¡MILLENNIALS!

 

“What do Millennials Want?” is a question businesses and market researchers need to answer now and for many years to come. 

We take a particular interest in Millennials as consumers, and they make up a majority of our million-active-member U.S. survey panel. Consequently, we're ideally positioned for our ongoing Millennial Insights Project.

After publishing  the first three installments individually, we've gathered links to each one  in this post for easy reference, and for readers who may have missed them earlier. The project's first phase was  a survey of 1,000 Millennials fielded Sept. 10 and completed within two hours using MFourDIY™.  We reported findings about Millennials' preferences in Entertainment, Money and Finance, and Technology.

To see them, just click on the topic names below. Note that each segment gives a detailed account of the survey methodology; you also can follow a link from each report to access the survey's Project Tracker. We invite you to review  the questions we asked, explore the data we gathered, and get a sense of how we operate and what MFourDIY™can help you accomplish.  

Entertainment 

Money and Finance

Technology

Remember, MFour is unique in fielding surveys that respondents receive and answer solely on an app they’ve downloaded to their smartphones or tablets. Unlike flawed, quick-fix mobile methods, which simply repackage online surveys that require emails notifications and   web-based questionnaires, we engage today’s consumers where they live — on their phones and using apps.

Because we're uniquely positioned to reach Millennials, we'll continue to engage  them and report back on what we find. 

 

 

 

 

Today’s splintered TV viewing landscape demands a new research approach.

 

It sounds like something we’d say ourselves, but in this case it’s the theme of a very cogent commentary at MediaPost.com by media consultant Steve Sternberg.

 

He poses important questions that programmers and advertisers need answered, but that are beyond the reach of customary data-gathering methods in the TV/Entertainment sphere.

 

Writes Sternberg: “Methods of drawing samples might need to be revisited, not to mention ways to evaluate media usage even among standard demographic age groups. Consumers whose media usage was once relatively similar if they were in the same few demographic categories may no longer be as cohesive as we think. Large groups of broadly similar consumers now get their video content in substantially different ways.”

 

Sternberg poses a series of questions about how viewer characteristics and habits might vary across the many ways people now access programming, but says that for now the answers remain a matter of guesswork: 

 

“We can speculate on these things, but this is where research needs to go now,” he writes. “Change is happening too quickly, and research needs to turn on a dime.”

 

“TV might be everywhere,” Sternberg concludes, “but really good research is still nowhere near where it needs to be.”

 

To us at MFour, Sternberg’s article reads like a request for proposals.

 

Our value proposition is this: By applying advanced, all-mobile survey methodology, along with years of experience with numerous projects for entertainment clients, we can get the answers and insights Sternberg and many others crave.

 

Our fans include Derek Turk, Vice President of Ratings & Research for Lions Gate Entertainment, who has raved about MFourDIY™, the market research industry’s first and only all-mobile, do-it-yourself survey platform. “Easy to program and field,” Turk says.

 

For a deeper look into what MFourDIY™ (or our custom-built research solutions) can do in the advertising/entertainment realm, check out our recent report, “1,000-Millennial Study Explores Entertainment Consumption,” part of our ongoing Millennial Insights Project. You’ll see  that we can segment respondents by their individual viewing habits – enabling researchers to do a deep dive into the very questions Sternberg says are begging to be answered.

 

And please feel free to click above-right on "contact" to set up a demonstration.

 

 

It’s that time of year again, when autumn becomes a cornucopia of delights for sports fans.

 

The National Football League is in full swing; Major League Baseball has entered its climactic playoffs, the National Hockey League and National Basketball Assn. are back in action with preseason games, and qualifying rounds are underway in soccer’s biggest competition, the World Cup.

 

While fans feast on this menu, market researchers can feast on the insight-rich data to be had by surveying those fans – not just about their sports interests, but anything researchers might want to know about people who are avid about sports.

 

Whatever you want to learn from sports fans, MFour’s App Tracking capability is the surest, most efficient way to find them.

