Versta Research is a marketing research and public opinion polling firm that helps you answer critical questions with customized research and analytical expertise.
Explore industry trends, research methods, and tips for your own research projects in the Versta Research Blog. All opinions are our own, and some may change over time.
First time reader? Check out the Best of the Blog for the most popular posts from almost 10 years of blogging. We’re glad you’re here.
A couple weeks ago we wrote about the crucial need to have (and ideally review) your raw data. We pointed to an article in the New York Times Magazine about a prominent professor in social psychology who faked his data and never provided the raw data for his colleagues and co-authors to review. What we…
Last week, Versta Research celebrated its 5th birthday—an important milestone in a twenty-year journey that has involved rigorous training and building significant capabilities that help clients solve research problems. <<Applause! Singing! Cake!>> “Speech! Speech!” Hmmmm, a speech. . . . Well, recently we formulated new year’s resolutions and described where we are headed as we enter the second half…
As we get further along in our careers most of us get further away from the nitty-gritty of data collection, data coding, and sometimes even data analysis. But I always feel nervous about that distance, and usually want to take a quick scan through the raw data myself. I want to see all those rows…
Over the last decade satisfaction research has shifted strongly towards loyalty research. This shift has been driven, in part, by widespread interest in Net Promoter Scores (NPS) as a way to benchmark against other companies and link the customer experience more directly to financial outcomes. But it turns out that focusing so much on loyalty…
When customers talk about wanting faster and cheaper research, we’ve learned they’re not clamoring for all research to be faster and cheaper than ever before. Rather, they’re looking for new methods and niche solutions that fit specific problems they face. The distinction is crucial, because the first pushes us to automate, routinize, outsource, and make…
Versta Research’s winter newsletter comes out next week, which will focus on some new approaches to faster (and cheaper) market research. In the meantime we have been thinking a good deal about where to invest in new methods and innovation during the coming year so that we continue to make our work better and smarter…
We ran this script of a Christmas Eve phone survey interview two years ago. It’s time to bring it out again! It’s an amusing and oh-too-true parody of how market research pollsters ask questions in clear, precise, linear ways to gather data we need for analysis. Although it takes the form of a phone interview…
One way to get more people responding to your survey is to let them know ahead of time that the survey is coming their way. Is one method of outreach better than another? It depends on your audience and the type of survey, but several studies over the last decade have shown a consistent difference…
A few weeks ago, The Patient, a peer-reviewed medical journal, published an article based on findings from two surveys conducted by Versta Research. This follows on the heels of a poster presentation last June at the annual meetings of the American Diabetes Association (ADA), and another one just prior to that at meetings sponsored by…
Or at the very least, ignorance should drive market research because fundamentally research should be about findings answers to questions that we do not already know. This idea for focusing on “ignorance” is inspired by a book published last year called Ignorance: How It Drives Science, by Stuart Firestein. Applied to our industry, the argument…