Omnibus – Part II

Here is the link for Omnibus part I

In part one we know what is omnibus study and how what to expect from this study, and now we will discuss what type of research is best using this study.

As you may know that omnibus cost is shared (therefore is cheaper) there are limitation in terms of the complexity of the study and the length of the questionnaire you want to include in the study.  Hence This study is best for basic information that require few questions to ask.

I generally advise to ask about 6 to 10 questions in this kind of study, which usually enough for most of my clients KPI. These are the questions that I usually put in Omnibus.

1. Unaided Brand awareness
2. Aided brand awareness
3. Advertising awareness
4. What to remember in the ad for specific brand
5. Brand trial
6. Brand Used Most often / Last used
7. Brand imagery
8. and other stuff according to clients need

With this few questions it usually enough to give us basic info about our marketing KPI. This can be powerful tool if we track this trough same omnibus, we will be able to see how our marketing activity can impact on the awareness, usage and image of our brand. Don’t forget you will get demographic profile too, so we can analyze it in specific market segment.

Although this research tool is meant for simple and broad information, this study anything but simple in terms of the methodology. The agency need to ensure that the sample is randomly selected, the quality control is also need to be good to ensure that the study is reliable and representative to the population that this study covered.

So call your research agency now and ask if they have this kind of study… it is good quality and cost efficient to get some basic information about your consumers.

Cheers

Omnibus – Part 1

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Some friend of mine asked what is the “cheapest” quantitative study that can help them to get some information that they need. As always my answer would be “depend on what you need to know”, but few alternatives would be: Omnibus, Telephone or online research, or just small scale study on one event.

Today I would like to talk about omnibus kind of study which I see is underused or even overly used by some.

What is Omnibus study

When I explain about Omnibus, I like to use Bus VS Taxi comparison to differentiate this service compare to regular quantitative research.

Just like in a bus, we share the cost with others to make it cheaper, so in one project, the questionnaire may be coming from multiple clients. They can not from same industry thought, otherwise we will repeating same question over and over again. The questionnaire will be divided into few “chapter” ie. Biscuit, Cigarette, RTD tea etc.

Just like in a bus, they are already set of things that clients can not change, for example : sample size, sample definition, area covered and field schedule. So check the detail of the omnibus project before you actually committed to join.

Say your target market is consumer aged 30 + but omnibus stated that they cover 18+ so you probably end up having less sample than it intended. But sometimes it is OK if you get only part of the sample as long as is still cheaper than you do it trough regular project. And no, there will be no discount for not having 18-29 age of respondents.

Despite sharing the fieldwork cost, the questionnaire will be specifically designed to each of the client need and in the end each of the client will get specific report/data according to questions asked. The result will not be shared with other client. This what made omnibus is different with syndicated report.

Since some clients may ride this bus, the questionnaire should be kept short generally 5-8 question per client (total interview can not more than 45 minutes). Other than those questions, clients will get demographic profile data as part of the deal.

OK that is about Omnibus, I will cover about how best use this type of the study in second part.

Omnibus part II