Research in the real world

How well does the media industry understand the people it serves? While the value of phenomena such as social networking is well appreciated, the social trends driving it are neither well understood, nor the next trends anticipated. Can the media sector learn from established models of social enquiry into how people live their lives and what they might really want? Alex McKie will discuss insights based on her rich experience in understanding social trends and the impact of technology.

“Sometimes being quiet and creating space for people may be the best way of getting attention”
Alex McKie

Presenter

Alex McKie, futurologist, researcher and strategist

Chair

Rebecca Caroe

Overview

The real world?

When looking at the future it is always tempting to concentrate on what is changing. It is also important to look at what is not changing.
How we live changes radically, what we want changes much less
Success tends to be more certain when it is based on those unchanging human needs and then looks at new and different ways to meet those needs

Living in a global village

We tend to talk about global but focus should be on village. Villages are driven by gossip and are chaotic and intense and this was what Marshall McLuhan was talking about when he coined the term. Nothing to do with the homogenisation of culture as talked about in the 80s version of globalisation.

The media are a key element in the global village. They provide the lens by which, in an increasingly fragmented world, we work out whether or not we might be living a good life.

Technology transforms but its transformation is human. It allows us to live differently. It has no intrinsic value. At the moment technology seems to be viewed with something close to religious mania. It makes a difference, we make things differently.

The future will be different but there are also many things that will remain the same, albeit in new forms.

I’ve spent much of the past few years travelling around Britain and it is on the edges of Britain (rather than the cities) that you see how things are changing. Briefly I want to cover three themes. All enduring human needs but also changing in the light of technology.

We are social beings – we talk about individuality but we need to belong

Many are looking for sense of connectedness

People want to connect with other people – spending time together, sharing food and drink. Technology increases the possibilities but the motivation remains the same. Heaven for the extroverts, hell for the introverts.

Technology is transforming what we can do; but something seems to be getting lost in the language. User generated content is much talked about and certainly people seem to be liberated to create and capture through technology. People talk about the film they made, the music they played, their photos on Flickr – they don’t talk about having ‘generated content’. Is it all so very new? Hasn’t the letters page always been user generated content?

The peer group is becoming the source of information, trust and connection – but it’s more to do with ‘my mate/mum/sister says…..; rather than ‘I rely on my peers’.

Music is a fascinating medium. It is changing as it becomes digitally created, stored and sold. Many people don’t know what they are buying when they purchase music. Most assume that they are buying the music rather than the rights to listen to it on a particular format. The lawyers seem set to try and work that one out.

There are also more interesting elements to music.
Music is a means of connecting with others. Increasingly it seems that music is going back to its roots and it is ‘being there’ with the music that matters. People are going to festivals and concerts.

There are also millions who are making music for themselves. Some are using technology to help them overcome their (lack of) musical skills. Music seems to be alive and well across the land and is particularly vibrant in the villages and old industrial towns. Many towns that can’t support a butcher’s shop have a music shop (selling instruments and the odd CD).


Festivals (and gatherings) are big, folk festivals more interesting than the more commercial rock. Highland gatherings show the connections because clans wear the same tartan.

Village life continues but for most people work has become the village. This puts a strain on family life. Family members are living in two or more different villages (home/school and work) with little spare time to integrate their lives.

Personalisation has also been a big theme - ’my’ added to everything to make it personal. Although the rhetoric is about following customer needs, the reality is about added value and added revenue. So what is billed as ‘personalisation’ often has more to do with mass customisation. You have more choice, but usually lots of choice of the same thing.

In a world where people feel at a distance the opportunity may be for brands/media owners to act as hosts and help with the introductions and create a means of connecting. Media brands have always had a strong connection with their audience, they are well placed to lead this change.

Never forget it is gossip that makes the world go round

Online is fun, it opens up new opportunities and new worlds. Fantastic for the shy and the tongue tied – in cyberspace no-one can see you blush. But still the real world is best. Multi-sensory, richer than others, easier to manage – it is where people want to be. The young may be digital natives, but they are also real people who live in the real world and want to do so.

Digital extends the real, it does not replace it

Time pressed – snack lives

• managing complex lives
• looking for greatest value for life
• editing what doesn’t fit/add value
• easy to end up with a ‘snack life’ – life lived on the run, never quite time to take stock and enjoy it. Only at a point of crisis do people stop and work out what comes next
• overloaded and seeking to simplify
• easiest to keep things at bay (editing)
  
• Time is money? No, money is time. Money is the ultimate concept – it is a means of storing time in an easily transferable form
• We seek to buy more time (convenience)
• Now energy may be as scarce as either time or money

Lack of time will affect the attention economy
Assume that media/brands have to capture people’s attention
Tendency to follow the last success rather than innovate
Assume that attention is limitless

It may be that attention will have to be given rather than requested
People want to be heard, to speak, to be attended – less willing to offer attention to others

With time limited there is a need for clear navigation – if something is hard to find, people won’t bother to look

Editors and editing. Editing helps. It is easier to find what you want. People are doing their own editing and also looking for edited choices. Too many choices and people are more likely to do nothing. And two may well be too many. All the predictions about ‘my newspaper’ – a paper where you were your own editor and choose the stories you wanted to read – seem to have evaporated. Much too hard to do and you miss all the stuff you didn’t know you were interested in until you saw them.

