Ok, so here is the big deal. I work for a biomedical research institute and deal with federal grants that are used to fund academic studies on various issues that resident PhD's have identified.
Presently, I'm working on a study call Weight Measurement and Standards for Soldiers. The premise of this study is to determine if the Internet is an applicable way of helping soldiers maintain or improve their levels of fitness in order to become combat ready. A secondary goal is to determine the efficacy of a website, which is designed to be the major tool in facilitating the study.
All of this sounds fairly straight forward and easy to execute, right? Well, there are a number of qualifiers that must be met in order to retain the funding for the study from the DOD (Department of Defense). The first of these qualifying events is that I (we, this lab) cannot identify any user of the website. By identification, I mean through email addresses, name, physical location, one-to-one interaction, etc. The level of anonymity that is required by the DOD is mandated by HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act), internal IRB's (Internal Review Board), Continuing Review Reports, and the HSRRB (Human Subjects Research Review Board) that is run by the DOD. If you take into consideration all of those issues, you essentially prevent yourself from having any sort of consumer relationship, database building opportunity, or follow-up opportunity.
The second issue facing this project is that the audience is targeted based on geography. The reason for this is that the DOD gave us a group of people on which to provide this study, not taking into account the level of connectivity, the desire for such a product among this population, or a myriad of variables that factor into why low user statistics are represented.
The third issue facing this study is that because we have a targeted audience that is defined by the gates of a military installation (and not any tangible consumer research), I (we, this lab) cannot use mass media to promote or advertise the website to the targeted audience. We have to limit the exposure of the website to the targeted soldiers in an attempt to prevent data corruption from undesired users. This means that civilians that live in the local area need to be prevented from being exposed to the website. Essentially what I am left with are 3 people that will venture onto an installation daily and hand out brochures and T-shirts, hang banners in strategic locations, provide informative briefings at scheduled meetings and functions, as well as spread the word via word of mouth. You can see that this is a very low tech way to test a high-tech tool.
I'm sure that I can list a number of other reasons why this study and the execution of the communication/marketing plan are so difficult, but I think you get my drift.
My hope is that this course (619) will provide me with greater insight as to how I can improve my communication and marketing efforts through new media and thus improve the data that is recovered from my website.
I have read the article from the Harvard Business School. It offers a number of interesting ideas, but they are all dependant on one variable, Interactivity. It is very difficult to be interactive with a consumer when you cannot identify them or know their internet habits.
Matt
Presently, I'm working on a study call Weight Measurement and Standards for Soldiers. The premise of this study is to determine if the Internet is an applicable way of helping soldiers maintain or improve their levels of fitness in order to become combat ready. A secondary goal is to determine the efficacy of a website, which is designed to be the major tool in facilitating the study.
All of this sounds fairly straight forward and easy to execute, right? Well, there are a number of qualifiers that must be met in order to retain the funding for the study from the DOD (Department of Defense). The first of these qualifying events is that I (we, this lab) cannot identify any user of the website. By identification, I mean through email addresses, name, physical location, one-to-one interaction, etc. The level of anonymity that is required by the DOD is mandated by HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act), internal IRB's (Internal Review Board), Continuing Review Reports, and the HSRRB (Human Subjects Research Review Board) that is run by the DOD. If you take into consideration all of those issues, you essentially prevent yourself from having any sort of consumer relationship, database building opportunity, or follow-up opportunity.
The second issue facing this project is that the audience is targeted based on geography. The reason for this is that the DOD gave us a group of people on which to provide this study, not taking into account the level of connectivity, the desire for such a product among this population, or a myriad of variables that factor into why low user statistics are represented.
The third issue facing this study is that because we have a targeted audience that is defined by the gates of a military installation (and not any tangible consumer research), I (we, this lab) cannot use mass media to promote or advertise the website to the targeted audience. We have to limit the exposure of the website to the targeted soldiers in an attempt to prevent data corruption from undesired users. This means that civilians that live in the local area need to be prevented from being exposed to the website. Essentially what I am left with are 3 people that will venture onto an installation daily and hand out brochures and T-shirts, hang banners in strategic locations, provide informative briefings at scheduled meetings and functions, as well as spread the word via word of mouth. You can see that this is a very low tech way to test a high-tech tool.
I'm sure that I can list a number of other reasons why this study and the execution of the communication/marketing plan are so difficult, but I think you get my drift.
My hope is that this course (619) will provide me with greater insight as to how I can improve my communication and marketing efforts through new media and thus improve the data that is recovered from my website.
I have read the article from the Harvard Business School. It offers a number of interesting ideas, but they are all dependant on one variable, Interactivity. It is very difficult to be interactive with a consumer when you cannot identify them or know their internet habits.
Matt
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