Everybody loves a good Forrester Research study. But who’s got time to read them? Not to worry. We’ve got you covered with our synopses of two of this research giant’s recent reports:

1. Introducing new social technographics
Back in 2006, Forrester created its Social Technographics Ladder to classify online social behavior into six overlapping categories, from top to bottom: “Inactives. Spectators. Joiners. Collectors. Critics. Creators.” The idea being that the higher you go on the Ladder, the more user-generated content you’re contributing online.

Recently, an exponential increase in the number of rapid conversations happening on Twitter and Facebook has inspired a new rung to be added to the ladder: “Conversationalists.”

This group tweets or posts updates to their social network status at least weekly.

In terms of demographics, Conversationalists are 36% Generation Y-types (18 to 29 years old), and are the most female-skewed of all categories on the Ladder (56% are female). They’re also the most likely group to have a college degree.

The Social Technographics Ladder has proven to be effective in identifying appropriate methods to reach customers.

The next time you’re writing a creative brief, don’t forget to take a look at the new Social Technographics Ladder to help you better define your target audience as being on one of the rungs.

2. The future of online customer experience
This report examines trends in online customer behaviour and arrives at four key attributes they believe will shape the next phase of web development. To help you remember, they’ve created an acronym: “CARS.”

Customized by the end user.
Aggregated at the point of use.
Relevant to the moment.
Social as a rule, not an exception.

A good example of CARS being used to create a better online customer experience comes from Zillow.com’s iPhone app. This real estate search application covers three of CARS’ four attributes: customized, aggregated, and relevant. Users move down the street with the mobile app while it pulls prices and details of nearby homes.

Here’s how the Zillow.com example breaks down:

Customization
Allows users to filter the homes based on personal preferences, save favorites, and receive updates.

Aggregated
Uses GPS data to display a map, while also pulling pricing and house details, all delivered to your screen simultaneously.

Relevant
Due to recent economic conditions, it’s currently a buyer’s market for real estate.

The CARS acronym is a great tool to use early in the development of interactive projects. It could make the difference between users returning to a website/application, or thinking it’s not user-friendly enough and finding a competitor.