 

Here’s how it works:

 

We gather passive data telling us which apps the Android users on our million active-member Surveys on the Go® panel are using.

 

Clients target respondents who use a given app, then send them a survey they receive and answer with their smartphones.

 

The lines of inquiry are limitless. But reaching avid sports fans efficiently and reliably takes a very specific and specialized approach. Targeting them by the sports apps they use is the shortcut that will answer many a research need.

 

Here are a few of the popular sports apps whose users you can access with App Tracking:

 

• NFL Mobile
• NBA Mobile
• Fox Sports
• ESPN
• Yahoo Fantasy Sports

                                                                                                                                               

You can ask these committed fans anything. Gain insights into buying habits for sports merchandise, favorite game-day snacks, or the popularity and effectiveness of a particular star athlete’s product endorsements.

 

• Need to know what fans think is a fair price for a sports jersey?
• Trying to decide whether to cut ties with a player who’s been starring in a commercial, but now faces bad publicity over an off-field incident?
• Wondering about fans’ willingness to give up a big screen experience and watch games on smartphones?
• When it comes to preferences within a given product category, do football fans differ from baseball or basketball fans?

 

 

Finding the most attuned fans with App Tracking helps you score rapid insights.

 

 

And of course, app-based targeting brings the same advantages for reaching consumers with proven interests and preferences in any other category -- travel, entertainment, banking, technology, retail shoppers, and social media users, among others.

 

 

Mobile App Tracking is always in season.

 

To learn more, click on our contact button above and we’ll fill you in.

 

 

 

 

When Popeye says “I yam what I yam and that’s all what I yam,” then toots his pipe, we believe him implicitly.

 

Everyone else has to prove it. Especially the people you’re counting on to take your research surveys.

 

Which is why MFour has added fingerprint scanning as its latest layer of validation to ensure that members of our all-mobile, Surveys on the Go® research panel are who they say they are.

 

Many phones have fingerprint recognition capabilities for unlocking the device (Apple’s Touch ID and Samsung’s Fingerprint Scanner, for example); MFour extends this so that SOTG members can sign in to the survey app with fingerprints that validate who they are. This adds another degree of assurance that respondents’ identities are confirmed and the data they provide is reliable.

 

Fingerprint scanning joins the other layers of respondent validation you get with MFour:

 

• Consistency between a respondent’s SOTG account and a linked Facebook account.
• Consistency between the respondent’s SOTG account and his or her survey payout account with PayPal, Visa, Amazon or Starbucks.
• GPS-enabled GeoValidation® to identify respondents’ whereabouts.
• Passive tracking data automatically captured from panel members’ phones.
• Data cleaning by our in-house research and operations experts, who analyze completed surveys for disqualifying signs of speeding, flat-lining, and open-ended responses that are too brief or make no sense. Data cleaning is provided at no charge.
• Respondents who cheat or give non-responsive answers are dismissed from the panel and locked out of rejoining.

 

From the panelists’ point of view, fingerprint scanning to sign in to Surveys on the Go® provides one more way to explore and enjoy a capability of their beloved smartphones. So it’s a win-win for respondents and clients alike.

 

They’re happy to let us (and you) check their credentials at the door.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The biggest names in business continue to place ever-bigger bets in the mobile realm.

 

Facebook, already a colossus of mobile reach and mobile revenue, aims to become even more colossal by introducing Marketplace, a newly-announced free mobile-shopping tool that will play matchmaker between buyers and sellers. It’s a leap into the secondary market in which Facebook becomes a space where shoppers and sellers can meet, negotiate prices, and solidify delivery plans – all inside its mobile app.

 

With $9.5 billion in mobile advertising revenue during the first half of 2016 (that’s 83% of its overall advertising income), Facebook can afford to create this new mobile Marketplace without charging sellers an entry fee. It’s likely to compete with Amazon Marketplace and eBay, which do take a cut of sellers' revenue, and Craigslist.

