Humanity Archives - Page 3 of 4

We Are All Super Human

1 Donor Can Save up to 8 + Improve up to 75 Lives

More at Donate Life America

Also seen on LinkedIn, https://www.linkedin.com/embed/feed/update/urn:li:share:7128698545490026496: “What it means when you sign up to be an organ, eye, or tissue donor.” by Katie McCallum

Some organs (like one of your two kidneys or a portion of your liver) can be donated to another human while you’re alive. Other organs, eyes, and skin are typically donated by a deceased person to help improve the lives of those left living. In a way, it’s the last, best gift someone can give. And for most of us, we can sign-up for this super ability simply by selecting “organ donor” when we renew our state-issued driver’s license. It’s all pretty fascinating. Cheers to humanity!

Organ donation improves lives, and dare I say it improves humanity. A lot of great organizations (HRSA, UNOS, AOPO, Donate Life America, National Kidney Foundation, the America Kidney Fund, Global Transplant Solutions, and more) are working to make allografts happen better and more often.

More from Penn Medicine on the subject. What do you think?

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Today’s Word: Allograft

Words from InsideHeads

Did you know, humans can donate organs, tissues, cells, etc. from their body when they are alive (yes, there are limitations), and also after death. Most deceased organ donations in America come from a generously checked “organ donor” box on the back of drivers licenses. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but God love the DMV.

Helping others by physically donating parts of yourself while alive is not for everyone. More people feel comfortable checking a remote box on a form that only applies if you’re dead. Others would give you an arm if they could. The beauty lies in in the diversity of thought and the undeniable equalizer of us all: humanoid.

For those who love words the way others love comfortable shoes, continue on. “Allo” means “other” in Greek, so making an allotransplant or allograft means the doctor is transferring human material between humans. While we may all be uniquely different, the vast majority of us are walking around with the same organ sandwich ingredients. If the liver in your body isn’t operating well enough, your life can be saved by either a living or a deceased donor. Yes, a living donor can donate a portion of their liver and the new liver grows like a flower from seed inside the recipient. And… the donor’s liver repairs itself. Crazy, right?

Donate Life America estimates that a single deceased donor can save the lives of up to 75 people. And then consider the friends and family who all love those 75 people. The exponential pain spare is off the charts.

Interested in learning a little or a lot? I’d start here to get the government’s assessment of the ordeal, then here, to see what’s happening to solve the problem. Here’s some more about what’s coming from InsideHeads.

Some surprising facts –

Bone Marrow Transplant Recipients and Donors have a national database and distribution procedure, while other organs (e.g., kidney, liver) do not.

Finding donors is managed locally and/or through the state, and operations for transplant are controlled by hospitals who promote their transplant services. Imagine if only certain hospitals could give you blood… it wouldn’t happen. So how are organs somehow able to operate as a form of currency between hospitals and insurance companies?

Rules of donor and recipient management vary by state and also obviously across the world. It is illegal in the United States to purchase an organ. We know that doesn’t stop it. We also know that hospitals do it, but they call it a service and the buyer is the insurance company. It’s all a little sticky.

Bottom line, regardless how you look at it, the problem is actually not supply. There are enough viable donors who die each year to provide those left on earth with needed life saving options. So it’s a sign-up problem? It’s a little more than that… but that sure sounds like a good place to start. Consider checking that “organ donor” box next time, and feel good about your life knowing you will be leaving the world a better place.

No pressure, but if you’re curious, here’s what’s needed in your neck of the woods.

Our questions breed more questions. What do you think?

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Crossing the Finish Line

Do you do it with everything, or just what you can?

Never giving up is a quality most of us just don’t understand.

If we could all be more like Bou Samnang from Cambodia, who, despite multiple challenges, and in front of a huge crowd, kept going. And going. And going. Her lesson to us lesser humans? Never give up. A sentence we hear, but rarely practice. Next time you want to give up, imagine doing it in front of the world. Cheers to you, Bou Samnang!

More Tips & Joy

Tips and Joy

Yam or Potato?

Keep the Peace

6 Ways to Boost Your Market Research

The Power of Empathy

To Gift or Re-gift

Work Less, Be Happy

Crossing the Finish Line

Breaking up (With Customers) is Hard to Do

Doodle Me Happy

Best in Show InsideHeads

Today’s Word: Allograft

To Glass or Not to Glass

We Are All Superhuman

Finding Your Funny

Getting a Grip on Grammar

Travel Smarter

How to Choose Your Research Method

Is Your Research Study Doomed?

