The Forrester Wave™: Experience Research Platforms, Q2 2023

Experience Research Platforms Vendor Product Comparisons 2023

Key features and pros and cons of top Experience Research Platforms products:

dscout - Leaders

Pros:

Quality of study participants through carefully curated 'the Pool' using mix of technological and manual efforts
Specialty in robust digital diary study method with multimodal moderated and unmoderated studies
Excellence in customer-centered innovation and expert professional services
Substantive expert knowledge via People Nerds blog
Platform designed for flexibility and ease of use by research practitioners and novices
Proprietary 'expressiveness' filter to identify engaged participants
Deep research capabilities on user-friendly platform

Cons:

Reference customers expressed desire for faster access to completed studies than current 24-48 hours
Recently complemented customer research with evaluative research capabilities for quick tests in fast cycles
Need to expand evaluative study capabilities per roadmap
Need for increased automated analysis
Expansion of global presence needed

UserTesting - Leaders

Pros:

End-to-end enablement and support across research process
Optimized participant recruiting through Contributor Network
Customer Experience Narratives generation
Comprehensive partner ecosystem connecting to other platforms
Copious free content for learning, collaboration, and best practices
The Human Insight Summit (THiS) Conference and UserTesting CommUnity
Analysis capabilities built with speed to insight in mind
Deep understanding of product development process and cross-functional roles
Approval flows and collaborative synthesis features
Ability to accelerate, scale, and optimize research processes
Recently announced merger with UserZoom strengthening participant panel and professional services

Cons:

Merger execution with UserZoom requires successful integration

UserZoom - Leaders

Pros:

Truly end-to-end research platform from organic development and EnjoyHQ acquisition
Full-service UX research and consultation support
Proprietary QXscore framework to measure customer behavior and attitudes
Helps teams scale speed and capacity through automated participant-study pairing
Enables nonresearchers to engage with platform
Helps move from internal debates to collecting insights in hours
Combines XRP with repository capabilities
Recently announced merger with UserTesting for greater depth and expanded capabilities

Cons:

Merger execution is a concern voiced by reference customers
Need to add features for greater customer control over PII for improved regulatory compliance
Roadmap promises to ramp up analytics and research management
Plans to create more DIY functionality for deeper, collaborative research

Discuss - Strong Performers

Pros:

Quality moderated interview sessions with optional live support (used by 90% of customers)
Heavy investment in video platform
Video platform used as white-label solution by numerous partners
Strong professional services including global panel and global moderator network
Quality moderated experience for individual and focus group settings
Regulatory compliance features: blur tools, pseudonym usage, private study settings
Heavy control over how and with whom panelist data is shared

Cons:

Capabilities in data analysis/synthesis and study methods lag competitors
Early days for technical capabilities post-interview
Reference customers want improvements in 'little stuff' like downloaded highlight reel file sizes being too large
Roadmap needs to address breadth and depth of functionality in ease of use, scalability, data analysis/synthesis, collaboration enablers, and workflow connectedness

Recollective - Strong Performers

Pros:

Helps experts leverage their methodologies rather than forcing predefined study approaches
Robust number of study types with flexible combinations
Community-building features not offered by other vendors
Comprehensive onboarding for expert researchers
Account managers help experts fully exercise platform power
Powerful data visualization features
Tremendous flexibility in building the right study
Expertise in enterprise community software applied to market research

Cons:

Primary customers are research agencies; enterprises are secondary market
Strategically chosen to forgo participants, requiring clients to add their own
Agency power users building multiple communities shoulder burden of identifying participants
Many clients use other vendors for participant recruitment
Professional research services not a key part of strategy (provides only basic support)

Userlytics - Strong Performers

Pros:

Global panel of 1.6 million participants
International market leader executing studies in 79 countries for clients in 38 countries
Multilingual professional services and sales support
Multilingual transcriptions in self-service platform
International reach of panel is notable product strength
Flexibility to leverage Userlytics panel or build own using customer databases
Scale with some customers receiving 300+ responses to studies
Large panels provide statistically significant responses in quantitative scenarios
Cost-effective, no-contract international research platform

Cons:

Limited data visualization capabilities
Clients cannot preview application-style videos of participants on self-service side
Cannot prepare participants in advance of launching studies on self-service platform
Need for concerted efforts to plan for and improve data visualization
Need to improve robustness of end-to-end strategy
Pursuing projects for thematic analysis, unmoderated VR testing, and platform usability improvements

UXArmy - Challengers

Pros:

End-to-end solution for qualitative research in Southeast Asia
Helps navigate complexities of dense, language-diverse region
Designed to support up to six roles during live interviews including translator roles
Strategy considers opportunities and complications of multilingual environment
Relatively easy to use end-to-end solution
Popular study types for qualitative research (tree testing, card sorting)
Good participant samples in Singapore and Thailand
Understanding of regional dynamics

Cons:

Lacks clear growth strategy
Did not share comprehensive plan to address strategy criteria
Filling studies with required participants in some regions requires UXArmy recruiting expertise
Roadmap and backlog claimed to be customer driven via biannual check-ins but strategy unclear
Limited geographic focus compared to other vendors

FAQs

Q: Which vendors are Leaders in 2023?

A: UserTesting, UserZoom, dscout

Q: What does "Leader" mean in Forrester Wave terms?

A: Leaders in the Forrester Wave demonstrate the strongest current offering and strategy. In the context of Experience Research Platforms, Leaders excel at providing end-to-end enablement and support across the research process, optimizing participant access and management, delivering comprehensive analysis capabilities with speed to insight, fostering cross-functional collaboration, maintaining strong partner ecosystems, and demonstrating clear vision for platform evolution. Leaders help research teams scale their reach and capacity while enabling both expert researchers and novice/nonresearchers to conduct qualitative research effectively.

Q: How do I interpret a Forrester Wave?

A: https://www.forrester.com/policies/forrester-wave-methodology/

Report:

Top Vendor Products for Experience Research Platforms in 2023

Experience Research Platforms Vendor Product Comparisons 2023

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FAQs

Q: Which vendors are Leaders in 2023?

Q: What does "Leader" mean in Forrester Wave terms?

Q: How do I interpret a Forrester Wave?

Reference