Showing posts with label asian research. Show all posts
Showing posts with label asian research. Show all posts

Wednesday 7 December 2022

Law of Unintended Consequences?


 

Monday 21 November 2022

Winston Churchill Research





I think it was Tom who mentioned the speech impediment, and that is born out in this TV 1950 re-election piece, of and by Winston Churchill, as it were

The follow up Ottawa 'Piece' is preposterous. Look at the Grand Poobah behind him, sitting in a propitiously large seat (Bless). And bless your little legs as well.

If we meet in real life, and should you be a Winnie expert. 

Ask me about the debunking research. 

It's troubling.

Monday 19 July 2021

Just The Facts Please - Not Suitable For Corporate Fluffers, Cowards & Intellectually Arrogant People




This is a deep dive into the patents surrounding the current global health panic. It's technical, attention demanding, in-depth, granular and devastating to Big Pharma and the unfortunates who have trusted the system to have the general public's interests at heart.

A little bit of a back story on this information. It was sent to me by a guy I met in a bar in Jomtien, Thailand. My girlfriend (if a 60 plus woman qualifies as a girl) nudged me and said, go talk to that guy over there.

"Why" I asked?

"Because he's on his own" she replied, so I walked over and introduced myself, we hit it off on esoteric subjects, and we've been friends ever since. It was only subsequently I found out he worked for the best law firm in his country, and was probably the best lawyer who was a foreigner (English in this instance).

It was he who sent me this information and it's mind blowing stuff in terms of legal decimation of the official COVID-19 narrative.

Now if you're a pussy and/or a bit intellectually challenged, this isn't for you, but if you like to be in the arena, the credit goes to the man who is in this domain and not outside of it.

The choice to know will be yours.

Wednesday 17 June 2009

Research



I got talking to a creative friend of mine who has just finished a big shoot in China, and we veered onto the subject of dross-quality Chinese advertising in mainland PRC. But don't let me shape your opinion go to Youtube or Youku and see if you can dig out something that has anything to say. 

It's pretty much all pants, which for a nation of 1.3 billion people and a LOT of ads says something doesn't it? I talked about it bluntly over here, but there's a few more reasons why "safety first" is king of the mill. You might also find something in my Asian research posts over here, here and here.

In any case we got talking about a particular BBDO style of blockbuster commercial that uses a method I don't want to specifically mention here but which was researched by the client in China and amazingly the answer was that it wasn't as effective as real ideas.

Well of course we know that but it's amazingly hard to prove this because one would need a parallel universe and an A/B split to see which one is most effective to prove beyond doubt which is more effective but in any case I thought that it would be wise to point out that we can make research prove anything if we want and in the case of quantitative methodologies it's nothing more than a cloak for mediocrity to rule.

This Youtube clip is not new but I want to bookmark it for future reference on my blog so I can just share it with people who aren't convinced by what I'm trying to say in the hope that they will take the road less travelled. It's riskier but not if a proper conversation about how to solve any fears takes places. But that's a conversation that takes both time and courage. I'm also not anti research but a cookie cutter approacher gives cookie cutter advertising.

Sunday 4 November 2007

From The Heart Not The Head - Research In Asia


Cybretron
Not so long back I was doing a depth research interview with an Asian pharmaceutical salesman at a hotel in the Hilton at Gatwick Airport. It was like pulling teeth. The ethnicity is relevant in this instance because of an opinion I’ve held for some years that I believe Western research methodology imposed on Oriental cultures is deeply flawed.
It made me remember a topic I've been meaning to post about and which might be of interest to international planners, and also I'd like to open up the debate on research methodology.
I first began to think about this some years ago because I was having a chat with the MD of a research company in Asia who said something that stopped me in my tracks. When I raised that the respondents in the focus group were very reluctant to speak, and could he think of ways to stimulate discussion he responded without hesitation, ‘use a cattle prod'.
At the time I thought this was quite a cynical view coming from a research professional that we had commissioned, but over the years I've regretted not changing the company immediately. The recruitment was bad, the research was bad and the reporting was bad. I guess I’d been warned from that off the cuff comment but wasn’t listening properly.
‘Any road’, as they say in Coronation Street. I got thinking about the whole methodology of qualitative research in Asia because of this interview with the pharmaceutical salesman. Early into the process the respondent’s behavior was guarded at best and more often not, just plain evasive in a garrulous way. I sensed that all the answers being giving were measured and unforthcoming for a strong reason. He refused to say anything negative about the organizational structure as if the discussion were a test, or a job interview.
Not content to go though the motions I tried to think of another way, because there is a propensity in Indian culture to use talking as a means of stalling for time to to think about the answer that is wanted. Often it’s an over compensatory willingness to be helpful on their part, although it achieves the opposite effect.
I tried an alternative approach, which was Socratic in so much that I waited for a clear contradiction of an earlier statement, and then asked questions that made this self evident to the respondent. Not normal interviewing technique but I’m glad I persisted.
People are contradictory by nature, Buddhism teaches us that nothing is permanent and that I'm afraid also applies to truth in a temporal sense. I hit jackpot when like a sudden tropical downpour the real stuff began to pour out of his mouth. I grabbed my pen and began madly scribbling down verbatim as much as I could get. It was priceless feedback. The respondent addressed the imbalance by being extra truthful and I realised from that point onwards he was talking from the heart and not from the head.
Getting to this point in Occidental cultures is no easy task but with a stranger in Oriental cultures, even within a validated research environment is not working with Western research methodologies. The hierarchical nature of their society, the desire not to stand out or be the exception to the rule, the value place on guarded responses that is instilled from birth all contribute to much research in Asia as little more than worthless. All the more frustrating because many research professionals in those countries, by their own cultural values are conditioned not to question the validity of the methodology. The evidence for this assertion, is the non existence of indigenous research methods in this part of the world.
Of course there are exceptions to the rule, but they are few and far between.
So what is the solution?
We now know that location based and user research, such as ethnography, is much more revealing than the sterile environment of a research agency or conference/meeting facilities or a hotel.
Here are some more suggestions that I’d urge the research industry to consider urgently in this amazing part of the planet.
Focus groups – Set up respondents to CONNECT with each other before hand, either through a moderated media like instant messaging or a more laissez faire approach like a Facebook group, allowing them to develop bonds about who they are, what they do while letting them reveal a little of their personality.
  1. Depth interviews – Let the respondents get to know their interviewer through a Blog or an updated page on the website. Encourage them to join the interviewers twitter circle, an easy thing to set up for a work profile that fosters a sense of intimacy.
  2. Use the low cost of doing business in Asia as a powerful follow up tool. Do focus groups that use stimulus material such as visual boards and if the first round is inconclusive, then get the creative team to work on them further and dispatch them to the respondents by COURIER for further discussion over the phone.
  3. Take hard to find high income business leaders to a high end restaurant and use the occasion as a forum for them to network before moving onto the topics that the research has been commissioned for. Give and you shall receive.
I could go on. In this age of ubiquitous internet the ability for people to develop the trust that is needed to speak from the emotional heart, rather than from the rational head which is culturally conditioned to be reserved opens up opportunities that research companies need to embrace. I’ve spent far too many research debriefs observing the interested parties (anxious clients and ‘wannabe creative’ researchers) using qualitative research as mini quantitative tests. Its time to listen to planners again and be a little more creative about how we problem solve.