Research and Tomorrow’s World View
This time in our history will seem like A.D. 1. It is a clear demarcation time, like WWII, the Great Depression or, in my home city, the Flood of ’08. It’s when everything seems to change — for good and not so good.
If you read this blog regularly, you know I scour the web for new research on human behavior and marketing, but I’m having trouble knowing what to do with surveys and studies that happened pre-COVID-19. Too much has changed. This event has impacted every business, nonprofit and human being in the U.S. and around the world.
Would a survey that showed restaurant habits pre-COVID-19 be relevant now that you know that people have increased home cooking by nearly 60%? What to do with all that research. 
One bit of research I have found useful is Google’s search trend reporting. In March 2020, Google reported that “virtual birthday party ideas” was a rapidly trending inquiry. To really see what is happening, Google has been reporting out search data on this special site https://searchingcovid19.com/ Google separates the data into “What is/are” searches and “How to” searches. The data is amazingly displayed and worth the look. 
I will continue to cull and aggregate the research that still seems relevant given our circumstances, but the COVID-19 curse has changed us all and our behaviors. This real-time Google research sees all our fears and anxieties around topics. With Google’s insights you can really see how the COVID-19 crisis has dominated our world view and our future view of the world.
Mark Mathis
Mark wrote his first direct-mail fundraising letter in 1981 for the University of Iowa Center for Advancement. The effort raised a few million dollars in undiscovered wills and legacy gifts. From that day forward Mark discovered a love of the big idea that moves the needle.
After 12 years at KWWL, Mark became a business owner as a co-founder of ME&V — rebranded as AMPERAGE in 2015. After 25 years of leading creative teams in video production, graphic design, PR, writing and web development, Mark transitioned out of ownership in 2021. Today he serves in an employee role as special projects consultant.
He is creatively ambidextrous — son of an artist and engineer — and famous for distilling complex ideas down to a few words and a few visuals. Mark is a writer. When he found that many nonprofits struggled with complex branding puzzles, he wrote the book, “NonProfit-NonMarketing .” He also wrote a novel called “Reenactment.”
Mark is an active blogger OneMinuteMarketer® with nearly 1,000 readers each week on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. One of his most popular YouTube videos is on “How to Look Good on Zoom.”
One of Mark’s fondest business memories was being named to INC 500 two times and attending the INC 500 conference with other winners. Mark is considered by some a Civil War expert (and that explains his novel). Mark also served as an adjunct professor in the business and in the communications departments at Wartburg College.
Mark is a graduate of the University of Iowa and is currently vice president of the University of Iowa Journalism and Mass Communications Advisory Board.
Mark is married to state Sen. Liz Mathis, and the two love to travel, even when it means being trapped by a volcano in the Czech Republic for three weeks.