People like people

Senior business folk like numbers. Facts and statistics to base decisions on and to evaluate performance. It’s both rational and sensible. But occasionally, it is beneficial not to be rational or sensible. As the Apple “Think Different” campaign so memorably reminded us. Organisations should have plenty of talented members capable of coming up with creative [...]

Observation and participation

One of the (many) criticisms of market research is that it is based on artificial, post-rationalised claimed responses. This line of thinking contends that there have been plenty of studies showing us to be unreliable witnesses to our own thoughts and actions – therefore surveys, focus groups and the like can’t be trusted. Obviously, the [...]

Homicide: A Year On The Killing Streets

I regularly buy books but I rarely read them. I’m making a conscious effort to rectify that – not only because of the expense of purchasing them, but because reading books is (for me at least) a different type of experience to reading online. I read slower and more carefully, thus absorbing the general flow [...]

Should we listen to every conversation?

Over on the Essential Research blog, I have responded to a post by a social media conversation monitor who eulogised the death of focus groups. In that post, I have outlined why focus groups themselves aren’t the issue; rather it is shoddy application. Here, I want to expand on that a bit. It is my [...]

Koyaanisqatsi and different perspectives

Last night I finally got around to watching Koyaanisqatsi, Godfrey Reggio’s classic collaboration with the master of the recursive composition, Philip Glass. It is the first part of a trilogy, with Powaqqatsi and Naqoyqatsi succeeding. Koyaanisqatsi is a Hopi Indian word that means (in one translation) “Life Out of Balance”. The central message of the [...]

We Need to Change: Presentation on Market Research

Helge Tennø has created several visually arresting and thought provoking presentation decks and the latest is no exception. We Need to Change is – in his words – a loosely structured collection of thoughts and references regarding the mediocre but promising state of market research (RSS readers may need to click through) I like the [...]