Here’s another reason why it’s important for market researchers to talk to Millennials via a smartphone app instead of trying to get them to open email invitations and take surveys online. 

 

GlobalWebIndex, which studies trends in communications, social media, and device use, reports that almost 25% of younger Millennials – ages 16 to 24 – are using mobile apps for a crucial aspect of consumer behavior: researching products they’re interested in buying.

 

That exceeded the overall rate of 18% for respondents of all ages. Only 5% of those over 54 reported using apps to check out product information, according to a survey GWI conducted during the first quarter of 2016. 

 

Although Google and other search engines remain the most popular conduits for accessing info about products, the study found that their lead is narrowing, with younger respondents, especially, increasingly favoring apps and social networks.

 

“As search behaviors on networks and apps continue to strengthen, it’s not hard to see why many consumers would prefer one intuitive platform or app in which they can interact with an array of brands rather than having to install and use a separate one for each company,” GWI noted in a summary of a new study on trends in social networking.

 

In the market research realm, MFour’s business is exactly that – providing a single app through which any number of companies with products and services to sell can communicate with the marketplace to conduct survey-based research.

 

Pioneering and perfecting all-mobile research is our game. In fact, we invented that game and have played it at a uniquely high level since 2011, when we introduced Surveys on the Go®, our proprietary app that makes the best mobile research happen. It’s obvious that smartphones are the way to reach Millennials – who now represent America’s largest population bloc, according the U.S. Census Bureau’s most recent estimate.

 

Combined with the million-member, all-mobile active panel of respondents who’ve downloaded the app, Surveys on the Go® keeps MFour on the leading edge in satisfying market researchers’ thirst for reliable, sophisticated data about any demographic's consumer preferences. It particularly excels with the Millennials, Hispanics and African Americans who get left out of conventional online samples because they've gravitated so heavily to smartphones.

 

The alternative for the market research industry is to stick with the fading approach of recruiting panels with email instead of pushes to a smartphone survey app, and then expecting the few who've clicked on the email to complete surveys that are prone to being slow, cumbersome and frustrating for respondents whenever their phones'  connections to the internet become less than optimal.

 

Although these restyled online surveys often get passed off as "mobile" because they can be taken on smartphones, usually with LOIs of no more than five minutes, it's important to draw distinctions. Surveys fielded with Surveys on the Go® are instantly embedded inside panelists phones, allowing them to complete the questions offline. That equates to much longer LOIs -- up to more than 20 minutes -- without interruption or frustration. 

 

To learn more about how all-mobile works, we invite you to explore this website and its sister site, MFourDI, home of the first all-mobile, do-it-yourself survey creation platform.

 

 

 

 

 

Trouble's afoot in the world of market research – witness the title of the CASRO Technology and Innovation Event, Monday and Tuesday in New York City: “The Engagement Crisis.”

The discussion will focus on what CASRO organizers have called a “disturbing trend” -- “As survey participation rates plummet to alarming levels, we need to stop talking around the problem and address it head on.”

MFour Mobile Research’s two-man delegation will show conferees that there’s an effective solution to that problem: all-mobile surveys fielded with the industry’s first and most advanced smartphone survey app, Surveys on the Go®.

Look for these two friendly faces at CASRO: senior solutions executives Alex Colao and Scott Worthge.

Our men in New York will detail how MFour does more than any other mobile option. Our proprietary survey technology, native app and million-member, all-mobile panel combine to create just the dynamic the industry is looking for: an engaged, demographically representative sample of consumers who provide data that’s a fast, accurate and reliable indicator for clients with important business decisions to make.

 “We’ve got Millennials,” is a refrain that conferees are sure to hear a lot from Alex and Scott. Not to mention Hispanics and any other group a study requires.

“The industry finally has realized, `this problem is so severe, we have to  have a conference about it,’” said Scott, a very busy man who teaches market research courses at UC Berkeley and Michigan State University when not evangelizing about all-mobile research for MFour.

“You’ll hear a lot of people at the conference trying to find a solution. We’ve already got a solution.”

So look ‘em up – Alex and Scott will tell you how the beginning of a beautiful friendship with MFour can be the beginning of the end of your research sample woes.

Ramp-up comes amid company’s drive to transform MR industry with all-mobile

Doubling down on its bid to transform the market research industry by bringing it into the age of the smartphone, MFour Mobile Research, Inc. announced today that it is doubling its staff to more than 100 in the coming nine months.

The hiring surge comes as Irvine, CA.-based MFour reaches critical mass with the applied-technology chain reaction it ignited five years ago.

“This is a revolutionary moment,” said Chris St. Hilaire, MFour’s cofounder and CEO. “We’re allowing the market research industry to harness the vast capabilities of smartphones as tools to conduct consumer surveys and generate the kinds of data and insights today’s corporations and brands demand.”

