Choosing the Right Market Research Agency

(part of Chapter 7: Market Research Agency Selection)

 

Once you’ve narrowed your agency choices down to a short-list of finalists, choosing between them can be a daunting task. While it may be tempting to go with the agency offering the lowest price, it’s important to consider other factors, too.

Read on to learn some different strategies your organization can use to make the right agency choice.

 

Once you have narrowed your list to two or three firms, what’s next? You will probably have a strong feel based on personality fit, but if you are truly conflicted, here are two approaches you can use to break the tie:

 

Approach A

Pick a tie-breaker criterion, and be objective. In my experience, too many people use price. Price is important, but take a moment to really reflect.

Isn’t there some criterion that is even more important to you? Which finalist would be best at the following tasks:

• Delivering results with credibility to your executive management team?


• Getting along with your project team?


• Adding value to the process through relevant contextual knowledge?


• Keeping your project true to stated objectives through a formal project management approach?


• Having enough business savvy to accurately interpret results and help drive real business decisions?

Assuming that the finalists are all equivalently attractive based on methodology and deliverables, it could be one of the “softer” items such as these that turn out to be the most useful tie-breaker.

 

Approach B

Create a weighted scorecard. If you really don’t have one criterion you can objectively use as a tie-breaker, pick your top five to seven items and create a scorecard. A weighted scorecard, like the one shown in Figure 7.2, helps to keep you honest about what is really important in your selection process.

Figure 7.2 A Weighted Scorecard
Criteria	Weight	Agency A		Agency Z
Fee	10	3	30	5	50
Insight into project objectives	10	5	50	3	30
Presentation skills	30	4	120	2	60
References	10	4	40	3	30
Relationship style fit	20	5	100	4	80
Timeline commitment	20	2	40	5	100
TOTAL	100		380		350

Set your weights such that they total 100 points. In this example, the client values presentation skills above other items, because in this case, the project’s success will primarily be judged by how well the agency delivers the key findings to the management team. In other cases, a client might value other items more.

To create the scorecard, follow these steps:

Step 1: Identify your criteria (it’s best to keep it simple, with five to seven items at most).

Step 2: Assign weights, such that they add to 100. Is timeline commitment twice as important as fee to you? Then you might assign timeline at 20 and fee at 10, as in this example.

Step 3: Assess your finalists on each item, using a scale of 1 to 5. In this scale, 1 means “weakness” and 5 means “strength.” A neutral score is 3. In this example, Agency A has okay fees (a 3), and Agency Z has very attractive fees (rated a 5).

Step 4: Tally the results, and make your decision.

 

This is an excerpt from the book, "How to Hire & Manage Market Research Agencies," which is available on Amazon. Published by Research Rockstar LLC. Copyright © by Kathryn Korostoff. All rights reserved.