 

As with all big developments in the mobile realm – and they’re happening almost every day – there are important implications for market research. Clinging to online panels when consumers are all but living on their smartphones and turning to mobile apps looks increasingly like a dead end strategy. Mobile adoption is now all but universal, and the appeal of online research tools such as email and personal computers  is waning, especially among consumers under 40.

 

But change comes hard, and we know there's some hesitation to dive into mobile, even with the likes of Facebook telling you the water's fine.

 

 

With that in mind, here are three ideas to consider:

 

• If you’re clinging to online panel and still hesitant to try mobile, consider this thought piece that Michael Smith, MFour’s Chief Product Officer and Director of Panel, contributed to GreenBook.

• If you’re worried that going mobile will invalidate past online data that you value, you can reconcile, integrate and calibrate the historic online data with new mobile data, assuring a smooth transition to the new reality. No need to worry about a sudden jolt rupturing your research's continuity.                    

• If you’re ready for mobile but want to know more about the best practices and approaches – and are worried about whether mobile comes with certain limitations such as short surveys (they don’t, at least not in state-of-the-art mobile methods), this article by MFour founder and CEO Chris St. Hilaire will tell you what to look for.

 

If you don't have Facebook-style billions to bet on mobile, consider MFourDIY™, the first all-mobile, do-it-yourself survey-building platform, as a cost-effective way to kick the tires on mobile research, then take it for a first spin. Like many others who are taking that route, we think you'll enjoy the ride. 

 

Photo credit: Michael Vadon (Donald Trump); Gage Skidmore (Hillary Clinton)

 

Here’s more bad news for online surveys: they’ve now been roped into the mudslinging of the presidential campaign, which can only mean more mud is being splattered indiscriminately on their reputation.

 

A recent headline in the New York Times reads “Why You Shouldn’t Trust `Polls’ Conducted Online.” The article details how data from respondents who answer invitations to take polls posted on news organizations’ websites is more or less worthless. These survey-takers simply aren’t representative of the voting public.

 

Granted, online market research has a much firmer basis in reality than the stunt-like ad-hoc online political polls the Times wrote about. But that basis is crumbling fast, and it’s dawning on many market researchers and clients that the data online research surveys produce has tumbled into a sinkhole of unreliability.

 

It’s a rare online research supplier that will publish its panel’s characteristics in detail. But researchers deserve to know who’s going to answer their questions, and anything less than open disclosure can breed doubt and distrust that's unhealthy for any industry.

 

For full disclosure of the demographic characteristics of the million-plus active members who make up MFour's Surveys on the Go® panel, just scroll to the bottom of this post. Please let us know if you can find comparable transparency elsewhere.

 

We did find one example in which a supplier of online sample published  a detailed statistical profile of its panel composition in the U.S. Kudos to that  company for doing the right thing.

 

But the facts it's sharing only add hard evidence that explains the rising note of discontent among end-users of market research, as the realization sinks in that the online surveys they're buying no longer are delivering the reliability and efficiency they need.

 

The supplier in question states that it has well over one million panelists in the U.S., of whom 71% are women. That's way out of sync with the reality of human biology, let alone the reality of the marketplace. It also lists the ethnicities represented on its panel – but glaringly omits Hispanics/Latinos. If research can’t connect with a representative cohort of U.S. Hispanics, how can it be in touch with the reality of the American marketplace?

 

Lastly, it acknowledges that only about 20% of its respondents complete surveys on a mobile device. 

 

As many studies have made clear – not least MFour’s ongoing Millennial Insights Project -- mobile devices are contemporary society’s crucial, dominant, definitively pervasive (supply your own adjective) means of communication and information exchange. How can any industry, especially MR, whose raison d’etre is keeping a finger on the public pulse, credibly claim to be engaging a representative cross-section of the public if it’s communicating in ways most of the public regards as all but archaic?

 

We grant that, unlike the instant online presidential polls that will continue to proliferate from now to Election Day, online market research has integrity and does all it can to serve clients honorably and effectively. Its methods were verifiably effective for many years. But mobile technology has changed the world, and online’s day has passed. Soon it will be like the phone booth or the electric typewriter – a one-time necessity that fell into near-total disuse because technology transformed how the public communicates and transmits information.

