Market Research Training from Research Rockstar

In economics there is a term known as “sunk cost.”  Investopedia defines a sunk cost as, “A cost that has already been incurred and thus cannot be recovered.” A cost does not have to be monetary either; it can be thought of in terms of time, resources, or anything else of value to a company. Business decisions are made independent of sunk costs. At first glance, this may seem a little ridiculous. If you have put hundreds of hours or thousands of dollars into a project, then you should work tirelessly to make it succeed, right? Well, the brutal reality is that sometimes we just have to accept that a project has gone bad, and it is time to move on. It can be best to just cut your losses and not lose any more money.

This idea of sunk costs applies to market research interviews (or in-depth interviews, IDIs) as well.  As does the concept of knowing when to walk away.

In-depth interviews can be an immensely valuable research methodology, and many market researchers use this tried-and-true approach (see some of the reasons why in this article from Quirk’s Marketing Research Review). But when conducting IDI research, a lot of time goes into planning before the actual interview is conducted.

Once a firm has spent all kinds of money and devoted countless hours to developing the IDI guide and screening participants, they should not waste a single opportunity right? Shouldn’t every scheduled IDI be completed fully? Not always: money and time at this point is a sunk cost. The goal now is to conduct as many good in-depth interviews as possible.  Wasting time on a bad interview just frustrates the interviewer and wastes time that could be better used elsewhere, so why bother? Unfortunately, in the quest to meet sample size goals and “not waste” sunk costs, too many researchers end up completing bad interviews.

So here is the critical question: how does one determine what is a bad interview and what is not? How long into an interview is it before it is possible to tell it is not worthwhile? What is the best way to end a bad interview? Each interview will be different and you will have to make a judgment call, however, Research Rockstar’s class on Conducting Research Interviews can provide you some valuable guidelines and tips for handling these unfortunate situations.

[Want to learn 12 valuable steps for stress free interviewing?  Visit Research Rockstar and take their self-paced, online class on Conducting Research Interviews. This class is available as both a self-paced and an instructor-led format: click here for dates!]

When consumers purchase a product, they expect to get what they paid for.  This is also true when companies purchase market research; unfortunately some no longer receive the high-quality tangible product they paid for, at least according to Gill Wales (as stated in her article published on Research-Live.com titled Will This Do.)

As quoted in this article, Justin Gutmann, head of research and insight for Consumer Focus, has a laundry list of problems with many of the reports he commissioned from reputable market research firms.  While firms dazzled him with well-written proposals and promises, the promises turned empty and the end result was a poorly written market research report indicating the writer did not fully grasp, or even understand at all, the subject being researched.  As Gill Wales writes, “No matter how skillful the fieldwork, if the report fails to provide a clear and reliable description of the outcome, then the client has acquired a useless product. The fieldwork may as well never have been done.”

These subpar reports can be attributed to a few issues, but as Wales notes, these issues are not difficult to fix.  Often, senior executives are involved in the planning and fieldwork portion of the market research, but delegate the actual report writing to junior analysts.  These junior analysts, while capable, are not properly trained and need more guidance from the senior executives, who are too often M.I.A. Furthermore, the author states that the economic environment today is contributing to market research firms being understaffed but afraid to turn away work, which forces them to sacrifice quality of work in order to keep up.  While this may seem smart today, in the long-run it will hurt them.  As Wales notes, the future for market research professionals lies in their ability to interpret, explain, and present the data that can now be gathered by ever-improving software.   She concludes that only properly trained professionals will be able to keep up with the changing market research environment. Not surprisingly, we at Research Rockstar agree!

Many of the comments on this article agree that the structure of market research firms, especially large ones, has lead to declining report quality.  As one commenter, Ray Poynter, notes, producing a good market research report is time consuming, and, as a result, a good report written by a senior executive costs well above what most companies will pay.  As Research Rockstar’s own Kathryn Korostoff notes, many market researchers she encounters are more than capable of producing good reports; they simply do not have the proper training to do so.  They have no processes, list of best practices, or frameworks to refer to.

Obviously we are biased, but this article raises issues we have been addressing in our market research training programs for over two years.  Good, cost-effective training can solve many of the issues seen in the market research industry today.  Unfortunately, many firms are not willing to pay the traditionally high costs of training.   We are trying to address this by offering more than twenty topics via virtual classroom training, which eliminates the cost and aggravation of travel, as well as having a lower price than in-person seminars.

[Want to learn more? Research Rockstar offers comprehensive market research training through a series of online classes.  These classes come at an affordable price, allowing market research firms to keep costs down while improving quality—thus avoiding the major problem of sacrificing quality for quantity that Gill Wales writes about.]

[The post was written by our fantastic new intern, Todd Haylon.  Well done, Todd!]

To a lot of people, the idea of training sounds difficult. Time out of the office, travel aggravation…not to mention the expense.

And don’t a lot of people who do market research just learn on-the-job? Sure they do.

They also often have supervisors who end up fixing the same errors over and over. Supervisors who have to add basic insights, who end up staying late to make sure the basics were done correctly. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Especially with our training classes, taught in an interactive virtual classroom.

Imagine how your life would be if you could rely on your staff to:

1. Anticipate common project challenges
2. Specify effective project parameters
3. Plan ahead for data analysis
4. Think precisely about screening and quota requirements
5. Communicate effectively with clients and suppliers (internal or external)
6. Craft a solid report
7. Write a solid management summary
8. Deliver a presentation

Here is what we suggest:
Step 1: Have your staff sign-up for our Free membership of self-paced market research classes.
Step 2: If you feel they are ready for more, sign them up for the Market Research Project Management Power Program. The next session starts this Thursday (8/9).  Or how about the Online Research Methods class? Check out the other options too.

If you have any sales questions, contact Kara at kdion@researchrockstar.com

Last week, you spent eight hours editing your staff’s work for basic survey design errors, weak report writing, and simple chart blunders.  Not a great use of your time, was it?

That is madness.

You can have your staff take some basic market research training—and give yourself the gift of 8 hours a week.

• If your staff needs basic help with the survey design process, click here.
• If your staff needs the essentials of managing market research projects, click here.
• If your staff needs a foundation in quantitative data analysis, here is the best option.

Our market research training is live, instructor-led and requires no travel. So no time away from the office, no travel budget necessary. Plus, summer pricing is in effect, so now is the time to get your staff up-to-speed.

And if your team needs more of a crash course, we can even come on-site. Our most popular on-site market research training programs are listed here.

For sales support, please contact Cathy Leonard at CLeonard@ResearchRockstar.com or use this simple form.

 And stop the market research madness!

Our winner was randomly selected (with the help of a random number generator).  Congratulations to Teri Woodruff, Research Manager, Principal Financial Group!

Winning this drawing means that Teri can attend all of our 4-week Power Programs at no cost for the next 12 months.  We are always adding new dates, and topics, so she will have lots of market research learning options. Click here to view our current list of power programs and other market research training options.

Thanks to everyone for their fantastic quotes about why learning market research is important. We are designing a montage of the quotes, and will release it next week. Stay tuned!

[Haven’t been to the new market research training store yet? Check it out HERE!]