INTERVIEW/Ger Farrell, Sponge It digital research agency:WE know what it's like to be rushing along the street, late for an appointment, only to be confronted by a desperate market researcher. The words "can I just ask you . . ." tug at your heart strings, but you've got to keep going.
That may never quite become a thing of the past, but market research is changing – it’s going digital. Virtual focus groups and digital supermarket shelf surveys have arrived – and Ger Farrell (29), founder of digital research agency Sponge It, is determined to lead the change in Ireland.
“To succeed in this new digital environment, we know that we have to be as cutting edge as possible in our use of technology,” says Farrell, who previously worked with Publicis QMP and helped develop its online research subsidiary, Askchili, in 2006.
“We need to use the very latest and most sophisticated means of delivering our research and our virtual focus groups are a good example of that. That’s why we describe ourselves as digital rather than simply online. That’s how we’re positioning ourselves.”
Sponge It was set up early in 2008 and is a sister business of WinWin, the promotions and rewards company which was launched in 1999 and had built an annual turnover of €1.5 million by 2004/05. Sponge It’s projected turnover for its first year is around the €300,000 mark.
The relationship between the two is one of mutual support. The 2,000 members of Sponge It’s market research panel receive rewards sourced by WinWin every time they take part in a survey. Sponge It also metimes works with WinWin clients – which include Bank of Ireland, McDonald’s and Dell – to research the impact of their rewards programmes, for instance.
Sponge It has already formed a partnership with Vision Critical, the Canadian market leader in interactive research, whose software systems it plans to use in Ireland for the first time.
“They specialise in virtual retail environments,” Farrell says, “and nobody else in the world is doing anything quite like it . . . They have a virtual shopper tour and a virtual shelf survey, for example.
“You start off in the parking lot, the doors open in front of you and you’re led around the aisles to the cash register. As you go, you see various products and messages and you’re asked to click on anything that’s of interest to you.
“If we do that across 100 people, we can find out how they react to different aspects of the store, and if we do what’s called a ‘heat map’, we can see not only where they clicked, but where they moved their cursor around and showed interest but didn’t click.”
The virtual focus groups are another example of what it means to stay ahead of the digital curve.
“The software creates a virtual room, and using webcams and VoIP [voice over internet protocol]. You can see, hear and speak to the other members of the group.
“A real person moderates and the group can see and react to whatever’s placed before them by the moderator, including print, radio and TV ads.”
There are pluses and minuses to the virtual as against the real-life focus group, Farrell accepts.
“On the minus side, you’re not really seeing the actual behaviour of the other people because you’re not physically in the same room as them. On the plus side though, the sense of anonymity is greater and so people may tend to be more honest.”
Not surprisingly, Sponge It tends towards a younger age group. “We’re specifically looking to talk to 16- to 25-year-olds, but not exclusively,” says Farrell. “We need to be able to provide a nationally representative sample of 1,000 for an opinion poll, for instance, so in reality our outside parameters are 16 to 65.”
ON THE RECORD
Name:Ger Farrell.
Company:Sponge It
www.spongeit.ie
Job:Founder and CEO.
Age:29.
Background:BA from UCC, diploma in business studies from Smurfit Graduate Business School, UCD, and master's in advertising, DIT. Joined Publicis QMP in 2005, helped establish and develop Askchili in 2006. Set up Sponge It in 2008, a sister company of WinWin. Has since affiliated to ESOMAR, which sets international market research codes and guidelines, and formed partnership with Canadian market leader, Vision Critical.
Inspired by:Marketing guru Russell Davies, formerly head of global planning with Nike, founder of the Open Intelligence Agency and blogger – recently voted the third most influential person on the web. "He never tires of preaching the digital message," says Farrell.
Challenges:Making sure Sponge It has access to the most sophisticated digital technology available to carry out its research and deliver it to its clients; in difficult economic times, convincing potential customers that research gives them a competitive edge – and making sure that digital research is more cost-effective.
