slated to be available in fall 2007. For more information visit www.vovici.com.
U.K. research consultancy Nunwood has added in-store video observation to its shopper insight services. For more information visit www.nunwood.com.
The London office of researcher OTX announced the expansion of its movie tracking service to cover Russia and China. This service provides customers in these regions with weekly reports on consumer awareness of and interest in feature film releases. For more information visit www.otxresearch.com.
Issues & Answers Network Inc., Virginia Beach, Va., will expand its telephone polling facility in Connersville, Ind. This call center was opened in June with 60 telephone interviewing stations and has been increased to 106 stations. For more information visit www.issans.com.
Sydney-based research process outsourcing firm Pulse Group has created a new qualitative division and is now offering viewing facilities for focus groups. The launch is part of a strategic alliance between Pulse Group and Itracks. For more information visit www.pulse-group.com.
London-based Research Now has launched a proprietary online Brazilian panel, Opiniões de Valor, at www.opinioesdevalor.com.br. In addition, the firm now offers a proprietary research–only online panel in New Zealand.
Power Systems Research, St. Paul, has completed the second-quarter update of published data and qualitative profiles of industry leaders monitored in CV Link, the commercial vehicle forecast. In addition, combustion engines production volumes have been updated in EnginLink and engine-driven equipment production volumes have been updated in OE Link. All are databases available to subscribers and based on historical, current and forecast production volumes within the powertrain industry. For more information visit www.powersys.com.
Prezza Technologies, Cambridge, Wash., is now offering an on-demand, or software-free, version of a mobile survey system that connects with Checkbox Online servers hosted by Prezza Technologies. Checkbox Mobile devices are designed to complement an organization’s Internet browser-based feedback collection system by offering a way to collect feedback in the field with handheld devices or tablet PCs. For more information visit www.prezzatech.com.
WAC Survey, Great Neck, N.Y., now offers a range of services in the word-of-mouth arena, focusing on blog tracking/analysis and buzz metrics. For more information visit www.wacsurvey.com.