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The Funniest Market Research Finding I've Ever Read
People ask the funniest (dumbest) things.
Posted March 7, 2013
In 2009 I began researching the psychology of market research. Was asking questions really a good way of understanding consumers? I had my suspicions that it wasn’t.
Many years working in market research had got me wondering: often the people with first hand experience of the businesses operations seemed uncomfortable with what was being reported back from surveys and focus groups. And yet they couldn’t argue with the ‘voice of the consumer’.
In the course of my research I came across many examples of market research that were amusing. In most cases these were funny in hindsight. For instance, when UK consumers said that Budweiser beer was, ‘Weak and watery - like kissing your sister’: it was only the ultimate success of the product’s introduction that makes the comments amusing.
Similarly, with the research used to gauge the appeal of Absolut Vodka in the US. The research concluded that there was no interest in a Swedish vodka. The importers were so frustrated that they’d wasted $80,000 on research that they brought in some cases to sell to try and recoup that money, and found they had a tremendously successful product on their hands.
At the heart of the issue is the fact that people don’t know how they will respond to something new when they encounter it in the real world. Under the contextual influences present at the time, many of which are processed outside of conscious awareness, they may or may not find a product appealing.
The evidence from psychology for the role of our unconscious mind in consumer behaviour is overwhelming. Which makes any research method that presumes that people can consciously account for their preferences inherently flawed.
Add in the fact that the research process itself creates a myriad of unconscious influences, and you begin to see why the same issue, asked in slightly different ways, can produce dramatically different conclusions.
How different? In one example I uncovered, two research companies researched the same issue simultaneously, at the same time, with the same methodology. One concluded 66% of consumers were in favour of a particular initiative, the other just 6%.
Statistical theory struggles to account for this difference. Psychological analysis of the questionnaires makes it entirely clear why the difference occurred – in fact, it’s almost predictable.
And yet, lots of this kind of research continues to be used. This is, itself, interesting from a psychological standpoint. People believe that asking consumers questions is worthwhile for two reasons:
- It fits with their (inaccurate) view of themselves as conscious agents of their actions.
- They like the idea that difficult decisions can be validated by some external reference: they are prepared to believe that market research can, unlike every other form of voodoo that they cast aside, predict the future.
The seductive appeal of market research is perhaps best exposed when a monumentally silly question is asked and reported as though it were an insight into people’s wants or desires.
Yesterday, a friend shared a report with me that contained just such an example: indeed, it is the funniest thing I’ve ever read in a market research report. It’s so silly that it also highlights the fact that you can’t rely on a respondent to say, “Hang on, that’s a stupid question.”
I could explain why I think it’s silly, but I really don’t think it needs an explanation from me. For those outside the UK and unfamiliar with its retailers, all you need to know is that Marks & Spencer and Primark are both stores that primarily sell clothing. The research was about growing membership of tennis clubs.
I promise that what follows was asked and reported in a piece of research, undoubtedly commissioned at considerable expense:
“Four out of five women would play more sport if it were more like shopping at Marks & Spencers and Primark”.
Priceless!
References: Consumer.ology by Philip Graves (2013)
