Ray Poynter, online research innovator and master networker

Ray Poynter is something of a legendary figure in the market research world. I first met Ray the way that many people do – at a conference overseas where Ray shone out as cheerful and sociable in an island of grey suits and seriousness.

Ray dived into social media at a time when other people were cautiously dipping a toe. He has started up research networks on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Ning, and is currently chairing a virtual market research conference, the Festival of New MR, which goes live on December 6th. He’s a busy man: he is the author of a recent book on online research methods, runs popular training courses on new research methods and speaks regularly at conferences. He runs The Future Place and is also a director at Virtual Surveys.

Q How did you come to get involved with online research in the first place?

A It’s more that I’ve stayed still and the world’s kept moving. You know Malcom Gladwell’s book, Outliers, where he talks about performance being in part a matter of timing. I was at university when the computer revolution started. I ran the first online data services in the early 80s, using PDP computers, and ever since then I’ve stayed on the edge of whatever’s new and shiny. I think a fascination with change has kept me moving forward. Also, I have a very low boredom threshold. I like to solve new problems.

Q Ray, I’ve often seen you as a very natural networker. Have you any tips for those of us who find it harder going?

A I’m not in fact a great natural networker. It’s more that people come up and speak to me. Every two years in the recent past I have stood for election, and gone knocking on doors. I hate that process deeply and thoroughly, so I never assume that people will want to speak to me. But people are nice at conferences. You’re there with a whole bunch of people who are interested in similar things, who want to talk to you about what you’ve just said.

Q How do you go about networking in online spaces, such as LinkedIn?

A Online is a little like a conference, in that you are finding like-minded people. Networks like LinkedIn are an invaluable learning resource and membership is fairly mature – they’re not all bright young people. My first tip is to start by finding conversations that you like, and then add comments to those conversations. When you find you are regularly getting replies, then you can start to post your own conversations. The trick is to offer help before you request anything. Lots of brands get this wrong. Make sure you’re contributing.

My second tip is to seize opportunities. Things like the Research Liberation Front and other groups – very few people sign up for those things. If you do join in you can be part of a very small number who are influential.

Q You’ve also said that it’s hard to get younger people involved in networking and organising. Why do you think that is?

A I think historically people used to separate their work and home lives. So if for example you’re working in web design as your day job, you don’t necessarily embrace that in your time off. Plus, many people are accidentally in their careers, so the idea of revelling in your work may seem very odd indeed. There are probably about 100,000 working in market research around the world, but only about 3,000 online. Out of the others, there are plenty who will be playing Farmville and signing in with Foursquare, but they’re not mixing it with work.

Q Interesting. We tend to look at the online conversations on Twitter and elsewhere as representative and newsworthy, just because it’s there and we can read it easily.

A The internet has made it easier and easier to find people who are like you, but as researchers you need to understand the people who are not like you. One of the things I do in training courses is to get participants to take Twitter and monitor the conversation that’s taking place in a narrow geographical area, like part of their city. When you watch the undiluted stream, you see how wide the conversation really is and how narrow our perceptions of it are.

There is a downside to the internet making it so easy to find likeminded people. Take the Tea party activists in America… Twenty years ago you would meet different people as you walked down the street. People who moved to a different country would have to read the local newspapers to find out what was going on; now you can find your own news online. I have a Hungarian friend living here, who reads Hungarian news online. He’s very happy because he can access things in his own language, but arguably his news is narrower.

Q You are currently occupied with launching the Festival of New MR, which takes place next week… (For those who don’t know, this virtual conference features ‘main stage’ presentation streams across three different time zones, for Europe, the Far East and Australia, and the USA, as well as fringe content and competitions).

A Yep. It’s taking place in a crazily short time, and it’s attracting some interesting buzz. We’ve had lots of synopses from around the world although once again, there are not so many young people contributing. There are very few boundaries here but the entries still came in from senior researchers. We really want to understand more about that. We also have a poster competition and video competition, both with decent prizes, but people are still very reticent.

Q You also have a fringe element to the Festival…

A Yes, that’s starting up. The Research Liberation Front have launched their recruitment challenge. They are emailing out descriptions of 10 people who have to be found in the next 24 hours. Then the Belgian organisation BAQMaR are hosting a debate on the Friday: is online qual better than offline qual? This is interesting because the speakers are millenials in the research industry, with a stronger point of view on the place and value of online methods.

Q I have to ask: are you going to be researching the conference itself?

A Yes. Nigel Legge is doing a social listening project, and there will be a post-conference questionnaire. Simple questions, what did you like and not like. What can we do differently. We’ve made no promises yet about whether we’re doing it again!

Thanks so much to Ray for taking part. You can get tickets for the New MR conference here, and the place to submit your poster and video entries is here. Also, if you are snowbound today, Ray also has some nifty webinars up on his site at the moment which explain cluster analysis and factor analysis.