 

“Follow the money” was the signature line from “All the President’s Men,” a classic film about the earthshaking political fallout from the 1972 presidential election. In market research, the new imperative is “follow the consumers.” The consumers are not online. They are to be found on mobile – in all their glorious, fully-representative diversity.

 

Research needs to be there, too.

 

As promised, here's the panel you'll get when you go with MFour. Please feel free to pass our chart around.

 

 

 

To wind up the first phase of MFour’s Millennial Insights Project, here's Part 3, on Millennials' views on Technology & Lifestyle -- with a focus on the smartphones and other computing devices that are the dominant technology in their lives.

Our study aims to generate insights into this crucial, much-analyzed consumer cohort of more than 75 million Americans, while demonstrating to the market research industry that the fastest, most reliable and effective way to reach Millennials is on the devices that define them -- the smartphones from which, as the results below show, they are in many cases literally inseparable. 

The data for this report -- and for the  previous segments on Millennials & Entertainment and Millennials & Money and Finance -- was obtained through the first wide-ranging, demographically representative study of Millennials undertaken solely by smartphone app. The fundamental premise is that Millennials are best engaged -- and will have the most comfortable and productive survey-taking experience -- on the mobile devices  that fully engage them in all phases of their lives.

Using MFourDIY™,  the first all-mobile, do-it-yourself survey platform, we obtained 1,000 validated responses within two hours from Millennials on the million-member active panel that uses the Surveys on the Go® smartphone app. The 30-question survey covered Entertainment, Money & Finance and Technology & Lifestyles, giving a representative picture of the U.S. Millennial population by sex, age, race/ethnicity, income and employment status.

These are key insights on how Millennials use smartphones and other computing devices.

Mobile is Multiple: Smartphone owners haven’t abandoned other computing devices – as long as those other devices meet the portability test. 87.1% also own a laptop, and 71.4% have a tablet.

But Smartphones are Essential: 92.3% of Millennials said they use their phones at least several times a day, compared to 32.1% for laptops. 44.9% said they spend at least five hours a day on their smartphones – compared to 23.3% who spend five or more hours on a personal computer (desktop or laptop). 79.3% of Millennials use their phones at least two hours a day, compared to 45.7% for personal computers.

Only 3.8% of respondents said they use their smartphones less than an hour a day. Millennials are far more likely to make sparing use of laptops and/or desktops - 26.3% report using them less than an hour a day.

A Constant Companion: 45.3% of Millennials say they keep their smartphones with them 24-7. 93.2% say they keep their phones on their persons or nearby at least 10 hours a day.

Minorities are Really Into Their Phones: Majorities of African Americans (57.1%) and Hispanics (51.6%) reported spending five hours or more per day on their phones; Asians (42%) also exceeded Caucasians (38.9%) when it came to epic phone usage.

Desktops are Bottoming Out: Millennials are pushing the granddaddy of personal computers into retirement. Only 45.2% of them own a desktop; men are the diehards, with 50.6% still holding on to desktops, compared to just 39.8% of women. Affluence is another predictor for ownership of what most Millennials apparently perceive as a luxury they can live without. 54.2% of respondents living in households with annual incomes of at least $75,000 said they had a desktop as well as a smartphone. Desktop ownership in Millennial households with earnings under $50,000 was 42%.

Only one-third of Millennials (33.1%) say they use a desktop computer at least once a day. Almost as many (30%) are now using wearable devices such as smart watches at least once a day.

Whole Lotta Checkin’ Goin’ On: 88.7% of Millennials check text messages the moment they get them. They’re considerably less compulsive about social media and app notifications (41.2% and 40.5%, respectively, get checked immediately). Email continues to trend downward -- just 35.3% get opened right away. 51% check their apps' push notifications at least once an hour, compared to 48.6% for email. 

OK With Their OS: Overall, Millennials seem satisfied with whatever smartphone operating system they’re using now. Those saying they were likely or very likely to switch (25.6%) were outnumbered two-to-one by those who said they were unlikely or very unlikely to make a change (51.9%). That left 22.5% who could go either way.

