A summary of important historical developments in market research, including women researchers previously omitted, technologies, social trends and some old-timey photos.

1. A History of American
Commercial (a.k.a.
Marketing) Research
Abby Phenix
Commercial Researcher
abby@abbyphenix.com

2. Pre-1930s
The “nose counting” era
© 2017 Abby Phenix

3. Social reformers advance statistics
1824 - the first recorded proto-straw poll to predict the outcome of an election
happens in the US.
1830-48 - An age of social reform commences with the reign of Queen Victoria of
England. French & British statisticians conduct comprehensive surveys to assess
“moral and intellectual status” among the poor, children, and women. These
surveys drive extensive advocacy leading to voting reforms, workers’ rights, and
improvements to living and working conditions.
1835 - Belgian statistician Adolphe Quetelet first applies statistics and
mathematics to surveys, creating “l’homme moyen”--the average man.
1870 - 13,369 women work in clerical roles in the US Josephine Butler, a British social reformer
who advocated on behalf of enslaved
women. Image by George Frederic Watts.
© 2017 Abby Phenix

4. Inventors design foundations for sweeping market research
1889 - Inventor Herman Hollerith files a patent for “Art of
Compiling Statistics” and designs the 1st tabulating machine,
the basis of what would eventually become IBM.
1902 - Psychology professor Sigmund Freud starts a weekly
salon where his ideas around psychoanalysis are established. A
number of leading communications and market researchers will
emerge from Vienna as a result.
1907 - Advertising pioneer Claude C. Hopkins institutes ad
campaign measurement.
1911 - Charles Coolidge Parlin forms the first commercial
research company, National Analysts Worldwide (now known as
NAXION).
US Census Bureau employee works at a tabulating machine.
© 2017 Abby Phenix

5. “Having it all” does not include the credit
1920 - A magazine publisher sends out researchers in tiny Sabetha, Kansas
for insights into advertising effectiveness
1922 - Freud’s nephew Edward Bernays and daughter-in-law Doris E.
Fleischman are equal business partners in a firm that uses Freud’s work to
influence public perception. Together, they pioneer the use of psychology and
social sciences to drive business. Bernays is later called “the Father of PR”
though Fleischman’s work is considered superior.
1923 - Daniel Starch creates new methods to assess advertising
effectiveness--advertising has to be seen, read, believed, recalled, and acted
upon.
1926 - Pauline Arnold pioneers telephone surveys, in-home interviews and
radio audience research methods, goes unsung.
Doris Fleischman ran a successful
business under her maiden name,
a rarity in the 20s. Image: The
Museum of PR
© 2017 Abby Phenix

6. 1930s-1960s
Accessing unconscious desires
during a turbulent time
© 2017 Abby Phenix

7. Listening to the will of the people
1932 - Ola Babcock Miller persuades her son-in-law to put all those degrees
to work and figure out if she’s going to win her election as Iowa’s first
woman secretary of state. George Gallup does, successfully, and it results
in one of the most influential businesses of market research, the Gallup
Organization.
1932 - Rensis Likert develops open-ended interviewing, invents the Likert
scale. In 1976, he co-authors a book on conflict management with his wife,
Jane Gibson.
1936 - Sylvia Rose Ashby sets up Australia’s first independent market
research agency.
1937 - Mass Observation begins recording what daily life in Britain is like.
What starts a social survey evolves into a commercial one by World War II.
Iowans can thank Ola Babcock Miller
for taking road safety seriously. She
established what is now called the
Iowa State Patrol.
© 2017 Abby Phenix

8. Founder of entertainment & audience research is a woman
1933 - Viennese social scientist Herta Herzog combines qualitative
and quantitative research and uses behavioral science to conduct the
first mass communications experiments in Austria. After a move to
the US, she develops the method for individual and group interviews--
the foundation for focus groups--among other innovations.
She deftly transfers and further develop communications concepts
into market research, expanding it from number counting--how many
people bought what--to motivations for purchase, how they were
influenced, and introducing the idea of the “brand image” over the
course of her career in academics and as a leading voice at global
advertiser McCann Erickson.
Her work is often downplayed or overshadowed by her ex-husband
Paul Lazarsfeld & his collaborator Robert K. Merton.
Herta Herzog listened to the motivations of
women daytime serial listeners, developing
research methods we use to this day.
© 2017 Abby Phenix

