••• telephone/online research
FocusVision debuts multimode offering
Can add phone to online
In San Francisco, research technology firm FocusVision now offers interactive voice response technology through Survox IVR for FocusVision, a multimode solution that allows automated phone interviewing to be added to online studies. It lets customers voice their opinions and researchers hear their feedback while maintaining and analyzing the data within the Decipher by FocusVision platform. With the solution, a Decipher online survey can be fielded as an automated phone interview with all data from either mode populating the Decipher database. Researchers can widen their addressable market and increase response rates by allowing the respondent to choose the reply vehicle most convenient for them. For inbound surveys, a retailer can, after a point-of-sale transaction, include at the bottom of the receipt an invitation with an 800 number to an automated phone interview and a URL to a Web survey to record the customer’s experience. For outbound-driven survey, the solution can extend the strategic reach of online surveys by recruiting respondents from under-represented groups into the study.
••• shopper insights
New tool for natural-products retailers
Integrates surveys with segmentation
SPINS, a Chicago-based retail consumer insights firm for the natural, organic and specialty products industries, and its partner, Chicago researcher IRI, have launched a shared shopper intelligence solution for natural retailers. The consumer research tool is driven by SPINS’ natural-product attribution and IRI’s household panel, Consumer Network, consisting of 100,000 consumer panelists, combined with loyalty shopper data. The combined effort integrates survey responses with of-the-moment buying behavior and SPINS’ market segmentation, providing an expanded view of consumer shopping habits.
••• customer experience
MaritzCX partners for predictive offering
Uses AI to build models
MaritzCX, a Salt Lake City customer experience company, has made available PredictionCX, a solution that helps businesses analyze known customer information, use it to predict customer behavior and take action to improve customer experience for individual customers. MaritzCX is partnering with PurePredictive, an analytics technolo-gy provider that uses artificial intelligence to automate the building of predictive models using machine learning, to deliver part of the PredictionCX solution. PredictionCX is integrated into MaritzCX dashboards and case management to provide a customer recovery system through a closed-loop process.
••• health care research
Eye care panel from Research Now
Includes patients and professionals
Plano, Texas, firm Research Now has launched a new eye care panel that enables health care researchers to monitor health practices, treatments and sentiments. The panel will be available in the U.S., Canada, U.K., Spain, Italy, France and Germany. Through the new panel, Research Now will provide access to a globally-targeted audience of patients who suffer from the most common eye diseases or complications such as dry eye syndrome, glaucoma, cataracts and other visual impairments. The panel also includes eye care professionals such as general practitioners, ophthalmologists and opticians.
••• political research
Election-tracking product from SurveyMonkey
Includes state-level data
Palo Alto, Calif., firm SurveyMonkey has launched Election Tracking, a self-serve polling product that lets subscribers access polling data for the 2016 U.S. presidential, Senate and gubernatorial elections. The product uses over 10,000 interviews collected every week to give customers tools to understand the elections. In all, Survey-Monkey will interview about 2 million voters, with respondents randomly selected from the responses the plat-form receives every month. In addition to national data, the product includes state-level data in battleground states and in the 34 states with Senate races and 12 states electing governors this fall. The product is overseen by Jon Cohen, chief research officer of SurveyMonkey, and the firm’s Head of Election Polling Mark Blumenthal.
••• pharmaceutical research
Text analytics for pharma
Identifies co-occurrences
Text analytics solutions firm Lexalytics, Boston, has debuted the Pharmaceutical Industry Pack for market research, social media marketing, customer experience management and voice-of-the-customer professionals working in the pharmaceutical industry. Using the firm’s natural-language processing and machine-learning technology to approach a human’s ability to understand the meaning and sentiment in a text document, the Pharmaceutical Industry Pack helps pharmaceutical companies and marketing agencies gain insights such as identifying co-occurrences of medications, conditions, symptoms and sentiment. The Pack will also uncover whether more patients have a positive experience at certain dosages of certain medications and if patients are being prescribed a medication for off-label symptoms.
••• Briefly
ReviewTrackers, a Chicago-based customer feedback platform, has released Trending Topics, which uses natural language processing and machine learning to analyze the text in customer reviews, surface the most relevant keywords and attach positive or negative sentiment to them in one, easy-to-understand word cloud.
