The year 2020 was hard on the entire planet –people suffered, and so did their businesses. But luckily, market research, as an industry, is rather flexible so we were able to provide our clients with continuous service and alternative solutions to run their studies.

So, let’s take a look at how the pandemic affected the methodologies used for our projects in 2020, in comparison to 2019:

Online Survey

In 2020, we had a 49% INCREASE compared to 2019. This made perfect sense, seeing how everyone was looking out for respondents’ safety and didn’t want to risk getting anyone exposed to the virus. Additionally, as people had to re-organize their lives, and their availability changed, online surveys were giving them the possibility of participating in market research at any time and place.

WATI/TDIs

Web-assisted telephone interviews and tele-depth interviews are always popular, as they are easy to conduct, and they  provide some kind of personal contact thanks to the technology used, so we had an 11% INCREASE when it comes to these methodologies

Online Focus Groups

We have had a 150% INCREASE when compared to the previous year. This methodology replaced regular Focus Groups Discussions due to security reasons and restrictions in travelling.

IDIs

Now, this is where it gets interesting, but it is perfectly statistically justified because of the pandemic, where we noted a decrease of 84%.

Focus Groups

The same goes for Focus Groups with 90% DECREASE. The reason these methodologies are not a 100% DECREASE is because all face-to-face interviews were conducted in the first 2 months of the year [before the pandemic]

What did we learn?

Seeing how the numbers don’t lie, one comes to the logical conclusion that the year 2020 was, indeed, an ONLINE Market Research Year [you heard it here first!].

So, even in the times of full lockdown, we did not stop, our operations ran smoothly, as we were able to quickly switch to remote methodologies, thus making sure we are still able to deliver commissioned projects.

We managed to stay afloat, and are proud of the team which stuck together, even when the times were hard. Because we know that tough times don’t last – but tough people do.