9. American workers gain more time, money for consumerism
1938 - As part of New Deal legislation, the US Congress passes the Fair Labor
Standards Act, instituting 40-hour work weeks, overtime pay, minimum wage and
age requirements. This affects labor infrastructure & an estimated 700,000 jobs.
1939 - Freud acolyte & market researcher Ernest Dichter conducts 1st
commercial research project on motivation, “Why do people use Ivory soap?”, for
Procter & Gamble for $400. He and wife Hedy co-found think tank Institute for
Motivational Research. She manages the finances and operations & he runs
focus groups on some of the world’s best known products, leaning on his
Viennese psychology experience to stoke American consumers’ subconscious
desires.
1940 - 3,439,562 women work in white collar roles in the US, 257 times 1870’s
number. The Dichters at work in 1965
© 2017 Abby Phenix

10. Investments in technology accelerate after World War II
1942 - Brazilian radio broadcaster Auricélio Penteado
first estimates the size of a live listening audience, using
Gallup’s methods.
1947 - Nielsen releases first radio program listener
ratings.
1948 - Women are 32.7% of the US labor force.
1950 - Nielsen begins tracking television ratings, an
audience measurement standard still in place today.
© 2017 Abby Phenix

11. 1960s-1980s
Fall of Freud
Rise of Machines
© 2017 Abby Phenix

12. Researchers set Freud aside for more multidisciplinary work
1960 - Academic John A. Howard authors influential papers
crossing multiple disciplines to address new theories of
“consumer behavior”.
1960s - Two quantitative approaches begin to replace
motivational research, one focused on statistics and the other
on behavioral sciences.
1964 - Corinne Lewis McLuhan edits The Gutenberg Galaxy
for her husband, Canadian philosopher Marshall McLuhan. In
later works, he describes a global electronic communications
network--providing a critical vision of the Internet.
1966 - NC State researchers begin to develop statistical
software package SAS.
1968 - While at Stanford, social scientists develop statistical
software package SPSS.
Professor Marshall McLuhan on television, talking
about television, in front of televisions. The medium
is the message.
© 2017 Abby Phenix

13. Regulatory changes, research projects and risky options change the playing field
1961-1978 - A series of bills and executive orders expand women’s
rights, including Title IX, which ensures equal access to education,
courses, athletics and more. By 2017, women are more likely to get
a college degree than men.
1968 - US Department of Defense funds the Advanced Research
Projects Agency Network, the precursor to the Internet.
1973 - Ad and brand tracking are developed by UK ad agency
Millward Brown.
1979 - Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky author “Prospect Theory”,
a seminal paper that describes how we make choices between risky
options. Their paper begins a new line of work into behavior
economics and cognitive biases that continues to affect marketing
and advertising decisions today.
1980 - Customer satisfaction research is recognized as important.
Photo: Santa Clara University
© 2017 Abby Phenix

14. Computers lead the way
1979 - CompuServe offers the first dial-up
Internet service to consumers.
1980s - Computer-aided telephone interviews,
postal surveys, and recorded focus groups
become the primary research methods.
Late 1980s - Terri Lindorf and her husband Ron
co-found Western Wats, which becomes the
largest market research data collection company
in America, relying on computer-aided telephone
surveys.
© 2017 Abby Phenix

15. 1990s - Present
The Internet
© 2017 Abby Phenix© 2017 Abby Phenix

16. It’s all about what’s on the web
1990 - The first website goes live.
1991-1993 - New legislation modifies the rights of
employees that, combined with increasing access to the
Internet, contributes to increased consumer and
employee savviness. The recession pressures
businesses, driving market research to improve its ROI
by looking for cost-cutting measures.
1990s - Online research inaugurated. Cost cutting
measure found!
2000 - Australia becomes the first country where online
data collection exceeds other forms.
2000s - Smartphone-based research starts.
© 2017 Abby Phenix© 2017 Abby Phenix

17. What’s next?
● The present - who are the women leaders of market research now and how
do they fit into the context of the broader business and social climate?
● The future - what are some futures we want to create?

19. Sources
● https://visual.ly/community/infographic/business/history-market-research
● http://keltonglobal.com/blog-post/a-brief-history-of-market-research/
● https://persuadables.com/the-history-of-market-research-infographic/
● https://www.ama.org/resources/Best-Practices/Pages/Father-of-Research.aspx
● https://www.amsrs.com.au/about/history-of-market-research-in-australia
● http://demographicchartbook.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/gibson15.pdf
● https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/files/docs/publications/women/b0218_dolwb_1947.pdf
● http://www.historyextra.com/article/bbc-history-magazine/matilda-william-conqueror-queen-facts
● http://www.moline-consulting.com/Reinventando/Pagines/conceptoDeLasMotivaciones.htm
● Wikipedia
© 2017 Abby Phenix

20. It was the Herta Herzog story that
really burned me & made me want
to put this together. How can we
understand the present or create
the future without a decent respect
for the past?
Thanks for reading!
-abby
Abby Phenix
Commercial Researcher
abby@abbyphenix.com