What is a MeBox Brand Map Study?

MeBox Marketing has created an online research tool that tells you which values customers most associate with your brand versus competitive brands. The game-like survey leads respondents to collaboratively choose and write in values they most associate with brands in a competitive set.

The end result is a map report that shows the mental real estate your brand owns among various types of consumers. The map helps marketers position and target, define their brand promise and track advertising’s effect on brand perception.

MeBox offers three types of brand map projects:

1. Full service: MeBox manages your brand map project for you with a service fee starting at $3350.
2. Self service: You configure your own brand map project using a self-serve wizard with a usage fee starting at $799.
3. Free Service: Configure your own brand map for free and get limited reporting.

What do I need to do to execute a full-service brand map study?

We make the full-service process very low-effort for you. To complete a brand map study, there are three or four things you need to do:
1. Send MeBox the logos of the brand(s) you want to test in Jpg format, 180 x 180 pixels. Send logos to logos@meboxmarketing.com no later than 3 business days prior to the survey’s planned launch
2. Approve or edit a list of description words to use in the survey
3. Recruit survey respondents by sending out an email or in some other way (or MeBox can do this for an additional fee)
4. (Optional) Provide an incentive for survey respondents

What is the pricing for a brand map study, and what are the payment terms?

Pricing is as follows:
• Full-service study of 1 brand:$3350
• Full-service study of 2-5 brands: $3950
• Full-service study of 6-9 brands: $4450
• Self-service study: $799

The MeBox brand map study requires an active credit card. For a full-service study, the card is charged $1000 to start and the balance is charged 15 days from the day the first respondent completes the survey. All surveys are closed 90 days after launch and are then no longer accessible to the public. However, client reports can be viewed for up to six months.

What does MeBox provide to me with full service?

1. Provide you with a starter list of possible description words and phrases
2. Prepare and launch the online survey prior to your respondent recruiting
3. Monitor the survey and handle any respondent technical support questions
4. Launch a secure, online reporting area 3-5 business days after recruiting ends
5. Send you the contact information of all respondents so you can fulfill any incentive

MeBox can also help you recruit respondents to participate for an additional cost.

How long does a typical brand map study take to finish?

Most clients get results about 2-3 weeks after first contacting us. This timeframe depends mostly on how quickly the client can recruit a sufficient number of respondents.

Who has MeBox worked with?

A partial list includes:
• 3M
• Ancestry.com
• AOL
• Audible.com
• Disney Interactive
• Disney Resorts
• Goodyear
• Grey Advertising
• IBM
• Leo Burnett Worldwide
• Medtronic
• MyFamily.com
• Netscape
• Nordic Track
• Primedia
• Stampin’ Up!

Is there a subscription option available for the brand map tool?

Yes. Custom pricing is available by contacting us.

Can MeBox send the recruiting email for me?

Yes. MeBox has the ability to send out a recruiting email to the email list you provide. You assume all responsibility in certifying the list complies with US law and generally accepted email practices. MeBox will mail to your list exactly as it is provided to us and can send the email in HTML or text format. The additional fee for sending an email for you is $1850 for up to 9,000 recipient email addresses.

Can MeBox manage other respondent recruiting programs for me besides email?

Possibly. We have resources to place online and print ads, make message board postings, produce direct mail and other tactics. If your needs are a good fit with our capabilities we can manage your entire recruiting campaign. Pricing for this service is provided on a case-by-case basis.

Who should I recruit as respondents?

Who you chose as respondents depends on whose opinions you care about hearing. If you want the opinions of your own customers, a customer list works. If you want the opinions of prospective customers, a prospective customer list works. You could choose to recruit both customers and prospective customers and then use Mebox’s crosstab reports to see how each group answered. The more specific your respondent requirements are, the harder it will be to find and recruit them. The brand map survey starts with a screener that only accepts the type of respondents you want.

While email is the easiest way to recruit respondents, you may also want to consider direct mail, message boards, site links, blogs, web and print advertising as a way to recruit respondents.

How do I know that the respondents are really people I want to hear from?

Respondents answer screening questions before they start the survey. Respondents who don’t pass the screener are blocked by a gentle deny page.

Can someone respond multiple times to the survey?

Yes, but they would need to work a little to do it. We allow only one survey response per IP address. If a respondent wanted to answer multiple times, he/she would need to do so from a different computer each time.

What are generally the response rates to these surveys?

It depends on who you are trying to recruit. CEO’s will yield a lower response rate than college students. We’ve intentionally designed the brand map survey to feel a little like a game so respondents want to participate and stay engaged. Response rates may range from 1 or 2% up to 20% depending on who you are trying to recruit and the incentive you offer.

What if I don’t have an email list?

