Forum Research

What Forum Research does

Forum Research Inc. is a privately held Canadian market research firm founded in 1993 and headquartered in Toronto, with offices in Saskatoon, Montreal, Edmonton, Vancouver, Buenos Aires, Shanghai, Lyon, Mumbai, Tehran, and Dubai. The firm serves 500+ enterprise and government clients across 12 industries including government, finance, healthcare, education, retail, manufacturing, media, and NGOs, delivering market and consumer research, customer experience measurement, retail and branch research, mystery shopping through affiliate Service Metrics, and the public opinion brand The Forum Poll™.

The company's technology stack centers on Forum Fuzion, a hosted SaaS platform with modules for Customer Experience, Employee Engagement, Market Research, and Social Analytics, combining CATI predictive dialing, IVR with RDD sampling, AI/linguistics-based text and speech analytics, and real-time social media monitoring. Field operations are supported by an 8,000+ field representative network enabling 19,000+ quarterly audits and 11,500+ mystery shopping field members through Service Metrics. The firm holds CRIC Accredited Agency status, ISO 20252:2019 compliance, PIPEDA and PHIPA compliance, and adheres to the ICC/ESOMAR International Code.

Revenue is generated through professional services engagements (full-service market research, consulting, mystery shopping, retail audits) plus subscription recurring revenue from the Forum Fuzion platform. The Forum Poll™ operates as both a service and a brand-marketing asset, with regular polling coverage in Canadian media generating top-of-funnel awareness. Pricing is quote-based and not publicly disclosed, with services tailored to scope, sample size, methodology, and geography.

Name

Forum Research

Legal name

Forum Research Inc.

Website

https://forumresearch.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

1993

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

51–100 employees

Short description

Forum Research is a privately held Canadian market research firm founded in 1993, delivering enterprise feedback management, customer experience, market research, mystery shopping, and public opinion polling through its Forum Fuzion SaaS platform to 500+ government and enterprise clients across 12 industries.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Market Research Services

NAICS

Marketing Research and Public Opinion Polling (54191), Marketing Consulting Services (541613), Research and Development in the Social Sciences and Humanities (541720)

SIC

Services-Management Consulting Services (8742)

akta.pro primary industry

Survey, Panel & Fieldwork Services (BPAHALAJ)

akta.pro secondary industries

Syndicated Market Research (Panels, Omnibus, Tracker Studies) (MPAAALAB), Social & Digital Insights (Social Listening, Online Community Research) (MPAAALAK), Industry & Sector Research (Syndicated/Custom) (BPAHALAE)

Keywords

• Market research services
• Customer experience management
• Enterprise feedback management
• Public opinion polling
• Mystery shopping services

Headquarters

HQ city

Toronto

HQ country

Canada

HQ region

North America

Offices11 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Market Research Services: Comprehensive market and consumer research services including corporate image studies, demand forecasting, program evaluation, ad tracking, brand equity analysis, product development research, usage studies, and market segmentation. Delivered through focus groups, executive interviews, online polling, B2B surveys, telephone polling, and IVR surveys.
2. Customer Experience Management: Enterprise feedback management and customer experience measurement solutions helping companies focus resources on customer requirements for continuous satisfaction improvement.
3. Mystery Shopping Services: Through affiliate Service Metrics, providing comprehensive mystery shopping services with over 11,500 field members nationwide conducting face-to-face market research across Canada.
4. Retail & Branch Research: Field audit and competitive intelligence services including branch office audits, competitive field analysis, retail mystery shopping audits, point of sale observations, and pricing studies using over 8,000 field representatives.
5. Consulting Services: Strategic consulting services including competitive benchmarking, KPI development, and change management with 30+ years of expertise focused on customer-centric solutions.
6. Forum Fuzion SaaS Platform: Software-as-a-Service subscription for the Forum Fuzion platform providing real-time analytics dashboards, role-based access control, and comprehensive stakeholder feedback management.

Go-to-market motion3 records

Distribution channels4 records

Marketing channels5 records

Core offering

Forum Research is a Canadian market research and technology firm that delivers enterprise feedback management, customer experience measurement, market and consumer research, retail and branch mystery shopping, public opinion polling, and strategic consulting. Its Forum Fuzion SaaS platform consolidates survey management, text and speech analytics, and social media monitoring to give enterprise and government clients real-time insight into stakeholder sentiment.