MFour, a privately-held tech venture, made its first impact in 2011 with Surveys on the Go®, the first and still only survey app tailored strictly for optimal function and display on mobile devices.

In April, MFour launched MFourDIY, the first all-mobile do-it-yourself survey-creating platform.

MFour increased its staff significantly in 2015; now the pace is accelerating with six new arrivals in the coming weeks. The ongoing hiring push will allow MFour to extend its technological lead and push the market research field past the tipping point at which hesitation gives way to a full-on embrace of the all-mobile methods MFour has pioneered. The result: a new norm for gathering the consumer data businesses need to thrive.

The hiring wave includes three new software developers who’ll help widen MFour’s technological lead. Two additional sales representatives and an account executive will educate market research firms and corporate research departments about all-mobile methods and bring them on board, expanding a client list of early all-mobile adopters that includes leading consumer brands and entertainment companies, as well as market research firms that already have seen that the best new survey technology and advice on how to use it will help them continue to excel in serving their clients.

“The mobile revolution will unshackle market research from the demographic and technological constraints of the outmoded online studies that are choking off access to fast, accurate and representative data,” St. Hilaire said. “Our lead will continue to widen and our growth escalate as we close in on our goal: to define and dominate mobile research.”

It’s fitting that “The New Face of Consumer Insights,” this week’s conference on the future of market research, took place in the lovely Southern California oceanside community of Marina del Rey.

Members of MFour’s delegation to the conference say the most consistent message they took away is that the industry now recognizes that the tide is going out on MR approaches that no longer work, and coming in strong for new methods. And the best new method – all-mobile research tailored to and optimized for a new mobile era dominated by smartphones – is not only MFour’s distinctive product, but its sole business commitment, its reason to exist.

“You could see people at the conference were open to new approaches. They were talking about new tools they need to meet their challenges and be successful. That’s obviously a great fit for us,” said Alex Colao, who headed up MFour’s contingent of three senior solutions executives.

MFour’s Ashleigh Mann said she was particularly impressed by a talk called “Creating a Research Innovation Ecosystem,” delivered by Marie Wolfe, Consumer & Market Insights Director of Research Innovation at Unilever.

“Her whole speech centered on `if you’re standing still you’re basically moving backwards,’” Ashleigh related. “You need to not be afraid of new techniques, you need to welcome them and understand them. Don’t be afraid to change with the marketplace, or you’ll get steamrolled.”

Next up is the CASRO Technology & Innovation Event, June 6-7 in New York City. We’d like to welcome you in advance to MFour’s exhibit. Let’s talk about how we fit into your future.

The CASRO event’s overview statement makes it clear the conversation we heard in Marina del Rey will be continuing in New York:

 “As survey participation rates plummet to alarming levels, we need to stop talking around the problem and address it head on…We seek to change the trajectory of this disturbing trend…We’ll learn how innovation and technology will provide solutions and lead us down alternate paths to engage the empowered consumer.”

To repeat what Alex, our team leader at the conference in Marina del Rey, said about the ready-for-change vibe that’s in the air: “It’s  obviously a great fit for us.”

In the meantime, see just why that’s the case: spend some time on this website and on MFourDIY.com, the sibling site for the nation’s first and only all-mobile, do-it-yourself survey-creation platform. The solutions you’ll see don’t just beat what the old online approaches can offer – they deliver data that’s faster and better than what online research was able to produce, even in its heyday.

 

We promised you we’d break MR’s sound barrier, but we went way beyond that and reached escape velocity, soaring beyond the previously-known atmospheric limits of market research.

 

Two-hundred quality completes in five hours was our goal for Wednesday’s geolocation-driven speed test of MFourDIY, the first and only all-mobile, do-it-yourself survey creation platform. When we closed the books at 5 p.m., Pacific, completes stood at 580.

 

We thought we had a Learjet; it turned out we had an X-15.

 

The point of the exercise was to show the MR community what a properly-conceived, all-mobile research approach can accomplish.

We’ve been saying for years that all-mobile research is not just inevitable, but better than the online, PC-based method that smartphones are supplanting.

 

“Researchers who care about quality will be thrilled that mobile data is quicker, verified and in-the-moment,” Chris St. Hilaire, MFour’s cofounder and CEO, commented during Wednesday’s successful test. “We’re still hopeful that researchers wedded to online will see the light soon.”

 

We’re confident that our 7-Eleven showcase will persuade researchers that we’ve been on the right track all along – and that now, more than ever, they need to join us. MFour’s all-mobile technology and panel don’t just produce data that’s faster; it’s also more accurate and far more demographically representative than what online surveys taken on a laptop or PC can deliver in this smartphone age. Wednesday’s results prove it.

