Research with Rob: Skyping for Depth

The following is a post by Rob Beachy, Axiom's Market Research Expert. Research with Rob is a weekly series of posts about the role of social media and technology in market research.

Smart phones have revolutionized the way we keep in contact with one another, but through video chat services like Skype, smart phones have changed the landscape of research as well.

For instance, I discussed panels vs. focus groups last week, but sometimes group interaction is not critical to the research process. This is where depth interviews (one-on-one interviews) come in, since they provide a great deal of information.

Being in-person is often difficult and time-consuming, so video chat alleviates the expenses associated with one-on-one interviews. We're constantly developing the role of social media technologies like Skype in our market research. Social media tools make depth interviews easier and faster to implement, while avoiding the time and financial cost of traveling.

The keys to an effective Depth Interview are:

• Qualify and Probe – Can you elaborate, explain, etc
• Unbiased - Explain but never sell
• Counter Question Technique – How much should it cost, weigh, etc.
• Common basis for comparison
• Flexibility to change and manage time

Depth interviews should be a strategic source of market research in every company and everyone involved in product development from marketing to technology should be trained and involved.

It is often as easy as scripting your questions and calling.

Facebook Friday: Let the Video Chat Wars Begin

Earlier this week, Mark Zuckerberg hinted that Facebook would unveil an "awesome" new feature in the coming days.

It turns out that the "awesome" feature is a set of new chat features to benefit the social networking giant's 750 million users, which were announced on Wednesday:

• Group chat redesign: Facebook has redesigned the group chat page is more fitting for wider screens, with a side bar of your most commonly-chatted with friends and whether they are online or not.
• Group-less Group chat: One of my biggest complaints about Facebook's existing Group Chat feature was that you had to have a group set up first. What if you just wanted to talk with a few friends about weekend plans? Normally you'd have to make a new group with those friends and chat from there. Luckily, Facebook has solved this by allowing users to create group chats without creating groups.
• Facebook + Skype: The biggest announce of the day centered on a new, Skype-based video chat. Unfortunately the chats are limited to one-on-one, but its still a big step forward for Facebook.

It's a solid set of new features, but right now the buzz continues to focus on Google+, which I will be covering more next week. The one thing I know for sure is that the social networking race is really starting to heat up.

Not Everyone Thinks the Sky(pe)'s the Limit for Microsoft

Microsoft made waves this morning with the announcement of their acquisition of video chat service Skype.

But the buzz wasn't just about the acquisition itself, and more about the $8.5 billion price tag will be worth it for Microsoft. Considering Google's second-place offer was $4.5 billion less, financially it's easy to say that Microsoft overpaid quite a bit.

Another knock against this deal is that Microsoft already has a pretty strong video chat service in Windows Live Messenger. In fact, Windows Live Messenger has more monthly users and a higher number of simultaneous users than Skype.

However, Skype's 124 million montly users is still a large chunk of the market, and no one is arguing that Micorsoft bettered themselves by acquiring them. The criticism revolves around how much they paid for Skype, and what the future holds for existing Skype users.

On the other hand, some people are hopeful that Microsoft's vast resources will mean big things for the popular video chat service. One example is potential integration of Skype and Kinect, Microsoft's innovative gesture recognition system that has sold over 10 million units in 6 months.

So the initial reactions to this move are mixed, and now it's up to Microsoft to prove to the tech world that they didn't break the bank to get Skype.