A quarterly MRSS newsletter
Issue 2/07, JULY/AUGUST 2007
RESEARCH DAY 2007
Last century, AdAsia and the Market Research
Society (Singapore) conspired to run a one day
conference in Singapore on market research.
The concept has obviously worked and the
seventh session, with the intriguing title “Meeting
the Tall Dark Stranger”, was held at the
Intercontinental Hotel on 21 June. Who says
research isn’t sexy?
120 researchers, ad agencies and clients
attended and listened to some excellent
speakers (that is once the sound problems were
eventually solved by the hotel AV gurus every
time a presentation was loaded – my one and
only complaint of the whole event).
The 2007 Research Day was a huge success.
We had some excellent papers that had some
thoughtful analysis and real ideas as opposed to
the canned sales pitches on research techniques
that were often the fare in the past.
The keynote speaker was Ray Poynter of The
Future Place in UK who made the most of his
long flight to Singapore by presenting two
papers: one on Mega Shifts and Web 2.0 and
the second on how our profession should meet
the challenges this presents with the
conveniently named Research 2.0.
Ray is prodigiously well informed for someone
whose other personas include politician and rugby
player. And if you don’t believe me go to his blog
<thefutureplace.typepad.com>.
Clearly the man never sleeps because his review
of the conference appeared on his blog the next
day and I quote…
“All of the other presentations were good, and
some of them very good. Radhecka Roy (female)
and Sue Phillips of Synovate presented some really useful material contrasting how
Singaporeans and UK citizens differed in terms of their usage of traditional and new media.
Their findings suggested to me that when similar studies are conducted in other countries, key
differences will be found. They also include a YouTube clip of a local actor/singer/comedian
signing a song title “Singaporeans”…. Some of the references in the song lost me, but I was
taken by the humor of the bits I could follow, and by the passion of it [Ray is referring to Hossan
Leong’s hilarious “I Live Singapura”].
Ian Stewart [newly promoted boss] of MTV Asia gave a useful presentation that showed how
widely Web 2.0 is understood in Singapore. One of MTV’s findings was that Asians increasingly
prefer Asian actors and music. Stewart showed that increasingly Asians preferred cultural facets
of their own culture, or at least their region’s culture.”
In the panel session, Isis Shek of MTV joined the platform and talked about Second Life, from a
user’s point of view. Isis said she was in second life about 5 hours a day!”
Strangely enough for a rugby playing/politician/researcher, Ray is clearly too modest to talk up
his own papers. He seems genuinely excited about prodigious change and its incredible ironies.
It was a wake-up call for all of us who still think that we can continue to remain relevant and
advise businesses without immersing ourselves in Life 2.0. I for one will be going out there and
hurling rocks at Survey Monkey as soon as I figure out how to squeeze my digital anthropologist
avatar into my new VW. Not the car silly, the Virtual World.
Meanwhile, our thanks go to the unfailingly generous Research Day sponsors – Colmar Brunton
who brought Ray Poynter from UK, and to ESOMAR, TNS, Nielsen and Synovate; special
sponsors Market Probe and Pulse; and gift sponsors CLS Research Solutions, Joshua
Research Consultants, Millward Brown, BlackBox and Starfish
This article was contributed by Greg Coops, Asian Strategies and MRSS’s host for the
conference.
MRSS Interviewer Certification
MRSS in the News!
Since the soft launch of the MRSS Interviewer
Scheme in May, 130 interviewers have been
certified by July. This is the first phase and we
hope that by year end, 80% of the estimated 500
career interviewers will be certified.
The Real Impact, a PR company headed by
Marie Ong, was appointed to handle the publicity campaign.
She did a great job! There were one-on-one media
interviews with 938Live and Capital Radio 95.8FM English
and News Bulletins.
The Business Times and
Marketing.com, the online portal of Marketing magazine
reported on the Scheme. Additionally, The New Paper and
The Straits Times carried articles.
We also took the opportunity to inform the public of the Professional Standards Committee.
Chong Lee Sah, Greg Coops and Ronnie Ho participated in ‘The Living Room’, a talkshow on
Radio 938Live on 7 August.
Asia’s Top 1000 Brands for 2007 unveiled!
Media magazine together with Asian Integrated Limited and global market research company
Synovate, has released the 2007 results from the annual Asia’s Top 1000 Brands survey.
This is the fourth year of the Asia’s Top 1000 Brands survey and it continues to highlight the
local and global brands that are able to break through the clutter and stand apart from the
crowd.
Synovate Director of Media Research Asia Pacific, Craig Harvey, said Synovate was delighted
to continue to work with Asian Integrated Media and Media magazine on such a large-scale and
revealing study.
“Asia’s Top 1000 Brands survey provides a solid and credible public opinion poll on the best
brands in Asia. Showcasing the names that have reached this status provides advertisers,
marketers and agencies with guidance on the brands that resonate with Asian consumers,” Mr
Harvey said.
The Top 10 brands in Asia were as follows:
Rank
Brand
1
Nokia
2
Sony
3
Colgate
4
Coca-Cola
5
Panasonic
6
Honda
7
7-Eleven
8
Samsung
9
Nestlé
10
Adidas
The Top 3 brands in Singapore were:
Rank
Brand
1
Nokia
2
Singtel
3
Singapore Airlines
Two questions were asked to determine the best brands in each of the various categories
covered in the survey:
“When you think of [product / service / category], which is the ‘best’ brand that comes to your
mind? By ‘best’, we mean the one that you trust the most or the one that has the best reputation
in [product / service / catergory].”
