Research Motivations and Engagement in an Online Era
Guest post from Paul Hudson of FlexMR. Paul Hudson, CEO & Founder of FlexMR, a research agency based in the UK. Paul has over eight years of market research experience. A regular guest speaker at AQR and ICG events, Paul is an experienced online qualitative research who is actively involved in developing new research techniques for online application. Here Paul shares his insight and findings from a career of market research, and what researchers should bear in mind when engaging online participants. I am a firm believer that engaging participants lead to better market research. It sounds obvious, and no-one, that I know of, would disagree. But what seems so simple is something that is often overlooked or ignored. We must, as researchers, recognise that traditional methods of engagement are no longer effective. As more research is conducted online, researchers and participants become more distant. There is no longer a face to face connection, and little common ground to build a strong emotional connection. So, when working with new clients and new participants, I try to take a step back and ask a few basic questions. 1. Why is this participant interested? The obvious answer is the reward – but this […]