Trust

When it comes to trust there is a gap between reality and perception
We think we trust no-one; in truth have to trust almost everyone – for our water, our food, to drive on the correct side of the road (most of the time), to move out of our way/avoid us.

Trust is now different:

• reciprocal
• personal
• specific

Authority is suspect, reduced to power unless it has legitimacy. Legitimacy is being questioned – the medical profession are often currently perplexed by the changes.

As authority is questioned, the peer group is trusted (and trusts you). Many look to the group for information and inspiration. This becomes a way of managing the clutter. The media gets caught in the middle of this debate – criticised for scare tactics, and criticising a ‘dumbing down’ of society.

Although some worry about the ‘decline’ of trust, it can also be argued that the changes reflect a change in the nature of trust rather than a true decline. This new basis of trust is a more equal and adult relationship between the people and those in authority. The traditional view of trust tended towards a parent:child relationship. Now people expect an adult:adult approach, or sometimes child:child – equality is now expected

If you want to be trusted, then first trust the other. Trust is now reciprocal – something you expected to be shown before you are prepared to offer it. The personalities become channels in their own right – Richard and Judy, Oprah – all influential because they feel like part of the peer group

There has been debate about broadcast and narrowcast, mostly it is scattercast. Influences come from many directions, they may contradict each other – but direct experience becomes the most trusted medium.

Polarisation of approaches

Either be global, powerful and glamorous or be personal and close

This may require a new business model

We’ve done the global bit, the interesting next step might be the emergence of a micro economy. Charge for your access to your data, be paid to watch ads, become a trader, or an artisan. It won’t pay the mortgage but it might pay for treats

It’s likely to difficult for established business to adapt, their cost base is too high. But it creates lots of space for new businesses and new sorts of business

Conferences are already changing, publishing is beginning to change with the rise of self-publishing. Will radio be next? Magazines?

‘But what of research?’

When research works well it’s as fascinating as anything on the telly

But the culture of research is changing. Increasingly it is part of the world of procurement. Although everyone talks about insight, there seems to be more process and much less insight. This is due to the lack of time rather than any dark conspiracy or lack of ability.

Listen
Research is about listening and hearing what people say (and what they don’t say). Listening (again much talked about) is a rare skill. In a world of busy people it is difficult to listen well when you desperately need to be able to talk, to gain attention after a day of being customer focused.

It’s a journey, enjoy the journey
I know the journey thing has become a cliché but that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. The best research takes you on a journey. You learn something new, but there will always be something more to learn. There is never ‘the answer’. There may be a ‘the answer’ for now, but not for ever.

Listen early
Research seems to be becoming more tactical and takes place later in the process. It is most helpful (most interesting and offers greatest value) when done at the beginning of the process. If you gain understanding when developing your strategy you will have a greater chance of success at the executional stage.

If you don’t do any research until testing executions then you might have guessed right, but it is a guess. And if you have guessed wrongly it all gets very expensive

If you want respondents to tell you what to do, pay them more than £30
Too often I find that there are more people behind the mirror than in front of it and clients are disappointed that the respondents have not repeated the ‘consumer insight’ as they have written (on a single page and usually the result of about 15 meetings). All too often I find the respondents saying ‘who wrote this?’

You do not have to do what the respondents say. It is wise to listen to what they say and think about how this affects what you want to do. You can do whatever you like, you are the client. You get to decide. But please don’t criticise the poor respondents because they don’t say what you want them to say.

Most are very marketing and media literate and many can give a pretty good critique of your strategy. I like to do workshops with consumers and group discussions with clients, but only occasionally am I allowed to do this.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions
Most people do not lie. What they say they do, they intend to do. But intention and doing are not the same thing. Do not be rude about the respondents, they are trying to get on with their (equally complex) lives and have come out to talk. They may well be knackered, irritated by the questions and hypoglycaemic because procurement got cheap with the refreshments.

There is a growing body of professional respondents who try to second guess what you want to hear and are only in it for the cash and the snacks. We try to weed them out but the timings increasingly make that difficult. As do recruiters who send out mass emails.

Think ahead
Try to imagine what the findings might be and anticipate what questions you will then want to ask. It doesn’t always work, but trying to put yourself in the shoes of the people you want to find out about is always helpful. Research doesn’t have to be formal. Get out more, Look and listen. Take time. It may be more useful than formal research. And if wandering about is counter culture, call it ‘anthropological searching’. When I worked for an ad agency, the New York office were always talking about ‘anthropological search’ a unique, branded research tool they told me. How did it work? No-one knew. It doesn’t really matter but say you are going for a coffee and a wander and it may be regarded as skiving. But who is going to challenge you when you are doing anthropological searching?

Reports and Commentary

MediaFutures and the Remembrance of Media past by Alan Patrick on the broadstuff Weblog

Live blogged notes by Rain Rainycat

www.flickr.com

PreparAtion

Bookmark for Survey: New Media ‘Among the audience’, The Economist, Apr 20th 2006