 

To recap:

 

At noon, Pacific, we began geolocating people in our million-member active panel as they shopped at 7-Elevens around the nation. We pushed a five-minute survey to their mobile devices, just as they left the store (MFourDIY easily can handle lengthy surveys, too -- with a 15-minute LOI, you’ll get a 90% completion rate ). 

 

We asked respondents about their shopping experience at 7-Eleven and got data that could not be more reliable -- given that we were asking about a store visit  that was absolutely fresh in mind.

 

The survey was a combination of single-answer, short-answer and intensity scale questions. Here’s what we found:

 

Our ability to reach Millennials was off the charts – 30% of respondents were 18-24. An additional 64% were 25 to 44 (older Millennials and GenX). So we have the age groups marketers covet most  completely covered.

 

Our survey's share of minorities also far exceeded online research norms. Hispanics accounted for 19.6% of the completes; African-Americans, 10.1% and Asians, 6%.

 

The main reasons respondents gave for their shopping trip to 7-Eleven were:

• Buy a non-alcoholic beverage – 28.5%

• Buy gasoline – 27.3%

• Buy hot or cold food or bakery goods – 16.8%

• Buy tobacco products – 11.5%

Asked to answer on a scale of one to ten how likely they were to shop again at 7-Eleven, 86.2% fell in the “very likely” range of eight to ten.

 

Apparently they got what they came for. Try MFourDIY, and you will, too.

 

Yes, we did what we promised we’d do, live and in full view of the market research industry. Breaking “MR’s equivalent of the sound barrier,” as we somewhat facetiously had put it when we announced today’s little showcase of our MFourDIY^®.  

Starting today at noon, Pacific, we geolocated members of our million-member all-mobile active panel just as they left 7-Elevens across the nation, and sent them a short survey about their shopping experience.

It took just 2 hours and 19 minutes to land the 200 completed surveys we vowed to fetch in no more than five hours – or suffer public humiliation. We did it with MFourDIY, the first all-mobile do-it-yourself survey platform. Many thanks to those who signed up to watch the data come in on the study's real-time project tracker.

As you’ll see in the chart below, we drew this rapid data from a demographically diverse group that included nationally representative proportions of Hispanics/Latinos, African-Americans and other racial and ethnic groups. And we were particularly successful in collecting interviews from Millennials, a smartphone-centric consumer demo that only all-mobile research can reliably reach.

Today's test was a 5-minute survey, but MFourDIY^® can handle lengthy ones, too. With a 15-minute LOI, you can expect a completion rate of 90%.  

But the point of this exercise wasn’t for MFour Mobile Research to puff out its chest over the unique, proprietary research technology and uniquely responsive market research panel that enabled us to pass the test. It’s to show the market research industry that we’ve entered a new, all-mobile age, and that embracing that fact is the solution to the documented problems of traditional online surveys in recruiting enough participants to collect quality, demographically representative data.

 

Click here to learn more about MFourDIY^®.

 

 

 

 

Join in: See live demo -- 200 speedy all-mobile completes from 7-Elevens

We're not chickening out!

We announced this week that we'd push an all-mobile survey to panelists as they leave 7-Elevens nationwide, starting at noon, Pacific today -- and land 200 quality completes in less than five hours.

 Or die trying (of humiliation, that is).

 Well, we aren't backing out. We're that confident in our new MFourDIY survey-building platform, the first all-mobile do-it-yourself market research tool, that we want you to see it in action for yourselves.

 Watch the results come in in real time on the same MFourDIY project tracker you'll be using for your own research as the all-mobile era unfolds. And keep in mind that MFourDIY easily handles lengthy surveys -- 15 minute LOI surveys with a 90% completion rate.

 Are we the masters of all-mobile research that we say we are? Or a bunch of blowhards due for their comeuppance?

To watch, please email us at diy@mfour.com and ask to register for  the MFourDIY 7-Eleven Showcase.  Please provide your full name and company in the  request.

How would you like to field a survey to people walking out of 7-Elevens and get 200 quality interviews within five hours? You’re thinking that you’d love it to death – if only it could be done.

To prove the power of all-mobile research, we’re going to show you how -- and we’ll do it in death-defying real time in front of the whole market research industry.

Tune in Wednesday at 12 noon Pacific to watch MFour’s groundbreaking new all-mobile, do-it-yourself survey-building platform, MFourDIY, go for broke to break MR’s equivalent of the sound barrier. We’ll field a five-minute survey to members of our nationwide panel who we’ll geo-locate on their smartphones as they leave 7-Eleven stores in all 50 states. We’ll land an incomparably fast 200 completes about their shopping experience in five hours – or come off looking like utter fools.

