It works for us but does it work for them? - How online research communities work for consumers invited to participate

Steven Cierpicki, Daniel Alexander, Stephanie Alchin, Colmar Brunton, Ray Poynter

Researchers and marketing organisations are embracing online research communities. But what about the people that ‘get marketed to’ and ‘researched’? Are consumers, customers, citizens, people, us (you and me when we are not at work!) likely to participate in and be more open and honest in online research communities compared to other research methodologies? This presentation explores the benefits that members receive by being part of an online research community and the resultant validity of the ‘data’ captured using the technique.

It works for us but does it work for them? – How online research communities work for consumers invited to participate

Steven Cierpicki, Daniel Alexander and Stephanie AlchinColmar Brunton, Australia

Ray PoynterThe Future Place, England

Lou RubieMars Food, Australia

INTRODUCTION

Online research communities (ORCs) have recently become a popular application of Research 2.0. Many large companies plan to establish some form of online community in the next two years,1 and it would be expected that a large proportion of these will be for research purposes.2

Within the market research community...

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