Yesterday I got a tweet from David Snowden with two links on a new implementation of the SenseMaker software and related methodology of narrative collection. The Brook Besor Consultants have been gearing ourselves up for using both in our evaluation work on the NIH grant to Vanderbilt Center for Science Outreach.

The software was designed originally for work David Snowden was conducting for certain intelligence agencies. He prefaced the tweet with “From counter terrorism to cosmetics in 4 years.”

The first link was to a cosmetic industry news site: Cosmetics Design.

Kline Group has launched KlinePulse, a new research tool aimed at gathering more targeted insights into consumer trends and patterns for personal care. …
The service is claimed to build on traditional consumer research because it goes beyond the close-ended, multiple choice approach to gathering information, which often leaves out key nuances governing consumer patterns

The second link was to the Cognitive Edge site with the initial “news release.”

Traditional consumer research often employs close-ended, multiple-choice surveys, interviews, or focus groups to solicit responses from consumers about historical behavior. The problem with these methodologies, Mills says, is that they rarely yield legitimately unbiased feedback. Survey questionnaires, by design, force respondents to choose from pre-determined selections, and focus group participants are easily influenced by the moderator and other participants in the group. In addition, the information gleaned from these methods is based on past behavior, which may have little bearing on future patterns.

KlinePulse uses open-ended, indirect questions and narrative gathering that enable respondents to deliver entirely unbiased, unprompted perspectives on their attitudes and thoughts. This raw, qualitative data is then quantified based on specific value metrics to help marketers identify the types of consumers and the contexts in which they are most highly engaged with certain brands and products.