If you’re looking to get deeper, ongoing insights from your customers, creating a market research online community might make sense for your business. In times of difficult and uncertain economic landscape, having a direct line to your customers can be a huge competitive advantage. High-quality customer feedback is the fuel to better decision-making.
But to get the most of a research online community, you need to adopt the right approach.
In this article, we’ll share some best practices that will help you run better online communities.
A market research online community (MROC for short) is an invite-only online group of customers, fans, employees or other stakeholders that you set up for the purpose of ongoing research and feedback.
It’s essentially a private insight community where members engage in research activities (like surveys or discussions) designed to understand consumer behaviors and attitudes. Instead of one-off surveys or focus groups, an MROC lets you connect with people on an ongoing basis so you can get insights faster and track trends over time.
Think of it as having a dedicated customer panel who want to talk to you. They feel special because they’re part of a select community, and you get the benefit of candid, fresh insights whenever you need them.
Because members engage over weeks, months, or even years, you can explore ideas in-depth. And you’re not starting from scratch each time—you’ve built a rapport with your community, and that trust leads to more honest feedback.
Building an insights community can transform how you do research. First, you get continuous quant, qual and video feedback. Rather than running a big study once a year, you can ask your community quick questions any time. This agile approach to research means you can test ideas (like a new product concept or marketing message) on the fly, ask follow-up questions, and iterate.
Second, an MROC is cost-effective in the long run. Yes, it takes effort to set up and manage, but it can reduce the need for expensive one-off research projects. Some Rival customers told us that they’re able to run at least 4x more research using an insight community using the same budget compared to running ad hoc studies. You have a ready-made group of engaged participants, so recruiting for each new survey or focus group isn’t necessary. Also, community members often provide richer, higher quality insights than random survey respondents because they’re more invested in your brand. You’ll likely see higher response rates and more thoughtful answers since members feel heard and want to help shape what you do.
A research community facilitates stronger customer relationships.
Finally, a research community facilitates stronger customer relationships, especially if you’re running a branded community. When you engage people in two-way conversations regularly, they feel valued. They’re not just research subjects; they become partners in your product development and decision-making process. This can boost customer loyalty – community members often love being “insiders” and brand advocates.
In short, an insight community doesn’t just yield data, it builds a network of passionate customers who are eager to give you actionable insight.
In the past, MROCs often required clunky portals. The intention was to have a place where participants can see new engagement activities and see updates from the company. Ironically, this approach turned off participants: People didn’t want yet another password to remember.
In addition, for many MROCs, email was the default survey distribution channel.
The top insight community platforms today are built in a way that’s more relevant to both modern consumers and researchers. They blend innovative tech and conversational methodology to make participation easy, engaging, and scalable.
Here’s what’s new with MROCs and communities:
Modern life happens on the go, so your community should too. A mobile-first approach means members can participate straight from their smartphones…. No passwords or desktop portals needed.
This frictionless approach removes barriers to entry – no hoops to jump through – so it’s effortless for people to engage.. Mobile-first communities often use SMS or messaging apps for invites and activities, which is a game-changer. In fact, our own research shows that SMS survey distribution can yield lightning-fast engagement (often around 40% of replies within the first hour.)
Mobile-first, conversational surveys also let participants snap photos or record videos on the fly, sharing rich, in-the-moment feedback from wherever they are. The easier and more intuitive the experience, the more participation you’ll see.
Nobody enjoys dull, robotic questionnaires. Leading insight community companies now use chat-based, conversational surveys that feel like a natural back-and-forth on mobile. This approach leverages familiar messaging interfaces and a friendly tone, making the process feel more like texting with a friend than taking a test.
The payoff is huge: community members tend to stay more engaged and provide more thoughtful answers. Rival’s research shows an average 87% completion rate for studies when using a conversational, chat-style design – far higher than industry norms. By designing research activities to be human, you not only get better data quality, but you also respect your participants’ time and attention.
And, of course, the increase in engagement can also result to research cost savings and higher quality data from your MROC.
Text-based responses are valuable, but modern insight communities take it further with media-rich feedback. A mobile-first customer insights platform makes it easy for members to share photos, video feedback, and audio as part of their responses.
Want to see how customers actually use your product at home? Ask them to upload a quick video. Curious about what catches a shopper’s eye in the store? Have them snap a photo on their phone.
These rich media responses add context and emotions that you simply can’t get from radio buttons alone. John Deere, for example, enabled farmers in its insight community to send videos and photos from the field, yielding deeper insights and real-life context for the research team.
Allowing multimedia feedback not only makes participation more fun for members, it also enhances storytelling. These artifacts give your team vivid, concrete examples and stories that you can use for your reports and other market research deliverables.
Perhaps the biggest advantage of a modern insight community is the shift from one-off projects to continuous learning. In the past, researchers would launching a massive survey on their MROC, hoping something useful would come back. Today, you can take a more modular approach — keep a steady pulse of insights flowing.
Community members are pre-profiled, so you can field quick questions or iterative studies at the speed of business. This agility means you can test ideas, get feedback, and refine concepts in days rather than weeks.
Many innovative brands use this iterative approach to get ongoing customer insights. From OURA to Warner Bros. Discovery, and Time Out, many companies are finding that short conversational surveys are a much smarter way of getting high-quality feedback and understanding today’s consumers.
Insight communities give you on-demand access to your most important audience, so you can respond swiftly to emerging trends or urgent business questions. The result is a more iterative, responsive approach to research – one that keeps up with fast-changing consumer needs and helps brands stay ahead.