Nielsen, New York, has enhanced N-Score, a syndicated solution that assesses the casting and endorsement potential of celebrities (actors, athletes, musicians and well-known personalities). N-Score will now offer a Fan Affinity score that will quantify a celebrity’s fan base to fit particular content or brands, providing the industry with a quantifiable way to research celebrities and brands based on fan behavior. The enhancement integrates Nielsen’s media and consumer panels, including Scarborough, Homescan and TV panel with N-Score values in order to allow decision makers to evaluate and select talent in a data-driven way. N-Score values are calculated using a proprietary algorithm which considers a number of celebrity characteristics. The Nielsen Fan Affinity score ranks celebrities based on how likely their fans are to watch certain content, exhibit consumer behaviors or have lifestyle preferences.
Market research training firm Research Rockstar LLC, Marlborough, Mass., has announced a training portal for market research professionals that gives them 24/7 access to courses, media content and instructors.
Location intelligence firm xAd, New York, has partnered with Reston, Va., firm comScore on comScore Location Lift in xAd, a global measurement solution that links mobile campaign delivery to in-store visitation. The solution uses comScore’s proprietary campaign validation and lift methodology with xAd’s Blueprints technology, enabling advertisers to measure the reach and frequency of their mobile campaigns and understand how campaign delivery influenced store visitation based on actual foot traffic into stores. The solution will initially be available globally for mobile campaigns through xAd and will be available at massive scale for desktop and television through comScore in the future.
Digital agency Razorfish, New York, has launched a new data intelligence platform, COSMOS, which combines cognitive algorithms, data intelligence and machine learning to create relevant brand experiences across all touchpoints. COSMOS is modular, allowing organizations to deploy the platform at scale or purchase need-based solutions that can be integrated with existing marketing and technology platforms. COSMOS learns, reasons and activates customer insights by introducing cognitive optimizations that drive loyalty, customer retention and experiences. The platform includes the following modules: COSMOS Consumer 360; COSMOS Audience Intelligence Hub; COSMOS Cognitive Intelligence-as-Service; and COSMOS Universal Graph ID.
Harpeth Marketing, Franklin, Tenn., has released its ninth e-book, “I Hate Selling!” - A Guidebook for Small Business Owners, Independent Consultants, and Other Part-time Sales Reps that can be downloaded for free from the firm’s Web site.
Research firm Toluna, Wilton, Conn., has added new features to its DIY survey platform, QuickSurveys. New features include random assignment to allow concept testing without bias by randomly displaying blocks of concepts (including text, videos and images) and/or questions as well as secure video hosting to enable users to safely upload video to their surveys.
Nielsen, New York, has launched Brandbank into the U.S. consumer packaged goods and retail market, inte-grated into Bentonville, Ark.-based Walmart’s systems as an approved content service provider. Brandbank, a Nielsen-owned company since 2014, provides digital product content for e-commerce Web sites, mobile shop-ping apps, merchandising and marketing. For Nielsen’s clients, Brandbank will capture/ingest, manage and dis-tribute product content on behalf of manufacturers, adhering to Walmart’s requirements for data attributes and formats (Walmart Enterprise Spec). As a member of Walmart’s Content Service Provider ecosystem, Brandbank will supply content to help Walmart implement its omnichannel product content strategy.
Eye-tracking technology firm SensoMotoric Instruments (SMI) has launched Automated Semantic Gaze Map-ping (ASGM), an automated analysis solution for mobile eye-tracking data based on its computer vision algorithms. ASGM uses SMI’s algorithms to aggregate gaze data from eye-tracking videos and delivers quantitative results for immediate analysis. It is aimed at both academic and commercial users of the SMI Eye Tracking Glasses.
Customer loyalty program provider Maritz Motivation Solutions, St. Louis, has released the Insider’s Guide to Customer Loyalty, providing insight and tips on loyalty programs for marketers and brands. To download the PDF version of the guide, visit go.maritzmotivation.com/insidersguidecustomerloyalty.