However, there were  differences  in the degree of loyalty commanded by Apple's iOS system and Google's Android. They were comparable when it came to their shares of loyal users -- -- 53.8% of iOS users and 50.4% of Android users said they were likely or very likely not to switch devices. But on the other end, Android users were twice as likely to express  discontent: 32.9% said they were likely or very likely to switch to a different OS, compared to 16.7% for iOS.

Can Google poach some of the 29.5% of iOS users who said they were neutral about keeping their current system, while persuading the 16.7% of neutral Android users to stay? Can Apple succeed in prying loose the one-third of Android-using Millennials who apparently are unimpressed with Google's system? Or, with nearly half of Millennials either poised to change operating systems or sitting on the fence, is there an opening for other system designers to compete?

Meet Your Next App: When it comes to discovering new apps to download, Millennials rank advice from family and friends (61%), social media (60.4%) and Apple and Google’s app stores (56.7%) as by far the biggest influences. The advertising about apps that's most likely to influence them is the kind they they receive through an app -- 33..6% of Millennials cited in-app advertising as a factor, compared to 23.4% who said ads on television, radio or in print media helped them discover new apps. News coverage ranked last as a portal to discovering, cited as an influence by 15.1%.

When it came to using  social media to discover apps to download, women were notably more active than men -- 67.6% to 53.2%. The same goes for legacy advertising (television, radio and print), cited by 27.4% of women and 19.4% of men. African Americans also stood out in citing legacy advertising channels as a source of information about apps – 37.1% compared to 22.6% of Hispanics and 20.5% of Caucasians. 

Just A Few Go A Long Way: About half of Millennials (50.7%) use 4 to 6 different mobile apps per day. At the extremes, just 15.4% use no more than 3 apps daily, and 13.5% use 10 or more. App usage varies little across ethnicities, age segments and gender.

Methodology

 

Using MFourDIY, the market research industry’s first all-mobile, do-it-yourself platform for designing and carrying out studies, MFour fielded a 30-question survey on Sept. 10 to Millennials who make up about 60% of its million-member active panel, all of whom participate in research via the Surveys on the Go® app for smartphones and tablets. Fielding time was less than two hours for 1,000 validated responses.

Responses reflected U.S. Millennials’ demographic profile: 50% male, 50% female; 56% Caucasian, 19% Hispanic/Latino, 14% African American/Black, 5% Asian, 1% each for Middle Eastern, Pacific Islanders and Native Americans/Alaskans; 3% Other. Age brackets were 18-24 (36%), 25-29 (31%) and 30-36 (33%). The study also segmented respondents by whether they were parents of children under 18, their type of work (full-time blue collar and white collar, part-time, unemployed), and their income (six brackets from $25,000 or less to $100,000 or more).

To read our previous reports, for Part 1, Entertainment, click here.

For Part 2, Money & Finance, click here. 

To view  all survey data, visit  surveysonthego.net/tracker and use these login credentials:

Username: MillennialCaseStudy

Password: MFourMillennials

 

 

 

A blackberry is once again just a pricey item in the produce aisle, now that its once-dominant technological namesake, BlackBerry, will no longer be manufacturing BlackBerrys. 

 

This exit from the mobile hardware marketplace was far from unexpected. Although BlackBerry was an innovator and muscular market force when it introduced the earliest devices to combine email, web access and telephonic communications in a single hand-held unit, that was in the early 2000s. Starting in 2007, Apple’s iPhones and Google’s Android system quickly captured the public’s attention, affection, and purchasing power, and BlackBerry’s sales rapidly declined.

 

The BlackBerry’s saga resonates with MFour, because we’ve also been a pioneer in mobile technology – in our case, the development and advancement of Surveys on the Go®, the first and still only all-mobile market research app. We rolled it out in 2011 and have been advancing its functionality and utility ever since.

