2019 GRIT Top 50 Released in Business and Innovation Report

The 25th edition of the GreenBook Research Industry Trends Report, using data collected in Q1 & Q2 of 2019, is here!

For several years we have designated each wave of the GRIT Report by referencing the quarters that it covers, but earlier this year we decided the GRIT program needed a refresh, and as part of that we have restructured each report topically to focus on different aspects of the industry. Thus, this can be considered the inaugural edition of the new GRIT Business & Innovation Report.

Business & Innovation

As the name suggests, the intent was to redesign both the questionnaire and the report to focus on large issues related to the business of research vs the process. The Insights Practice edition of GRIT later this year will tackle the nuts and bolts of the industry. 

Here are some of the key findings from this edition:

• Both clients and suppliers agree that AI is the buzzword of the year
• Buyers in media/entertainment/retail and tech are increasing their budgets by more than 10% of other industries
• Research providers are 9% more likely to feel optimistic about their business outlook than research buyers
• Which 12 companies debuted on the ‘Top 50 Most Innovative Suppliers’ list
• The rate of suppliers reporting revenue increases is at its highest level since GRIT first began tracking this

GRIT is the primary vehicle to quantify the role and impact of innovation in the research space, and so that is the primary lens we use in understanding the business itself as well. Overall, this effort is tied to our vision of not just understanding the industry, but to eventually develop models that will be available to the industry to create a series of tools that function as a roadmap for success.

What does that mean in terms of content? 

Well, we decided for this report to focus on a few key topic areas: the Buzz topics the industry is paying attention to, Opportunities & Challenges for both organizations and the industry as a whole, quantifying a variety of critical Organizational Success Factors, mapping the industry with a new GRITscape, understanding the current business outlook, refreshing our benchmarking section and of course, a perennial favorite, the GRIT Top 25 Clients and Top 50 Suppliers (with lots of movement in the rankings including a new #1 company!) considered to be most innovative.

The roots of GreenBook are based on developing a taxonomic view of the industry for vendor identification and exploration. Last year we implemented our GRITscape model to use that experience and expand on our vision of creating the most comprehensive segmentation model of the insights & analytics industry available. In this wave, we took that a step further and inserted a “big bucket” classification question into the GRIT Top 50 section to help tie everything together further.

The result is six new ‘GRIT Top 50’ sub-category lists for each segment, in addition to the overall ‘Top 50’ list:

1. Data & Analytics Providers
2. Full/Field Service Agencies
3. Qualitative Suppliers
4. Strategic Consultancies
5. Technology Providers
6. “Other” (Emerging Players)

Our goal here was to accomplish a few things: to showcase even more companies that are leaders in specific areas, to understand how companies are perceived in the marketplace, and to compare how companies are perceived by the market versus how they are positioned by their own employees via the GRITscape. The research industry is a very segmented marketplace, to no one’s surprise. Understanding where you play, especially as a supplier, is important for positioning and marketplace success. And, based on the data from this edition of the GRIT study, there is much information both buyers and suppliers need to know about how well (or not well!) they are doing on this important front.

What else is new?

Some of the analysis has shifted to a new Appendix section where you can access descriptions of methodologies and a deeper dive into certain topics/descriptions. Our hope is repositioning them in the layout increases the usability of the overall report.

That is the high-level structure, but there are some surprises herein as we decided to dig deep while also maintaining as much consistency with previous waves as possible. As the industry is doing, we wanted to keep the best of the tried and true while embracing the new to deliver more value and impact.

The end result is a report that we believe to be an even stronger resource for the insights industry than ever before. GRIT is the #1 tool for strategic planning purposes and we’ve kept that need as our touchstone in all decision making.

Acknowledgments 

Last but not least, acknowledgments must be given. GRIT is a community effort and our authors, commentary providers, sample partners, advertisers, and most especially research partners make it all possible. Special thanks go out to the organizations who helped with data collection and analysis: AYTM – Ask Your Target Market, Deckchair Data, Dynata, Gen2 Advisors, Infotools, Lightspeed, NewMR, OdinAnswers, OfficeReports, Potentiate, Market Research Institute International, Stakeholder Advisory Services, and students from the Michigan State University MMR program. We couldn’t pull this off without their generous time, energy, and expertise.

Start using the report today. Enjoy!