Online market research courses provider MRII, Ann Arbor, Mich., and the University of Georgia have released a revised module on data collection within both the Principles of Market Research and the Principles of Pharmaceutical Market Research online courses. The module sorts out the strengths and weaknesses of various data collection methods and guides the learner through a process designed to match the data collection method to the client’s business problem. The revised module was developed by Pete Cape, global knowledge director at research firm SSI.
www.georgiacenter.uga.edu/courses/market-research
St. Louis-based research agency Brädo Creative Insight has introduced its Innovation Lab, a mobile prototyping suite that is equipped to ideate and prototype new products and packaging, including low-tech materials such as clay and pipe cleaners and high-tech 3-D printers, laser cutters, modeling software and food extruders.
The NPD Group, Port Washington, N.Y., has launched its Digital Games Tracking Service, a digital point-of-sale-sourced service that provides the U.S. gaming industry with publisher-sourced data on digital game sales, aggregated from the participants of a digital panel that includes publishers in the industry. The service, which is currently available to participants contributing digital data to the service, provides SKU-level sales data for full-game and add-on content downloads for consoles, portables and PC Games. The Digital Games Tracking Service will allow participating clients to understand the size and growth of the digital market and analyze attach rates and other important metrics.
Reston, Va., firm comScore has announced the U.S. launch of mobile data insights within Plan Metrix, a solution that combines Internet users’ actual online behavior with offline information. The combined solution will continue to deliver desktop insights, as well as provide insights into the offline behavior of mobile (smartphone and tablet) users on a monthly basis. Plan Metrix leverages inputs from both Media Metrix and Mobile Metrix, along with a tailored methodology, to deliver desktop and mobile insights that help clients understand the psycho-graphics and demographics of the audiences generated by their sites or mobile apps.
Salt Lake City customer experience software and services firm MaritzCX has made available SocialCX, a solution that helps customer experience professionals manage and increase positive reviews on social media to enhance online reputation. It also provides a means of identifying, distributing and responding to negative or positive online feedback and reviews. SocialCX focuses on social media sources like popular local review sites and uses a MaritzCX text analytics engine to find, capture and transform unstructured social media data into custom-er experience insights. SocialCX is fully integrated into the MaritzCX platform. MaritzCX delivers SocialCX in partnership with social media company Podium.
U.K. customer engagement solutions firm Grass Roots and New York-based enterprise feedback management firm Questback have launched Tune, a packaged customer survey solution that enables brands to listen to and act upon their customers’ feedback. Tune’s engagement-led surveys deliver customer insight through increased response rates, feedback and real-time reporting. Initial sectors being targeted include retail, travel and leisure.
RTi Research, Norwalk, Conn., has released a new e-book, Brand Extensions: Finding Opportunity at the Inter-section of Demand and White Space, that can be downloaded free from the firm’s Web site.
San Francisco retail analytics firm Euclid Analytics has introduced Euclid Connect, a Wi-Fi-based platform that allows brands to market more effectively and personalize in-store experiences. By allowing smartphone users to opt-in to guest Wi-Fi through a single login, Euclid Connect enables brick-and-mortar retailers to build a relation-ship with their shoppers across mediums, personalize their shopping experience and influence the path-to-purchase. Separately, the firm has introduced Euclid Traffic, which enables retailers, malls and restaurants to compare traffic across locations, staff locations more effectively based on visitor flow and evaluate the impact of marketing campaigns on traffic.
Nielsen, New York, now allows clients to choose a viewability provider within Nielsen Digital Ad Ratings to create viewable, human, demographic ad measurement that best supports their digital ad campaign goals. Based on client feedback, Nielsen has been working with a number of viewability providers, including DoubleVerify, Integral Ad Science and Moat.
Researcher the NPD Group, Port Washington, N.Y., in partnership with GfK MRI, New York, has launched BrandLink, a tool that provides updated data detailing the likelihood that a celebrity will resonate with the fans of specific brands and vice versa. The NPD Group gathers data from consumers every year regarding their celebrity, music, sports, sports team, movie and gaming preferences, as well as brands in key categories such as beverages, automotive, mobile, fashion, beauty and more. GfK MRI provides data that informs brand targeting in-sights for U.S. advertisers by providing a view of consumers’ media choices, lifestyles, attitudes and usage of products in 550 categories. The new BrandLink service combines these two databases, providing data that connects brands, media and entertainment properties and the individual fans of specific celebrities and sports teams.
