MarketTools Blog

This is a follow-up to the recent blog post on mobile market research titled "Getting Started On Your Mobile Market Research Journey".  Here we focus on the third cornerstone of the mobile research framework: Research Applications.

One of the great things about having kids is I get to go to amusement parks much more frequently. But one of the downsides is having to wait in line for the rides, usually for about 20 minutes or more. While standing in line on a recent trip, I was impressed by a sign inviting me to give my feedback about my experience in the park. This was a welcome distraction from the monotony of waiting, so I texted the number and within a few moments the first question arrived on my mobile phone.

My initial good impressions were quickly dispelled. After just one question, I was invited to give fuller feedback at a kiosk near the park's exit. Did they seriously expect me to remember to find this kiosk and spend 10 minutes at the end of the day, when the kids are inevitably tired and hungry, and we all just want to get home?

I had a similar experience with a coffee chain at a train station asking for feedback on their customer service. Once again, the ingredients were right: free wi-fi at the station, consumer downtime waiting for a train, a web-based survey, etc.  However, when I tried to access the survey via my smartphone, the page failed to load. Was it because the coffee chain didn’t design the survey for a smartphone – thinking that consumers would be willing to unpack their laptops?  Or maybe they considered it sufficient that their mobile survey only worked on certain models of phones. (I only tested the link on one of the more common Android handsets!)

If you are considering using mobile market research tools to get in-the-moment feedback on the customer experience, here are five pointers to maximize response rates to hear a representative voice of the consumer:

• Give people the opportunity to provide real-time feedback by making your mobile survey accessible instantly, thereby avoiding drop-out or putting obstacles in their way
• Leverage downtime when customers are more likely to see a survey as a welcome distraction rather than a task that competes with other things they’d prefer to be doing
• Choose an appropriate mobile survey platform, whether text or mobile browser-based, that gets the right balance between efficiencies of data collection and analysis, and ensuring a representative spread of responses
• Keep it simple, avoiding graphics or enhanced functionality unless absolutely necessary, to ensure the survey script works on all mainstream devices likely to be used by your customer base
• Make it easy for respondents to access the survey – for example, via a free messaging service for text based responses, or using short URLs and QR codes for browser based surveys.

By following these five tips, it's more likely that respondents will act on your mobile survey invitation, complete the survey, and provide high-quality data that you might not have been able to capture through more traditional research methodologies.  With results that reflect real, in-the-moment actions and perceptions, your mobile survey instrument can deliver richer insights that will help you make better decisions.