Tips to Calculate Qualitative Research CPI

When Did Online Qual Begin?

March Madness Message to Marketers

How to Choose Online or In-Person Interviews

How to Choose a Marketing Research Provider

When a Great Idea Goes Wrong

5 Business Trends to Watch in 2015 (How Close Were We?)

Mobile Internet Access on the Move (see what has changed since 2015)

Are Synchronous Group Chats Limiting?

Take Custom Courses in Online Qualitative Research

Tell Me Three Things

Boost Attendance

The Game of Would You Rather

H ow We Learn

Step Away from The Work

Decision is Done, Take the Cannoli

Break Time

Super Bowl Surprise

Cell Phones + Toilets

Take Note

Spring Ahead, Fall Back – But Why?

Spring Shake

The Joy of Olive + Mabel

Marketing on the Move

Truth Telling Tips

Spotl ight on Good News

Marketing of Omission

Geek Out on Statistics

Holy Crap, a Clean Joke

Battle of Word Pronunciations

Request a Quote

Schedule Moderator Training

Join the Panel

Great Ideas Gone Wrong

When you hear a great idea, how do you know? The idea may sound great, but just because it has good intentions doesn’t mean it will work. At the very least, a great idea should be feasible and harmless to others.

Good Intentions

Not long ago a group of dedicated volunteers in my town got together to raise money for the local rescue squad. Their idea was to print and sell drink cards that offered a free drink at each of 6 local restaurants. The drinks were valued at $36 and the cards were priced at $20, and all the local restaurants agreed to accept them. Our town is a heavy tourist destination, so cards were given as gifts to visitors to encourage them to check-out local establishments.

Lasting Damage

People bought lots of drink cards and loads of money went to the rescue squad. Success, right? Wrong. Visitors who received the gifted drink card and attempted to use it encountered restrictions and ignorance from uninformed seasonal bar staff. So while the money was made in the moment, the damage of dissing tourists is immeasurable. Vacationers not only recount bad experiences to friends and family members, today their comments on social media reach further and linger longer. Ouch.

The drink card debacle is just one small example in the shadow of a far more substantial bad idea that occurred in Flint, Michigan. Town officials saved money in the moment, but gave way to irreversible damage down the line. Hindsight… you know what they say. So what’s the takeaway?

No Repeat

I can’t help but wonder: We all learn from our own mistakes, so why can’t we also learn from the mistakes of others? Sure, big gaffes get the news, but most mistakes only enlighten the bumbler. In today’s connected world, where is the portal to deposit our lessons learned? Facebook and Instagram are filled with accomplishments, carefully selected ‘selfies’, and emotional, envy-inducing posts. Wikipedia offers us our collectively edited facts, and millions of websites push products and self-serving information. Where is the hub for all things that went horribly wrong? All the lessons of war. Of life. A virtual library of bittersweet warnings, filled with evidence of what not to do. Or perhaps a way to tag those bits of learning amidst all that worldly web content.

With today’s technology and our tendency to share, a blunder blog sure sounds like great idea…

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5 Business Trends to Watch

Originally published June 19, 2015

Business behavior can be very telling. InsideHeads identified these 5 business trends to watch that will affect market research.

1. Crowdsourcing

If it’s not clear yet, social media is here to stay. The human desire to socialize and engage with others online gives savvy businesses the chance to collect feedback that is immediate, trusted, and free. Lengthy questionnaires have given way to quick polls, as attention spans of respondents wither down to seconds. Gone with consumer attention is the long term strategic planning that traditionally accompanies good marketing research. With the immediate feedback mechanism of today’s social media, businesses can (and do) post questions and problems to receive rich, real-time results. Smart brands looking towards the future are designing their virtual space with an eye on conducting more marketing research via social media.

2. BYOD (Bring Your Own Device)

Choice is everywhere these days and showing no signs of going away. Each of us uses a device (or multiple devices) that best meets our needs. As the lines between personal and business hours blur, businesses are realizing the advantages, and challenges (e.g., security), of implementing BYOD in the workplace. Present obstacles aside, solutions are on the horizon. Because BYOD is not a trend, today it’s a right. Successful businesses will accommodate choice and offer customized solutions across all of their marketing. Lenovo’s recent decision to issue logo options for multimedia marketing is just one example of a business bending their approach to fit the mobile world. We expect to see a lot more accommodating.