“Apart from the brand that you have just mentioned, which brand do you consider to be the
second-best brand in the [product / service / caterogry]?”
Synovate covered 12 major product and service categories: alcohol and cigarettes; financial
services; automotive; health; retail; food; beverages; cameras and electronic goods;
personal/business equipment and services; telecommunication; travel and leisure; and baby
products, household products, toiletries and cosmetics. In total, 84 sub-categories were covered
in the 2007 survey.
Nine markets were included in the fourth round of the survey: China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, the
Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, India and Indonesia.
The results were weighted to the population composition of the markets covered within the
survey areas, to provide a representative cross-section of society.
The full survey is available from Media’s Group Circulation Manager, Jessie Ho-Avery by
emailing [email protected].
What Singapore Consumers are buying, once they’ve covered the essential
Saving for a rainy day continues to be the main priority for 65 percent of Singapore consumers,
when they consider what they will do with their spare cash after covering essential living
expenses.
Vacations (50%) and New Clothes (32%) are the next two most popular spending options.
The survey also found a consistent increase in interest by Singaporeans towards investing in the
stock market. While only 22 percent of local respondents expressed an intention to spend their
spare cash on stocks and shares early in 2006, this figure increased to 24 percent by the year
end, and hit 31 percent in the latest 2007 survey.
This ranks Singaporeans among the top 10 in the world, and also elevated stocks and shares to
the fourth most popular option among consumers here.
The desire to put spare cash into superannuation / pension funds strengthened along similar
lines.
The Nielsen Online Consumer Confidence and Opinion Survey is the largest half-yearly survey of its kind, aimed
at gauging current confidence levels, spending habits/intentions and current major concerns of consumers across
the globe. The latest survey, conducted in the last two weeks of April, polled about 26,486 internet users in 47
markets from Europe, Asia Pacific, North America and the Middle East.
The Rise of New Consumerism
The annual Research Day event was held recently in Singapore, organised by AdAsia magazine
in conjunction with the Market Research Society. The theme centred on how the research
industry is making predictions about future costumers. TNS Regional Director ALM, Arnaud
Frade, shared his insights on the subject of the Rise of the New Consumerism.
You may have felt it, seen it and sensed it. Something fundamental is
happening in the market place. The Asian landscape as we know is
rapidly changing. The rise of the savvy, demanding Asian consumer
and the exponential growth of digital personalised media, challenge
marketeers as well as market researchers to keep up with the pace of
evolution. And even more important, the challenge to stay ahead of
trends and to future-proof market research.
FUTURE: NOW!
The Rise of New Consumerism
Stay ahead of trends
The two trends that have and will continue to shape this evolution are the rise of the new
consumer and the usage of digitalised and more personalised media. The new consumers are
basically savvy and more expectant; they are actively involved and vocal and they expect more
accountability, more realness and more individualised service. With the digitisation and
especially the personalisation of the media, the new consumers are using new forms of
interaction and communication (myspace.com, YouTube etc) which has its impact on what
people see, hear, experience, expect and demand.
Future-proof market research
These changes require the need to future-proof research. As marketing has moved from the era
of interruption or mass marketing to permission marketing or one-to-one marketing and now to
engagement marketing, the challenge is to move towards engagement research. The new
challenges involve the needs to change the research approach towards engagement. This
means:
- change the direction and format of information flow
- more frequent / ongoing dialogue with consumers
- in more interactive and engaging ways
- understand the impact and usage of new media
Future-proofing research will be about using innovative methodologies: leveraging technology
but not being solely focusing on it and understanding the whole experience as much as the
purchasing rationale. Within a fast pace changing environment it is important to continuously
identify the ideas and trends that will have lasting impact and to identify the new consumers who
will shape the future, engaging them in research.
COMPANY NEWS
Synovate continues to expand, reflecting its rapid growth within Singapore and
the region. Recent recruits include:
Radhecka Roy. Radhecka has been appointed Head of Qualitative
Research at Synovate Singapore.
She has 15 years experience in India, Taiwan and the South Pacific.
Tammy Ho, named as Business Development Manager. She is a
graduate of the National University of Singapore and will be responsible
for developing new businesses in Singapore and the region.
Paul Richmond named new Managing Director for ACNielsen Singapore
and Malaysia.
In his new capacity, Mr Richmond will oversee The Company’s
ACNielsen operations in both countries, in close collaboration with the
local management teams. Mr Richmond will report to Farquhar Stirling,
Managing Director, South East Asia, who is based in Jakarta.
Starfish Research (Asia-Pacific) is pleased to announce the launching of Papua New
Guinea’s first syndicated market research study, the Papua New Guinea Consumer 2008.
“Our clients in PNG have been asking for this for quite some time”, said Nicholas Cameron,
CEO Starfish Research & Strategy. “The PNG market is often disadvantaged simply due the
lack of basic market research information”, he said. “The market is very profitable market for
our clients, but it is difficult for many of them to prepare sound business cases for
investment without solid market information. It is very clear that market research plays a
major role in economic development in situations like this, where information is an essential
requirement for major capital investments”.
This issue is coordinated by Synovate