The Japan Marketing Research Association (JMRA) will celebrate its 30th anniversary next year in 2005 and in preparation, a Pre Conference was held in Keio Plaza Hotel on Monday, November 8th under the title of “The Social Value of Marketing Research and the Current Market Situation”. To a packed house, five presentations selected by the JMRA were made by mid-career researchers.

The conference was opened with an address from the Chairperson; Mr. Yasuo Miki. Following that, Ms. Eriko Ota from Kirin Brewery made a keynote speech titled “ What we expect from researchers ? Research for product development”.

She pointed out that, from the client side, an over-emphasis on speed is accelerating a trend towards the commoditization of research products and results generated from “Black Boxes”. On the other hand, research companies were guilty of uncritically implementing client demands, and prioritizing client requests even if means sacrificing the accuracy of the data, as well as abusing techniques such as multi-variable analysis. The breakdown in communication between clients and research companies has unhappy consequences for both sides.

Expectations by clients from their suppliers were improvements in fieldwork accuracy, the ability to make hypothesis, new survey methods using innovative IT techniques and reliable online research. Research companies wanted more input regarding client needs and more latitude to point out client mistakes, as well as to include information from other industries in research proposals.

The remaining presentations were made with coordination of Ms. Kayo Nakaji from Dentsu Research.

Ms. Yuuka Shiomura and Ms. Yukiko Doi from Nippon Research Center made a presentation on techniques to improve the completion rate through a study of interviewer performance entitled ‘”Improvement of face to face survey completion rate”

Next, Ms. Reiko Kitagawa from Nikkei Research made a presentation on what her company does under the title of ‘”The Current Market Situation and the Value of RDD surveys”.

Mr. Daiichi Homma from Interscope made a presentation regarding a mock web purchase test under the title of ‘”Virtual Retail Conjoint on the Web”. This technique was developed to overcome the limitations of other simulations such as Pos data analysis, in-store purchase tests and Simulated Test Marketing.

Ms. Mariko Abe from Research International made a presentation on branding under the title of ‘”Management of global brands ? Meeting consumer expectations”. Her company conducts a multi-national qualitative brand study almost every year. The results are analyzed locally and globally, and the report is issued under the name of RIO ? Research International Observer.

Finally Mr. Takashi Sakamoto from Intage made a presentation under the title of ‘Marketing Research Industry in China’. He introduced the current market situation and the issues to bear in mind when conducting surveys in China as well as the differences in the research industry between Japan and China.

All of the presentations were energetically and skillfully completed. There were many questions from attendees.

After the presentations, attendees moved to another room and a Networking Party was held. “The Marketing Research Industry in China” by Mr. Takashi Sakamoto from Intage received the award for the best presentation from the JMRA chairperson; Mr. Miki. The presentation was selected for its skillful delivery as well as its topicality due to the emerging importance of China.

There were a total 312 attendees representing 114 companies ? 215 from 53 regular member companies, 36 from 18 supporting member companies, and 42 from 30 general member companies as well as 19 from 13 companies invited to participate.