Having the right community platform is only half the battle; how you manage and engage your community is equally important. Here are some proven best practices (drawn from Rival’s experience with Community 2.0) to ensure your market research online community delivers maximum value:
Give your community a clear purpose: Make sure you (and your members) know why the community exists. Are you co-creating product ideas, testing marketing messages, or tracking customer satisfaction? When you define the purpose up front, you can recruit the right people and ask the right questions.
Even with a blind community, members will feel more motivated to participate if they know the community’s mission and see that their input will influence real decisions.
Recruit the right participants: The quality of insights from your community depends on who’s in it. Invite members who represent your target audience and genuinely want to participate.
At Rival, our customer success team often recommends a multi-channel approach to recruitment. Different channels have their own pros and cons, and this approach allows you to get the right people in the community in a cost-effective manner. If you’re building a branded insight community, tapping into your existing customer database is also a good first step.
Make participation effortless. Remove friction in the participant experience wherever possible. The last thing people want is another login or clunky portal slowing them down. Ditch unnecessary barriers and meet your members where they already are. The easier it is to join and give feedback, the more people will participate (and the less likely they’ll drop off).
Think mobile-first. Design all activities for mobile engagement first. Use SMS or notifications to invite folks to your conversational surveys – they’re more likely to respond immediately on their phones. A mobile-first mentality also means keeping surveys short and optimized for small screens.
This approach pays off in spades: mobile messaging invites can generate remarkably fast responses (often a large chunk within an hour). By embracing mobile, you meet members in their natural habitat and get more authentic, real-time input.
Keep it conversational. Jargon-filled or formal surveys will make your community feel like a chore. Aim for a friendly, conversational tone in your questions and prompts. You can even use AI tools to help rephrase “survey speak” into more natural language.
Also, avoid repetitive questions by leveraging profile data – if you already know someone’s age or product usage from a previous activity, don’t ask it again. Treat members like humans, not data points. A conversational approach not only respects respondents, it leads to higher completion rates and richer answers. Engaged members = better insights.
Offer incentives. When it comes to research communities, incentives work because they are incentivizing. While many people join communities to have a voice, it’s still important to show appreciation for their time. Whether it’s sweepstakes entries, gift cards, exclusive content, or even just public recognition, incentives help boost engagement in your MROC.
Close the feedback loop. Don’t leave your community members wondering if their feedback vanished into a black hole. Share back what you learned and how you’re using their input. For example, you might send a brief summary of key findings or record a two-minute video update from a team member to say “Here’s what we heard from you, and here’s what we’re doing about it.” This simple step makes participants feel heard and appreciatedrivaltech.com.
Even better, incorporate these thank-you moments at the start of the next activity to grab attention. When people see their feedback driving real decisions, it builds trust and motivates continued engagement – truly creating a community rather than just a panel.
Some Rival customers, like Time Out, for instance, use the chats themselves to create “Wrapped”-style engagements — sharing some key stats or insights from previous research studies. This is a big hit for many community members!
Leverage expert support. Running a thriving insight community is a team effort. Don’t hesitate to lean on experts – whether that’s an internal insights team or your platform provider’s customer success managers. These pros have seen what works across many communities and can be a treasure trove of ideas. Tap them for insight community management best practices on keeping members engaged, refreshing your activities, or optimizing your recruitment strategy.
For instance, periodically refreshing a portion of your member base can keep the community from going stale. A great insight community company will work with you continuously to maximize your community’s health and impact. Use that “secret weapon” to your advantage.
By following these best practices – making participation easy, engaging, rewarding, and supported – you’ll set your insight community up for success. Participants who feel valued and enjoy the experience are more likely to stick around, respond often, and provide the candid, quality feedback you need.
Leading organizations across industries are already seeing the impact of these best practices in action. Here are a few examples of how insight communities (Community 2.0 in practice) are delivering value:
John Deere – 100+ studies a year, richer insights: The agricultural equipment giant transformed its traditional research approach by launching a mobile-first insight community for farmers and dealers. This tech-savvy audience is hard to reach via email surveys, but by using SMS and chat-based engagements, John Deere is able to capture feedback from people out in the field in real time. The results have been impressive: the company now conducts over 100 studies per year through its B2B insight communities.
Warner Bros. Discovery started working with Rival to engage more Gen Zs in their insight community. The conversational approach works well with the company’s passionate fans, and today, Rival is now the default protocol for their long-standing community. Warner Bros. Discovery uses their insight community to support a wide range of research use cases: everything from UX research to concept testing and content evaluation.
OURA started working with Rival Technologies to create a way to get on-demand access to member feedback. Community members today provide insights on new features, marketing messaging, product concepts, and everything in between. The team at OURA also leverages Rival’s AI capabilities to enhance the richness and depth of their insights.
More responses in less time meant the team could tackle far more questions and internal stakeholder requests than before. This kind of ROI – more insights for the same spend – gets the attention of executives. It exemplifies how a well-run community isn’t just a “nice to have,” but a smarter way to do research that drives real business value.
These examples show the power of modern insight communities to transform market research. Whether it’s faster insights, higher engagement, or greater research capacity, Community 2.0 delivers tangible market research ROI.
Your consumers are evolving, and the tools we use to engage them must evolve as well. A market research platform that offers a mobile-first, conversational experience to participants, and supported by industry experts can be the catalyst for better insights in less time.
Rival Technologies’ Community 2.0 is built on these principles. This insight community solution blends engaging tech with research rigor to remove the old hassles of community research.
If you’re ready to elevate your research with faster, richer insights, it’s time to explore what Community 2.0 can do for you. Ready to get started? Request a call with Rival to see how we can help you with your research needs.
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