Market researchers need the opposite of a blog
By Mike Moran. Filed in Market Research, Social Media Marketing |Tags: market research, reverse blog, social media
Image by jdlasica via Flickr
OK, I get it it. You probably haven’t spent much time considering the question of what the opposite of a blog is. But Genevieve Bell has. She is working on something she calls a “reverse blog,” and I wonder if the idea contains an element that we’ve overlooked in social media and online market research. Market researchers struggling with how to adapt to the challenges of the Web might not want to overlook anything.
Genevieve is an Intel Fellow who is working with her government in South Australia to get the opinion of the people. She was quoted in FAST Company: “I am running a reverse blog,” she says, “asking citizens to share their stories of how technology affects their lives.”
This reminds me of Dell’s IdeaStorm, where customers can contribute product development ideas. This kind of crowdsourcing is good, but maybe there is a bigger idea here.
We all know that market research has gone online. Those ubiquitous polls by SurveyMonkey provide a structured way to get opinions quantified. And we know that focus groups have moved online, where certain customers are asked to share their opinions in more free-form style.
Is Genevieve on to something? I think she might be. Her approach is free form, like a focus group or crowdsourcing, but is not exclusive (you don’t have to be invited) or focused (it’s not about a specific problem).
Are market researchers looking at this? I think they should be.
Wednesday, July 8th 2009 at 9:21 pm |
Mike:
This “reverse blog” already exists. It is called communities.
We just finished a research project about the future of entertainment where we analyzed over 40 million (online) conversations between some 3 million people. (From the last 12 months.)
There is a plethora of information out there – it mostly isn’t about brands, but about people helping each other solve problems. Lots of it is about technology.
If you want to chat about this – you can reach me at the email above.
TO’B
MotiveQuest LLC
Wednesday, July 8th 2009 at 11:59 pm |
Hi Tom,
I am not sure that I agree. My company, Converseon, mines lots of these conversations, but I think what Genevieve is doing ties the conversations together better than just analyzing what people tend to see with no central place to say it when they know the other party is listening. I mean, what I say to someone as feedback is different than what I say to you about them as a third party. There is a need for both.