Friday - June 1, 2012 | 14:45-15:45
Salon E

Modern “Social” Online Qualitative Research

Marketing research has reached a major inflection point. The relationship a business has with its consumers, empowered by the social web, is being transformed. While there is still a place for traditional tools and methods, qualitative researchers have an opportunity to enhance their professional practice by using new techniques and technology to deliver insights in fresh ways that tap into the growing expectation to “be social.”

Marketing research online communities (MROCs) are among those new breed of tools that can complement the traditional focus group. A challenge is reflected in the gap between the proportion of research buyers who are interested in such new tools and the smaller number of suppliers that offer them. Filling in this gap are non-traditional suppliers that can contribute new expertise and experience.

This session explores how researchers can extend their scope of practice by integrating established techniques with new methods that rely on online community environments. Through the case study of a Fortune 100 telecommunications firm using an ongoing MROC to gauge its customer care program and initiatives, the presenters will discuss how to:

  • combine the use of modern, mobile-enabled web technologies, with qualitative research methodologies and a community manager’s experience of participant engagement;
  • generate rich, robust and continuous insights from an online community using traditional ask and response activities enhanced by intuitive social and community interaction design elements that facilitate conversations and group collaboration;
  • efficiently mine MROC data to regularly deliver actionable business insights to the client while increasing brand goodwill with participants.

Stephen Thompson - Executive Vice President, Ramius Corporation

As Executive Vice President of Ramius Corporation, Steve leads the customer facing functions of the company and is responsible for developing and managing its business relationships.

With a background and expertise in business transformation through information technology, Steve joined Ramius in 2006 to build the company’s Professional Services line of business. He lead the implementation of its software for numerous large clients including SAP and Sun Microsystems before extending the scope of his responsibilities to include the company’s customer support, marketing and business partner development functions.

He works closely with the design and engineering teams to ensure Ramius’ software meets the needs of its customers. He has published white papers and led several webinars on the subject of online community and the business use of social software.

Steve is a professional engineer (mechanical) with degrees from the University of Sheffield and the University of Cambridge.


Simon Chen - Senior Consultant, Ramius Corporation

As Senior Consultant at Ramius Corporation, Simon manages major client relationships, helping them design and deploy Ramius’ online community and social network solutions. During his tenure at Ramius, Simon has helped launch customer, knowledge and partner networks for organizations including the American Marketing Association, Compuware, the IEEE, Juniper Networks, NASA and SAP. He is the Ramius lead for insight and research community implementations.

With an expertise in using online social technologies to help people connect and communicate to work, learn and innovate, Simon acts as a spokesperson for Ramius. An active contributor to the social computing community, Simon co-organizes the Social Media Breakfast events in Ottawa, Canada - a business networking event for community and social media marketing professionals.

Simon is a graduate of the University of Western Ontario. He remains active with his alma mater as a Director with Alumni Western and is a former President of its Ottawa Branch.