Vol. 16, No. 8 - A Publication For Faculty, Staff and Friends of Wichita State University - December 2, 1999 

[Inside]

By Amy Geiszler-Jones

Thane Chastain, a consultant to the Elliott School of Communication, demonstrates WSU’s latest research tool that can evaluate such things as marketing strategies to legal arguments. Audiences give feedback via wireless hand-held keypads, shown below. Their input, relayed to MARTI’s computer, can be displayed immediately on a projection screen.

The keys to a successful ad campaign or an effective presentation may be contained in something no bigger than two steamer-sized trunks and a remote control pad.

WSU’s newest research tool called MARTI – Mobile Automated Response Testing Instrument – is a sophisticated high-tech way to evaluate everything from marketing strategies to teaching styles to legal defense arguments.

A similar evaluation lab is in the basement of Elliott Hall, within the Interdisciplinary Communication Research Institute.

A number of organizations have used the fixed lab. For example, the Kansas Health Foundation used it to evaluate drug awareness materials for rural and urban Kansas communities. Various groups, including parents and middle school children, were tested. The results were used to select TV, radio and print ads produced by the Partnership for Drug Free America.

What makes MARTI attractive to potential clients in the business, education, legal and government sectors is that this lab can be set up anywhere because of its wireless nature, according to Philip Gaunt, director of ICRI and the Elliott School of Communication.

"There’s nothing really like it in the Midwest," said Gaunt, noting such labs have been used on the East and West coasts for some time.

Recently he and his staff demonstrated MARTI’s capabilities to a group of about 75 members of the WSU and Wichita communities.

Sitting in front of the heart of the system – the two steamer-sized trunks containing MARTI’s computer hardware and software – consultant and former faculty member Thane Chastain ran video of news anchors, projecting their images onto a screen in front of the group. Using wireless keypads, the audience rated the anchors’ trustworthiness, believability and other qualities. The audience’s ratings were immediately superimposed on the anchors’ images, giving instant feedback. The group’s demographics can be shown immediately as well.

Gaunt can list a number of other uses for the system, but members of the audience also saw its potential.

"Because I’m in the international arena," said Pam Doonan, CEO of the Kansas World Trade Center, "all kinds of things popped up with what it can do with the global marketing strategies of a lot of corporations and industry clusters as a whole and to deal with cultural issues."

Don Checots, general manager of KPTS, said MARTI could be used to test the public television station’s fund-raising activities before they air. Another unique use of MARTI, he suggested, would be to preview museum exhibitions before actually signing up for a traveling exhibit.

Often company executives will want research to back up expensive ventures like ad campaigns. Using MARTI would provide that validation, said Mark Chamberlin, director of marketing and promotions at KAKE-TV.

A grant from Southwestern Bell helped purchase the $50,000 system. The cost to use MARTI will be $300 an hour or $2,500 for a day, not including travel or support staff time.

The Docking Institute at Fort Hays State University has expressed a strong interest in using MARTI in early spring.

[Inside]