Germany-based eye-tracking technology firm SensoMotoric Instruments has introduced an eye-tracking HTC Vive head set with 250 Hz sampling rate, giving professionals and researchers a controllable and immersive environment for visual studies. The HTC Vive with SMI scientific grade eye-tracking allows the integrated study of interaction and perception in a range of sectors, including marketing research, neuroscience, psychology and more. With full control over 360-degree images, videos or interactive environments, users can create and analyze more realistic scenarios to study and train human activities. Immersive environments can also be integrated with motion, manual interaction and biosensors.
Online panel and survey software firm dataSpring, Tokyo, has launched surveyon, a mobile survey application developed in partnership with Intage Singapore Pte. Ltd., a subsidiary of research firm Intage Group. The surveyon app provides researchers with a responsive mobile experience for research projects while giving them ways to drive panelist engagement. Panelists are able to complete a short profiling survey, register for panels, manage their profile and track accrued points using the mobile application or via the company’s surveyon.com Web site. The surveyon app is available for Android and iOS phones and tablets. Building mobile panels for the surveyon app has begun in Taiwan and Indonesia, with South Korea and other Asian countries to follow shortly.
Nielsen, New York, has launched Social Content Ratings, a measure of program-related social media activity across both Facebook and Twitter, with plans to incorporate Instagram insights at a later date. Social Content Ratings is an expanded service that will replace Nielsen Twitter TV Ratings in all markets, including Australia, Italy, Mexico and the U.S. Nielsen uses an evolving set of classifier combinations to measure organic and owned activity on Facebook and Twitter. Classifiers are program-related terms, including accounts, handles, hashtags, talent names and other phrases associated with programs and are systematically identified and applied to measure relevant social activity when a program is airing and on a 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week basis. Nielsen receives aggregated anonymous topic data directly from Facebook and accesses full-fidelity APIs from Twitter to measure total social TV activity across social networks while respecting privacy. Both public social media activity and activity taking place between friends is measured. Facebook Messenger data is not available to Nielsen and will not be included in measurement. Social Content Ratings will also support the analysis of “owned” media strategies by measuring the engagement with content posted by official accounts associated with a program or network.
Oslo, Norway, research software company Confirmit and U.K.-based IP contact center solutions firm Sytel have partnered to deliver a series of new CATI features, including Redial, Reconnect and Seamless Survey Switching. Redial enables the interviewer to re-establish a call with respondents and resume the interview in the event the call is cut off. Reconnect allows an interviewer to continue a survey on a new number if the respondent would prefer to speak on a different phone. Seamless Survey Switching enables supervisors to reassign inter-viewers to a new project without the need to logout or disconnect from the dialer. These new features within the combined solution are immediately available.
Survey research firm Abt SRBI, New York, has enhanced its capabilities to include data science and emerging data capture technologies. Additionally, the firm has also changed its corporate logo and its headquarters location.
London research firm Ipsos Healthcare has launched its Nonalcoholic Steatohepatitis (NASH) Therapy Monitor. The new syndicated study will run in the U.S. and EU5 initially, with other markets available on demand. This development comes in response to the growing focus on NASH, a liver disease characterized by rising prevalence, low diagnosis levels and a lack of therapies currently approved for treatment. The new NASH patient chart audit is designed to allow subscribers to understand and track the treatment of NASH as a number of pipeline drugs arrive on the market.
Van Nuys. Calif., research firm SoapBoxSample has launched a new physician panel, DocThought. Engineered to provide targeted access, DocThought is a network of medical professionals ready to provide opinions to answer clients’ medical research questions. Members will provide feedback about a variety of medical products and services and weigh in on aspects of the medical industry.
Marketing technology company Amobee, Foster City, Calif., has launched Amobee Triggers, a solution that allows marketers to target and deliver digital campaigns at key consumer mind-set moments based on online and offline data signals. The firm has also introduced an updated brand identity and Web site.