 

We work both sides of the technological street: improving the experience for the survey-takers who use the app, and for the clients who field surveys to panelists. Surveys on the Go® now has more than one million active panelists; with no recruiting on our part, membership keeps growing by more than 2,000 a day -- a word-of-mouth testament to the user experience SOTG members enjoy. 

 

The core premise is that the better the panelist’s experience, the better the data quality will be. People love carrying out tasks on their smartphones – as long as all goes smoothly. We make the match between researchers’ needs and the public’s enthusiasm for technologically-driven pleasures. Call it serious fun – fun for respondents, leading to serious consumer insights for researchers.

 

The takeaway from the story of BlackBerry is that innovators can’t relax. Sure, it’s OK to take a deserved bow for having conceived and birthed a new product, service or delivery system. But then you have to keep on innovating. There’s no basking in the afterglow of conception when you’re confronted with the never-ending challenge of optimizing the function and utility of whatever it is you’ve conceived. A BlackBerry was the coolest device you could pull out of a pocket or a handbag -- until it wasn't.

 

The driveshaft of MFour and Surveys on the Go® is our Labs & Engineering division. Its staff constantly devises upgrades both subtle and sweeping to ensure that our panelists will enjoy the easiest, most engaging survey-taking experience on their mobile devices. L&E also is obsessed with anticipating the MR industry’s needs – which means expanding researchers’ options for obtaining ever-richer data and insights, while minimizing the time and effort it takes to obtain them.

 

A leading example of our stamina as innovators is MFourDIY™, the first all-mobile, do-it-yourself research tool. We debuted it in April, and have been adding further new research capabilities since then, both on the do-it-yourself platform and in our core, custom-designed surveys. Also new this year is our app-tracking feature, which allows clients to sort and query panelists according to which apps they use. It’s one more option for identifying and interviewing the consumers most relevant to the research task at hand.

 

"In the mobile space you've got to always start new," says Chris Monahan, MFour's Chief Technology Officer. "BlackBerry just got too comfortable. It's about always staying on the cutting edge, and riding the wave."

 

This, Chris adds, is a pleasure, not a chore.

 

"At our core, we love technology. Like kids at Christmas time, we love the latest cell phones and new server technologies. We are geeks who love to learn and share this excitement with each other. This culture is what drives the SOTG platform. If we aren't using the latest and greatest in technology, we become stagnant."

 

The consequences of stagnation are very real in any business: keep moving, or you might get squished. If you need a reminder, look to the produce aisle.

 

 

 

What are the special questions of identity that U.S. minorities grapple with – shaping their lives, including their lives as consumers?

 

The MRA’s SoCal Chapter will delve into this hugely important question in its 6^th annual Multicultural Event, Thursday, Oct. 13, at 6 p.m. at the 1919 restaurant in San Diego’s Gaslamp District.

 

Todd Costello, MFour Senior Solutions Executive and chapter President, invites anyone who’s interested to register for the panel discussion, which is open to members and non-members alike (see details below).

 

“We have an experienced panel of multicultural market research practitioners speaking on the dilemma every minority person faces as it relates to acculturation vs. assimilation among U.S. Hispanic, Asian and African Americans,” Costello said.

 

Carlos Garcia of Garcia Research will be the moderator; other panelists are Lawrence Yeung (361 Degrees Consulting, Inc.), Gwen Young (Young Communications Group, Inc.), David Morse (New American Dimensions) and Marissa Romero-Martin (Culturati).

 

Admission is $45, $25 for students, and includes an open bar, appetizers and desserts.

Seating is limited and fills up fast.

 

Networking and refreshments are from 6 to 7 p.m.

The program runs from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

 

Register at:

http://www.cvent.com/d/1vqzts

 

 

Here's your Friday roundup of 3 items from the MFour blog to keep you up to speed on mobile research as you head into the weekend. Whatever else you do, don't forget to check at the bottom for something to mobilize your spirits and get you humming.

1,000 Millennials' Entertainment Consumption

DIY Researchers: We'll Back You Up

Mobile Research: The Big Picture

And here's a Friday tune to send you hopping and smiling into your weekend.