Telecommunications Industry

Recent Articles

Below are the 4 most recent articles on this topic. These articles were published within the last three years and are only available to registered subscribers.

Trade Talk: The Web drives sales, but not all by itself

A Pew study shows that while consumers do rely on the Web for information searches when shopping for products and services, in many cases they also consult in-store salespeople as part of the process.

My cell phone, my life

A week-long online study, in which respondents used blogs to record their phone usage and related experiences, helped the Consumer Electronics Association see how important cell phones are to pre-teen and teenaged kids.

Perceptions and realities

While video cannot and should not eliminate the written report, it should have a greater role in the tool kit of the corporate researcher. A case history example involving cell phones in Japan is included.

Work your plan

Using a case history involving Texas-based Motion Computing, the article shows how a technology firm used research to define and refine new products.

Related Articles

There are 11 articles in our archive related to this topic. Below are 5 selected at random and available to all users of the site.

Speed dialing

Sprint conducted focus groups with residential and business customer segments to make sure its customer satisfaction tracking program would measure service attributes that were important to customers. That information was used to construct the telephone surveys with its customers. For customers that express specific complaints during the telephone survey, the interviewer electronically sends the comments to Sprint for follow-up action that responds to that particular customer.

Don't eliminate — migrate!

Based on a case study of a Fortune 500 telecom company, the article outlines the difficulties of moving a phone survey to the Web. Specific tips are offered, including paying close attention to sampling, running a parallel test, and keeping questionnaires brief.

Research helps AT&T sharpen its newsletter

When AT&T customers received their "Stay In Touch" newsletter with their long distance bill, most didn't realize the extensive market research that went into it. AT&T employed focus group sessions and mall intercepts to find out what type of newsletter would best appeal to customers.

Network ratings

AT&T uses a mail survey and feedback from local access meetings to gather information from employees about satisfaction with their health network providers and service.

In search of the perfect plastic

Ameritech and Household International relied on qualitative and quantitative research strategies to develop a credit card concept combining the features of a MasterCard and a telephone calling card. The study involved focus groups and a conjoint analysis in which participants completed a computerized questionnaire in which they isolated the combination of features that most appealed to them by keying their answers to a detailed series of questions.

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