Product overview

Forum Research operates as a market research and technology company offering a platform-plus-modules architecture centered around Forum Fuzion, a comprehensive SaaS platform for enterprise feedback management. The product portfolio includes The Forum Poll™ (Canada's leading public opinion poll), four Fuzion modules (Customer Experience, Employee Engagement, Market Research, Social Analytics), and complementary service offerings including Customer Experience Management, Market & Consumer Research, Retail & Branch Research, and Consulting Services. Supporting proprietary tools include Prophet™ for price analysis and Market View for usage and attitudes research. The company also operates Service Metrics as an affiliate for mystery shopping services. All offerings are designed to help clients understand stakeholder perceptions across customers, employees, communities, and partners.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• The Forum Poll™: Canada's leading public opinion poll and the most reliable chronicle of the public pulse in the country.
• Forum Fuzion
• Service Metrics

Products and services

• Forum Fuzion Forum Fuzion is a comprehensive hosted SaaS platform that provides advanced analytics on business impact across customers, employees, and partners through real-time dashboards, text analytics, speech recognition, and social media monitoring. It targets enterprise and government clients who need ongoing stakeholder feedback management.
• The Forum Poll™ The Forum Poll™ is Canada's leading public opinion poll, regularly measuring and reporting Canadian public sentiment on key social and political issues at all government levels through surveys and interactive voice response telephone polling.
• Enterprise Feedback Management Enterprise Feedback Management is a service that analyzes feedback from employees, customers, communities, and partners through unstructured data (emails, chats), structured data (surveys), and social media data, with analytics tools for text and speech analysis.
• Customer Experience Management Customer Experience Management helps companies enhance customer experience and loyalty programs through data-driven solutions including customer satisfaction measurement, transactional measurements, and customer segmentation and churn analysis.
• Market & Consumer Research Market & Consumer Research provides market and consumer insights including corporate image and reputation studies, program evaluation, brand equity measurement, price analysis using the Prophet™ tool, and usage and attitudes analysis using the Market View tool.
• Retail & Branch Research Retail & Branch Research provides retail mystery shopping audits, branch office audits, competitive field analysis, and point-of-sale observations through Service Metrics with over 8,000 active field representatives across Canada.
• Consulting Services Consulting Services provides strategic consulting including competitive benchmarking, KPI development, and change management with over 30 years of expertise, focused on customer-centric solutions for enterprise clients.
• Service Metrics (Mystery Shopping) Service Metrics is Forum Research's affiliate providing comprehensive mystery shopping services with over 11,500 field members conducting high-quality face-to-face market research across Canada.

Quantifiable outcome

• 500+ global clients served across 20+ countries
• +4 more outcomes

Named customers20 records

Segments10 records

Ideal customer profiles4 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability5 records

Feature6 records

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• Service MetricscoreOthersAffiliate company providing comprehensive mystery shopping services with over 11,500 field members nationwide conducting high-quality, face-to-face market research across Canada. Extends Forum Research's service capabilities in retail and branch research.

Scale indicators13 records

Recent moves7 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Pollara Strategic Insights: Pollara is a Canadian-based full-service market research firm specializing in public opinion, customer experience, and corporate reputation research. It is a direct competitor for many of Forum Research's government and enterprise engagements.
• Angus Reid Group: Angus Reid Group operates the Angus Reid Forum online panel and provides public opinion polling and custom research in Canada. It is a direct competitor for Forum Poll™ and Forum Research's panel-based services.
• Environics Research: Environics Research is a Toronto-based Canadian market and social research firm focused on public opinion, consumer behavior, and policy research. It is a direct competitor in Canadian public opinion polling and custom research for government and enterprise clients.
• Maru/Blue: Maru/Blue is a Canadian technology-enabled market research and customer experience firm offering Voice of Customer, public opinion polling, and online panels. It directly competes with Forum Research's Fuzion platform and Forum Poll™.
• Leger: Leger is the largest Canadian-owned market research and analytics firm, offering public opinion polling (Leger Survey), customer experience, and custom research. It directly competes with Forum Research across virtually all Canadian verticals and serves similar enterprise and government clients.

Broad incumbents

• NielsenIQ: NielsenIQ is a global consumer intelligence and market research firm serving CPG and retail clients. It competes with Forum Research's Market & Consumer Research and Retail & Branch Research services but at vastly greater scale.
• Qualtrics: Qualtrics is a global experience management platform competing with Forum Fuzion in enterprise feedback management, customer experience, and employee engagement. It is significantly larger and more capitalized but serves overlapping enterprise buyer personas.
• Ipsos: Ipsos is a global market research and polling leader with major operations in Canada. It competes with Forum Research in public opinion polling, brand tracking, customer experience, and healthcare research, but at significantly greater scale and global reach.
• Kantar: Kantar is one of the world's largest marketing data and analytics firms, with deep presence in Canada. It competes with Forum Research across brand equity, consumer insights, and customer experience engagements for major enterprise clients.

Emerging players

• Abacus Data: Abacus Data is a Canadian public opinion and market research firm known for political polling and online survey research. It overlaps with Forum Research on The Forum Poll™ and policy research for government clients.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights8 records

Customer concentration

Compliance4 records

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles11 records

Subsidiaries1 record

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Forum Research