A Few Trends We Expect to See in 2021

2020 brought a lot of changes to consumer behavior and attitudes, and market research was no exception. We could review our predictions from last year, but let’s be honest, we could never have foreseen the impact on COVID-19 and we’re sure many other industries feel the same. However, this year we feel we have some good insights into what we can expect to see in the market research space in 2021.

Here are a few trends we expect to see in the new year:

Swings in Research Demand

We saw a surge in response rates at the start of the pandemic while many countries were under quarantine and the supply of research skyrocketed. However, we also saw a decrease in demand for research from companies at this time. The reverse happened in the fall. Demand surged, but supply went down as lockdowns ended. This caused difficulties in closing studies with historically easy targeting. We believe we will be seeing more of these swings in the coming year, including another surge in demand as brands put more value into the insights they are collecting.

One difference could be that the changes may be more regionally focused as different areas deal with the pandemic and vaccine rollout differently.

We think demand will surge this year as brands clearly value insights. As research companies integrate survey research with other data, the value of survey research and insights will likely grow.

Additional Focus on Data Quality

When the surge in demand hit in late summer, a surge in data fraud came with it. There were a variety of causes, including lower supply for a higher demand, the nature of the research being conducted, and more. For this year, the new tools that have been in development will be adopted at a higher rate to reduce fraud and eliminate poor quality data. This year will also show that brands and other end clients are willing to pay for quality if quality can be ensured. Panel companies that prove out respondent validation will put pressure on those that don’t.

Continued Consolidation

Over the past few years, we have seen the market research industry consolidate and we expect 2021 to be no different. We predict that this year, the market research industry will see more consolidation and expect that large-scale companies will merge and acquire smaller, tech-driven companies to enhance what they can offer and improve their data.

Shift into End-to-End Solutions

This year we saw many companies shift their focus to end-to-end solutions and we don’t expect it to slow down any time soon. For instance, 2020 saw Dynata’s shift to full service and a focus on selling to end clients and brands, as well as Schlesinger’s acquisition of Market Cube and 20/20 Research to offer a full range of both qualitative and quantitative research services. We’ll see more companies moving to all types of research in 2021.

Federal Privacy Legislation

While numerous states, most notably California, have either enacted privacy legislation that affects marketing research, we are hopeful that federal legislation will happen to ease the burden of different rules for different states, creating numerous challenges for data providers and panel companies.

Progress on Leveraging Non-Survey Data

We believe that we will continue to see survey companies working with brands and sampling companies to combine survey data with behavioral data and transactional data, and more. This will be driven by both the surge in demand for research due to rapidly changing consumer behaviors and the demand by clients to see all forms of data in a more encompassing format to allow them to make better business decisions.

Overall, we believe that the market research industry will continue to evolve, with that evolution being pushed faster due to the impact of COVID-19 and the needs of clients to understand consumers’ changing preferences and behavior.

Here’s to 2021 and making it better than last year!