The Handbook of Mobile Market Research: Tools and Techniques for Market Researchers

Foreword

There have been two critical events in recent years that have had a profound effect on the market research industry.

The first was the ‘internet’ – the advent of online as a research medium and information source. On the positive side, it brought greater cost-efficiency; provided the platform for a whole new range of collaborative and social networking services; facilitated the growth of panels and associated software (which has become a sub-industry now in its own right); became a source of freely volunteered information, and for many research projects, particularly those dealing with highly sensitive or personal topics, facilitated a much higher level of respondent honesty and detail.

On the downside, however, issues of sample duplication, respondent verification, professional respondents, and online response behaviour (such as straight-lining, etc.) raised a series of challenges and quality concerns that, in some cases, have not been fully resolved, even today.

The second critical event that is having (and will continue to have) a profound effect on our industry is the development of mobile – not just telephones, but also tablets, phablets, other portable devices, and the associated ‘app’ industry. These devices now allow us to capture ‘immediacy’ with technology greatly expanding our ability to measure ‘real-time’ behaviour, rather than reported behaviour.

This ‘immediacy’ also adds a whole new dimension to many of the benefits that the internet has brought – in ...