Sound risky? Well, maybe – but when we’re done you’ll know we’re not fooling around. And you’ll have witnessed just a fraction of what MFour’s custom technology and MFour’s superior, million-member, all-mobile active panel can do for you. For instance, if you need 1,000 completes, you’ll get them within 24 hours – easy.

You’ll see our real-time results from 7-Elevens on the same project tracker you’ll be using when you, too, jump on MFourDIY, the fastest set of wheels in do-it-yourself market research. In the meantime, click here to kick our zoom machine’s tires before the big race.

Starting time is Wednesday at 12 p.m., Pacific. The checkered flag waves at 5 p.m., whether we’ve hit 200 completes or not. Be There!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you’re coming to “The New Face of Consumer Insights” conference in Marina del Rey, stop by the MFour Mobile Research exhibit for some friendly chat – and for insights into how our all-mobile approach will take you to the best destinations in the new era that conferees will be discussing.

We’ll be there all three days, manning the MFour exhibit Monday to Wednesday at the Ritz Carlton. Look for the green backdrop that flies the company colors -- and for a big monitor that’s not just for promo videos (although we’ll have some of those).

A key feature of our exhibit is giving you the chance to test-drive MFour’s new all-mobile do-it-yourself survey-building platform, MFourDIY. You’ll get under the hood and see the display on our screen as you build a test survey – just as you will on your own screens when you start fielding surveys on MFourDIY.

We’ll also have special discount DIY offers for conference attendees who want to put the system to work.

The conference’s theme dovetails with MFour’s mission, says Alex Colao (pictured), who’s heading up our conference delegation. “People are going to be talking about how consumer research is changing and how companies are changing their research approaches to take advantage of new processes. We’re there to consult on their business challenges and provide solutions in real time.”

Joining Alex on Monday and Tuesday will be fellow senior solutions  executives Jeannette Ceballos (Monday and Tuesday) and Ashleigh Mann (Wednesday). We’ll also have senior  operations staffers at the conference to acquaint you more deeply with how we help clients create surveys that tap into the vast capabilities of today’s mobile technology, including geo-location and multimedia. Jenny Shi, assistant director of research, will be on hand Monday and senior project manager Alec Schaefer on Tuesday.

Stop by and you'll get something that's old-school mobile to bring home to the kids in your life: little rubber-band-powered helicopters that really can fly – but perhaps not as high as the cutting-edge mobile  research opportunities we’ll be sharing with you.

People traditionally have carried purchasing power in their pockets and purses, but that habit has a new dimension. Smartphones have joined – and may soon supersede - credit cards, cash and checkbooks as essential monetary take-alongs.

Recent research by GlobalWebIndex, a tracker of Internet trends, found that 30% of U.S. smartphone users are making purchases with their mobile devices at least once a month.

“Mobile commerce continues its ascent in importance,” according to the U.K.-based firm’s biannual report on Internet commerce.

This leap in mobile shopping and buying is one more exhibit in the ever-rising mountain of evidence that the age of the personal computer is winding down as the Mobile era takes over. If you don’t believe it, just look in your own pocket or purse.

As we keep saying, the market research industry needs to adjust accordingly. Sticking with email survey notifications and online panels no longer makes  sense in a new age in which texting and smartphone apps predominate. Only custom, all-mobile technology and specially cultivated mobile online panels will do the job properly – and that has been MFour Mobile Research’s mission and competitive advantage since the 2011 debut of its all-mobile native app, Surveys On The Go®.

Here are some other interesting findings from GlobalWebIndex’s surveys of 103,000  Internet users ages 16 to 64:

• Worldwide, monthly use of mobile shopping apps shot up 50% from mid-2014 to late 2015.

• Among Millennials, the rising generational cohort that is shaping commerce for the 21^st century, 80% make monthly online purchases.

• The average amount of time Millennials spend online with a mobile device grew 76.4% from 2012 to 2015, to more than three hours per day.

Among the conclusions GWI draws from its data:

• “The increasing centrality of smartphones to the digital habits of Internet users means that every aspect of the purchase journey is being influenced by mobiles."

• “Mobiles are on course to capture more daily time than all other devices put together – emphasizing just how dominant the smartphone has become within the daily lives of this trend-setting [Millennial] audience.”

This just in, by the way, from the techcrunch blog, reporting on new research by brand consultant Influence Central: “The average age for [children] getting their first smartphone is now 10.3 years.”

In other words, this trend isn’t going away.

For a full analysis of why market research needs to go mobile, check out this op-ed that Chris St. Hilaire, MFour’s cofounder and CEO, recently wrote for RW Connect.