As I was looking for a way to illustrate how complex and fragmented the online sample market place has become in the US in the past few years, I decided to list the companies and sites who provide sample for market research directly or indirectly: panel companies of course, but also online communities, reward sites, survey directories, co-registration sites, brokers…
The outcome is the picture below:
Did I forget someone? Let me know.
I wish ComScore or Hitwise could come up with a cool mapping of how all these programs overlap.
So, how can you survive in this jungle and get the sample you need? And what can you do if none of the suppliers above is large enough to provide enough sample for all your needs? How can you use multiple sample partners when an increasing number of avid survey takers are joining any panel they can? How can you guarantee consistent results if all sample sources have different biases?
I will try to answer those questions at the ESOMAR Panel Research conference next month in Barcelona.
I can’t see RewardTV, the so-called “panel” that produces those extraodinary IAG results.