3. Access Ubiquity

Access ubiquity refers to having global, high-speed broadband available to all. Just a few years ago this would have felt like a pipe dream (pun intended), but today it’s not only feasible, it’s happening. As smartphone usage continues to rise around the globe, access ubiquity is the best thing to happen to market researchers since the pencil. Researchers who are keen to know what online research tools are available and when to use them will be well poised for future success.

4. Loyalty Metrics

Marketers today are finding the ROI of existing customers is far less than acquiring new ones. Loyalty rewards build organic (read: cheap) word-of-mouth, as customers eagerly share their joy with others online. The strategies of Walgreens and JCPenney seem right on target for future success, as we anticipate the demand for assessing the effectiveness and user experience (UX) of reward programs to rise.

5. Goodbye Voicemail

Big companies like JP Morgan Chase and Coke have taken voicemail out of their communication mix. While businesses may be driving this boat, it is in direct response to a changing culture. We may not fully understand all our aversions to leaving a voice message, it’s clear text messaging and email are tangible, trackable, and preferred. If your stock portfolio happens to be heavy in automated telemarketing, you may want to give those investments a second thought. Do not leave a message at the beep.

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Mobile Internet Access on the Move

(Originally posted June 2015)

Today’s consumer is choosing to travel light and keep their access devices within arms reach at all times. According to the Pew Research Center, approximately 2/3 of US adults use their mobile phones to access the internet and one in three (34%) go online mostly using their cell phones. This statistic is even higher among Millennial, Hispanic and African American population segments. Mobile internet access is on the move.

While businesses may be hanging on to their computer infrastructure, consumers have clearly settled into their communication comfort zone. At quitting time, even business folks who are wired to their walls at work are grabbing their mobile devices and heading out the door.

Unless (until?) a better option comes along, people are opting to travel light and keep their devices close at hand. For a growing many, mobile-ready with full featured apps are eliminating the need for a desktop computer. It’s no wonder tablets, phablets, and smartphones are in such high demand.

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Breaking Up With Customers Is Hard to Do

(Originally Published May, 2015)

As businesses big and small plod through a slow economy, there’s a tacit sense of urgency to survive. “We must increase sales! Where can we find new customers?!” This natural, albeit knee-jerk, reaction to tough times seems sensible. If sales are slowing down, clearly customers are not holding up their end of the agreement. Rejection hurts!

There’s the inevitable mourning period, but hopefully survival instincts kick-in and businesses get out of bed, into shape, and back out there in search of better customers.

That’s one way to handle it. There’s also begging for forgiveness.

Whichever approach you choose, breaking up with customers is hard to do. Walgreens recently presented their new strategy at the Loyalty Expo a few weeks ago in Orlando and highlighted two main reasons they’re opting to coddle current customers before marketing for more:

Acceptance is the first step to recovery.
Rather than run away in search of greener pastures, Walgreens accepted their inability to keep patrons happy and worked to identify and repair the “leaky bucket”. From learning from their past mistakes, Walgreens is able to mature into a better brand.

Reconciliation is cheaper than divorce.
Before seeking separation, Walgreens’ accountants crunched the digits and determined current customers held more value once all the efforts and expenses were factored in. Ultimately, marketing to current customer provides greater ROI – a language everyone speaks.

As Walgreens moves to ramp-up loyal customer rewards, they’re not leaving prospects at the door. How much “strategy seep” Walgreens will reap remains to be seen, but my money is on Walgreens for making happy customers who will surely spread and share the good news about Walgreens.

6 Ways to Boost Your Online Market Research

A hot topic in industry articles, white papers, and webinars today is conducting a strategic combination of quantitative and qualitative research online. While intimidating labels like multimethod research, hybrid approaches, mixed methods research, multimethodology, and even methodological pluralism (seriously?) may be flooding the airwaves, at its core the concept has always been a good one for online market research.

Quantitative studies require a significant sample size and qualitative studies require a few who freely speak. While that fundamental difference may seem to put the quant and qual fields at odds, in practice the two have always been more complementary than contradictory.

