The newest season of Dr. Who is underway, and the series in general has a few lessons for market research. But what can we learn from a time-traveling, two-hearted alien obsessed with Britain?
The first thing that we can learn is the sheer constancy of human nature. Even humanoid nature. Wherever and whenever the Doctor travels in space and time, humans and humanoids act in the mix of rational and irrational ways that we’ve observed here on Earth.
Contrast this with the pundits who often make the mistake of identifying market research with its most popular methods, and saying that since surveys and focus groups will become obsolete therefore market research will become obsolete. In fact, it seems that, to be fashionable, any market research conference has to have at least one presenter making the case that “market research is dead!”
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Author Notes:
Jeffrey Henning
Jeffrey Henning, IPC is a professionally certified researcher and has personally conducted over 1,400 survey research projects. Jeffrey is a member of the Insights Association and the American Association of Public Opinion Researchers. In 2012, he was the inaugural winner of the MRA’s Impact award, which “recognizes an industry professional, team or organization that has demonstrated tremendous vision, leadership, and innovation, within the past year, that has led to advances in the marketing research profession.” In 2022, the Insights Association named him an IPC Laureate. Before founding Researchscape in 2012, Jeffrey co-founded Perseus Development Corporation in 1993, which introduced the first web-survey software, and Vovici in 2006, which pioneered the enterprise-feedback management category. A 35-year veteran of the research industry, he began his career as an industry analyst for an Inc. 500 research firm.
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