2019: How will Research Automation evolve?

2018 was a big year in research automation. And we’ve had a great run too. We launched a research engine for our clients which enabled them to have faster insights at a cost-effective price. We were also able to accommodate that with quality research. It turned out to be a great year for us: 1: We were able to join the growing adoption of research automation across platforms. And 2: We were able to welcome a lot of great brands that wanted to use our new service.

2018: The year of investments

We weren’t the only ones that noticed a change in the game over the last couple of years. Huge investments were made in research automation. And the biggest investment was just a couple of weeks ago, with SAP (the multinational software corporation) announcing their plans to acquire Qualtrics, a provider of survey and feedback software. The price? $8 billion, only 20 times Qualtric’s annual revenue.

Some other 2018 movements

What are some of the movements I notice in the field of research automation?

“Clients want to conform their objective into the right research questions, 
to get the most out of their results.”

1          ‘Humans-in-the-loop’

In the 2018 GRIT report, by Greenbook, was mentioned that there’s still some uncertainty about what tools to use, and what tasks to automate. I saw that there’s still a lot of automation tools that are being tried on a pilot basis. In addition, a lot of companies aren’t sure how they can test and implement these automation alternatives in the best way. Automation often leads to do-it-yourself tools that aren’t of much value. Research is a profession after all.

Research automation delivers faster and cheaper research, but in order to also deliver quality, I believe that you need ‘’humans-in-the-loop” as well. One aspect is that clients should get support when needed. This goes up against self-service tools that are fully automated vs our hybrid automated solution. Our research team supports clients when needed. For instance, when adding custom questions to each survey, and/or building custom sample targets.

2          Maximising impact

Most automated solutions are made for scale. And sometimes these tools don’t – or at least not enough – show the depth of the results. I believe that technology should support you with getting the most out of your results. Create the most valuable insights for your campaign. For instance, by conducting a cross-project analysis, you can instantly see which media or creative generate the most impact. This way, an automated solution can actually help marketers with their media strategy.

3          Tech driven vs. research driven

Going back to investments made in research automation. Many research automation solutions are built by technology companies who enter the market research field and are usually backed by venture capital fundings. They have great looking interfaces, great marketing and are made for scale. But I wonder, do they have enough experience in the game?

Should research automation tools be driven by technology companies or research companies? Because helping clients with their results by focusing on the research itself, can be quite a challenge. Companies could, for instance, lose some of their credibility when being solely driven by technology.

4          Testing everything

With the rise of digital, there is more creative content being produced and used for overall marketing campaigns. I’ve noticed with clients that there is an appetite to test all the creatives in a marketing campaign.

Testing everything can generate lots of insights. For example, whether to GO/NO-GO with a creative and/or understand which medium type was the most impactful. Thereafter, clients will be able to learn from their own creatives. With results becoming more and more valuable over-time, as opposed to coming to a stop at just one creative. I feel that 2019 will be the year where more and more companies start to realise the value of testing everything.

“The main goal should always be helping clients gain the most valuable results, 
to maximise the impact of their campaign.”

Research automation in 2019

I see that more and more companies are realising that most automated solutions are made for scale. The more users, the higher the value. The more volume of data, the better it becomes. It will be interesting to see whether clients will choose for a full tech-driven company, or a hybrid tech company driven by research experience.

Something I’ve also noticed last year is that a lot of companies are still not familiar with the benefits faster research brings. Our research solution allows companies, that only test 1 or 2 creatives out of 3 or 4, to test everything for almost the same budget. That’s certainly something to think about.

But, my most important learning this past year was: If you want research to be faster, cheaper and better, you must consider a few things. To me, the combination of technology and use of, is vital. Tech in combination with having a research team on hand brings the best of both worlds. In addition, it’s important to not forget about the research itself. Helping clients gain the most valuable results in order to maximise the impact of their campaign, should always be the main goal. And that’s something I’d certainly like to see more of in 2019.