When should we ask, when should we measure?

SPEECH IN ENGLISH

Q​uestionnaires have been a fundamental tool for market research for decades. With the arrival of Internet, the questionnaire, a tool invented more than 100 years ago, was simply adapted to online data collection. We have come this far making all kind of market research projects using almost always the same tool. But this does not mean there is no room or need for improvement. If researchers massively used questionnaires during all these years, it is not because this is the most suited data collection tool for all the problems they faced; but because there were no better alternatives available. In the last years, we have witnessed the emergence of new ways of gathering information from consumers. On the one hand, social media offers easy access to fresh and spontaneous content. On the other hand, passive online data collection is a research opportunity never seen before. These technologies allow massive data collection of the navigation activity of hundreds of thousands of users. These different methods of data collection both offer possibilities and limitations. For example, where the questionnaire is a good tool to collect opinions from consumers, it has been long used to collect recalled information from respondents, such as last seen advertisements, visited websites, etc. But nowadays people recall this information less and less correctly. Yet, technology is currently offering us a way to access and measure such information by observing individuals, instead of asking them. There is a real need for looking into new directions, renewing surveys, improving passive data collection analyses and combining different approaches to handle the same problems. It is crucial for market research professionals to find out when to use which method. Thus, the main goal of this presentation is to compare the information obtained using passive and active data collection.