Market research recruiting is subject to the same market forces as any other industry. There are disruptions, improvements, advancements, contractions, and expansions. And since market research recruiting works in lockstep with market research, sometimes the headwinds feel amplified.
Market researchers are under pressure to incorporate new methodologies for capturing customer insights, and the perennial pressure of wanting more for less is always squeezing margins. Adapt, or die.
Focus Insite has been fortunate to work with a number of market research firms that have not balked at the quickly changing landscape and have pivoted to incorporate strategies so they remain relevant and current.
Let’s take a look at the top 3 areas of advancement in market research and market research recruiting.
Storytelling: What has changed the most for market researchers is the amount of time spent crafting reports. New technologies are streamlining and automating the data collection process, and researchers are spending more time on higher-level analytics and storytelling, and less time generating reports. How this impacts market research recruiting is in the types of people needed to participate in market research studies. Since so much data is generated automatically providing aerial insights, researchers need to be more selective and precise in the types of candidates who can best give voice to the ‘noisy data.’
Speed: Many market research firms are being asked to check in with users to verify the accuracy of sentiment monitoring, and other similar tools being used to gauge the emotional reactions of customers and users. Again, such tools are great at providing a very aerial view, but not so great about getting to the ‘why’ and ‘how’ customers are trending one way or another. Companies want quick answers and thus researchers and recruiters need to respond quickly. Our recruiting teams stay nimble by engaging with multiple professional networks and online communities so that when we get the call to find respondents fast, we can deliver.
Specialized study participants:It was not that long ago that a majority of studies we recruited for were more general. Nowadays, we are tasked with finding very niche audiences to fill a study. Whether its medical or technical; B2B or B2C, our teams are needing to dig deeper and work harder to find qualified candidates for studies. Fortunately, we’re up to the challenge and pride ourselves on finding the best people, no matter how challenging.
No industry is immune to challenges and changes. Even though many aspects of market research are now automated, there will always be a need for people to interpret and verify data. AI-generated data cannot provide context, key insights, perspective, or implications. Only market research consultants can make sense of the copious amounts of information and personalize data. At the end of the day, people are still needed to interpret and give voice to information.