There are other recruiting alternatives to email: Online and print ads, message board postings, direct mail, blogs and other tactics. MeBox can find respondents for you and manage the recruiting process for you if your needs are a good fit with our capabilities. Pricing for this service is provided on a case-by-case basis.

How many respondents do I need for a valid study?

Studies have shown that accuracy begins to improve less at 500 responses and increases only a minor amount beyond 1000 responses. As a general rule of thumb, 400-500 responses from a random sample is a good target (you can go lower but must accept lower accuracy).

If the population of respondents you want, however, is very small (female accountants in Denver, for example) you may need fewer than 500 responses to get valid data. MeBox will help you statistically determine the target number of responses.

Can you find panelists for me?

Yes. We have relationships with various sources that can provide respondents of various backgrounds for you. Pricing ranges generally from $7 to $20 per survey completion in consumer markets.

Can you provide recruiting copy?

Yes. MeBox can provide you with copy samples.

Is an incentive necessary?

No, but it really helps. Today’s consumers are bombarded with requests for market research and most expect something for their time. It’s possible to not use an incentive, but you may need to dramatically increase the volume of people to whom you send invitations in order to compensate.

What is a good incentive?

This depends on who you want to answer the survey. CEO’s require a bigger incentive than college students. If you can, providing a small incentive to every respondent is better than a big prize sweepstakes. In any case, here are some ideas that have worked for other clients.
• Sweepstakes for consumer electronics, cash or travel
• A modest gift certificate ($5-10) to a popular store (Amazon.com, Home Depot, Target etc.)
• Music downloads and ring tones (this might skew your respondents younger)
• Starbucks gift certificates
• Frequent Flier miles
• PayPal cash deposits (this might skew your respondents tech-savvy)
• Discounts on magazine subscriptions
• Your product, free or discounted (this might skew your respondents to people who want your product)
• Audiobook downloads (this might skew your respondents tech-savvy)
• Restaurant gift certificates or discounts

Remember, the incentive you offer may influence the type of respondents you get. That can be a pro or con depending on who you are trying to recruit.

Can MeBox help me provide an incentive to respondents?

Yes. MeBox has resources to deliver your incentive to respondents for an additional fee. Pricing is determined by the incentive you want to offer.

Can we give the survey our brand, look and feel?

No. The MeBox brand map survey cannot be graphically altered to mimic your brand or site. In most cases, however, you don’t want to brand the survey to be coming directly from you. Running the survey through a third party like MeBox helps reduce bias in the answers and helps produce a pure result.

Is online research valid?

Absolutely. According to Nielsen/NetRatings, over 75% of Americans have access to the internet and that number continues to rise (in contrast with home phone penetration that continues to fall because more Americans are using a cell phone as their primary phone). The vast majority of Internet users have access to email. Overall, the Internet has emerged as a cost-effective alternative to phone and mail surveys without sacrificing accuracy. Exceptions to this are the very elderly and very low-income households.

Is my study confidential?

MeBox shares your results only with you and only publishes your reports in a secure online area. Your survey respondents, however, have made no confidentiality commitment and thus any information you share with them in the survey should not be considered confidential.

Is the brand map available in languages other than English?

Possibly. We will work with you to determine if that is a possibility.

What kind of reporting is available?

MeBox has created a suite of online reports that are easy to view and manipulate. You can crosstab responses (see if different types of people answered questions differently), see aggregate data and even download the raw data. We will launch a secure reporting area for you once your survey has launched. For a sample of our reports, visit our sample reports area.

Can I download the reports?

You can download a comma delimited Excel file containing all your survey data. You can also copy tables and high-resolution graph outputs.

Can I order custom reports?

You will find that the standard MeBox reports are already very deep and allow you to dissect the information in many ways. However, MeBox can still provide you with custom, advanced reports by a statistician for an additional fee.

How many brands can I test in one study?

The limiting factor in how many brands you test is the amount of time you can get from a respondent. Depending on the incentive provided and type of respondent, the optimal time requirement for taking a brand map survey is 5-10 minutes. That timeframe can best accommodate 4-7 brands.

Can I use a different word description list for each brand presented in the survey?

No. The purpose of the survey is to see how brands compare to one another in the mind of the respondent, and that requires each brand to share the same list of options. By having one word description list for all the brands, you can see exactly how competitive brands stack up against one another.

How long are my reports available online?

MeBox stores your brand map reports for 6 months and then deletes them. You are welcome to copy the reports over to your computer and you can also download the raw data for a permanent record.

Who designed the MeBox Brand Map Technique?

The methodology was developed by a team of market researchers, marketers and web engineers with experience helping Fortune 500 companies understand their customers. The project’s directors and founders are Justin Ethington and Steve Stoddard, both of whom are marketing consultants with advanced degrees from Northwestern University’s Integrated Marketing business program.