Originally published: Greenbook, 24 April 2024
Martin Filz is one of the most highly respected and influential leaders in global research and was appointed as CEO of Pureprofile in 2020. A pioneer of online measurement and research, Martin has more than two decades of experience as a leader across the technology, media and research sectors.
Discover how AI can revolutionize market research, boosting productivity, efficiency, and effectiveness for businesses. Unlock innovation and enhanced results.
The sudden ubiquity of AI has been a game changer across industries, and market research is no exception. Instantly generated content has flooded the internet, from articles and images to music and videos. Amid the excitement, there have also been significant missteps, from bias and information leaks to plagiarism and IP theft accusations.
As a result, many businesses have become more cautious about AI adoption and usage, with concerns about the extent of AI’s issues and potential liabilities.
Additionally, businesses are realizing that fully integrating AI into existing operations isn’t as simple as they expected. They are becoming more selective, with many adopting “bite-sized” implementations instead of going all-in at once. Most importantly, they’re taking a closer look at the quality and feasibility of the technology and what it can practically do for the bottom line.
The Innovation Boost
While there is a lot of hesitancy and fence-sitting, the by-product of the AI explosion is that it’s forcing companies to be more innovative. As AI offers a faster way to develop ideas and products, businesses cannot afford not to innovate if they are to maintain competitiveness and relevance. Increasingly, customers are also expecting more in less time.
With AI the catalyst of increased data accuracy, reduced project costs and faster turnaround times, traditionally conservative companies are now alert to the cruciality of innovating, even if they are on the fence about AI.
Instead, they may consider other strategies to remain competitive, such as focusing on core competencies, including high-quality products and services, enhancing customer service or partnering with companies that already have AI capabilities, allowing them to enjoy the benefits without the need for direct investment. Eventually, AI will become a requirement rather than a nice-to-have, so building a skilled workforce that can adapt to new technologies and innovate is also critical.
By focusing on these areas, companies can build a strong foundation and position themselves to adopt AI technologies when they are ready, ensuring they remain competitive in the meantime.
How AI is employed in market research
One way AI will boost innovation is by enabling deeper insights when it comes to data processing. This is perfectly showcased in the market research sector, with AI helping to collate more data points, extrapolate additional insights and, consequently, extend business reach.
1. Extracting better responses
AI can extrapolate on an open-ended response, prompting respondents to provide more complete and insightful answers by using natural language processing, generative AI and text analysis when it detects that an answer can be refined further.
This makes survey insights more comprehensive and useful. For example, a survey participant might be asked about what they did over the weekend, but when answering, they may forget to jot down mundane and easily forgotten activities such as visiting the supermarket. An AI tool, using patterns and insights in previous data, can then specifically prompt questions such as “Did you buy groceries?”, making respondent feedback more accurate and thus giving market researchers and brands greater perspective that can be leveraged.
2. Faster analysis of data
The evolution of AI has enabled bulk data analysis in a manner that was previously not humanly possible. In market research, AI allows quick and efficient analysis of open-ended responses that is traditionally a cumbersome and expensive process. In a matter of minutes, it can crunch through data that humans would have taken hours, days and weeks to process.
3. Improved understanding
With its ability to use natural language processing and sentiment analysis, AI can analyse individual entries for sentiment, emotion and legitimacy, providing a more accurate view of every response. AI can also discover hidden patterns via clustering algorithms, which organise data into meaningful groups and reveal underlying trends and associations. This saves time-consuming manual effort and captures insights that may be missed.
4. Multilingual capabilities
The instant and precise translation capabilities of AI grant greater access to a wider diversity of researchers and respondents, whether globally or across multilingual communities in a single market. Recent university-led studies of ChatGPT- 4 have found its language translation tool provides high accuracy as well as a nuanced understanding of cultural subtleties.
AI translations will also cut down on time and costs, enabling easy scalability and worldwide reach while opening new regional insights that were previously blocked off by language barriers.
With powerful capabilities to enhance businesses and brands to be more productive, efficient and effective, AI’s potential in market research will herald a new era with more innovation, creativity, reach and, consequently, greater results for businesses.
Even if an organization isn’t ready to adopt AI immediately and directly, by partnering with a research team that already has the capacity, they can still experience a giant leap in scalability and streamlining. Organizations that thoughtfully leverage AI will deliver faster, more accurate and comprehensive data that enables them to better target consumers and cater to their customers, resulting in more attention, leads and conversions.