Increasing the richness of the data you collect and the insights you can elicit is just one reason to create a healthy mix of quant and qual. And it need not be a double-whammy to your research budget. At InsideHeads we consider small budgets to be a healthy challenge!

Here are 6 simple, cost effective quant/qual add-ons to consider when designing your next market research study:

1. Give your screener a boost
While you have prospective recruits completing your online screening questionnaire, consider directing qualified respondents to complete additional questions for an added incentive prior to their selection for an interview. Not only is it a good way to further qualify recruits, you’ll also collect a sizeable amount of quantifiable information. The added incentive cost is a small price to pay for getting valuable data in advance of an in-depth interview (IDI) or online focus group.

2. Invite participants to engage in other ways
Working a multimedia reply into your online questionnaire is crazy simple. Regardless which platform you’re using to create your survey, consider branching respondents based on their answers to a page that instructs them to do something else that will bring clarity or depth to their answer. Ask respondents to call a designated phone number and leave a detailed audio explanation, or ask them to email a photo or video before continuing. All viable requests you can layer into your survey and track files received by name, email, or a preassigned ID number.

3. Not all homework is bad
Converse to the idea of working qualitative responses into your quantitative study, consider incorporating activities before or after a single or group interview. Whether it’s a shopping assignment, a diary, collage, video request, or some other activity, research participants are quite good at meeting whatever expectations you set in the recruiting process. Pay recruits appropriately for any homework time and you’ll be pleased how much the added information will enrich your discussions.

4. Think ahead to future research efforts
Whether you’re running an online questionnaire or screener, it’s always a good idea at the end to ask respondents if they’re interested in participating in future research, should they not qualify for the study at hand. Having a list of willing and eligible partipants at the ready will prove handy the next time you have questions that need answering. Even a small sample size can offer valuable insights. More than once I’ve seen a website halt release of a feature based on a few usability studies done using a free screenshare platform.

5. Get a little social
It’s difficult to ignore the impact the internet has had on our social lives. The sheer volume of information, valuable or not, is enough to make any budding Data Scientists drool. The good news is that you don’t need an expensive tool to find good stuff in this vast space. The key is to have a working knowledge of boolean search methods, and some insight into Google’s research gold mines, including public data, scholarly publications, and consumer surveys . Marketers are even using social media sites like Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Pinterest and others for crowdsourced feedback to burning questions.

6. Design before device
Probably the most important tip for saving money on your next research study and keeping your objective in clear sight is to design your study first before you pick a tool or platform. Begin with the desired end result and work backwards and you’ll not only understand the best path to success, you’ll also find the best device for the job. Always fabulous, sometimes even free!

For more information on creative research approaches that deliver, contact the nice folks at InsideHeads.

To Glass or Not to Glass

(Originally posted March, 2015)

Since launching Google Glass in April 2012, there has been much debate over the value and ethics of having a smartphone on your head.

The battle between the Glassed and the Glassless officially began in April 2013, when the Google goggles first landed in the hands of eager early adopters. Throughout the launch, Google had their marketing and PR departments in overdrive, coddling these new Glass “Explorers”.

As non-users began encountering Explorers in real life, they began asking questions. Lots and lots of questions. A privacy debate like no other began to rage and Google even published an embarrassing list of Do’s and Don’ts for Glass wearers. The Google guide dumbs it down to playtime rules at the park, actually espousing that Explorers not “be creepy or rude”.

While Google expanded Glass into the UK and Canada, an increasing number of developers began abandoning the Glass ship and the Glasshole sentiment began picking up some serious social media speed.

When Google announced the end of the Glass Explorer program earlier this year, it was a supposed regrouping to improve “appearance, price, and functionality.” Dare I say, I am Glassless for none of those reasons, but I digress.

Google’s spin on the shutdown? Glass has “graduated” from experimental to operational, and will now have its own department at the company.

Even at this early stage, I have to wonder if Google’s tireless marketing efforts to promote Glass as mainstream these past few years moved the needle of acceptance even a little. Google’s clever product placement on athletes, television, fashion shows, sporting events, and magazine covers – did it work?

Unfortunately, Jerry Seinfeld sporting Glass on the cover of Wired doesn’t change the fact that Google provides Glassholes a tacit method for covertly peering and recording a non-consenting audience.

Perhaps Google filed that problem under “functionality.”