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<p>PROUD TO BE AGENTS OF CHANGE.</p><p>Between us, we have over 100 years in marketing, research and insights experience. We understand how to fill the gaps, look toward the future and understand changes in the insights business. We tell you how to use tools, technology and applications to gather and leverage insights in a smarter, better way to strengthen your business. And your bottom line.</p><p>Gen2 Advisors constantly scan and track ways to manage insights, keep up with the latest tools and technology, and predict the impact of all this information on the future before it's here. Through syndicated reports, advisory services, and consulting engagements, we present emerging management, applications and technology in a systematic overview, and tell you how to apply it to your individual business.</p>

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Strategic Market Research

<p dir="ltr">In today's fast-evolving marketplace, innovation isn't just a buzzword; it's the cornerstone of staying relevant and competitive. For marketing research professionals, understanding the nuances of how innovation is identified, tested, and implemented can unlock untapped potential for delivering consumer-centric solutions. A recent conversation with Andrew Erlick, Scout and Scale Manager at Reckitt, and Gregg Archibald, a marketing research expert with Gen2 Advisors, sheds light on practical strategies and emerging tools that drive innovation in marketing and product development.</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">The Pillars of Innovation Data</h2>
<p dir="ltr">Erlick highlights four critical data pillars that inform Reckitt&rsquo;s approach to identifying innovative opportunities:</p>
<ol>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation">Behavioral Data Observing and measuring how consumers use products in real life. For example, Reckitt&rsquo;s collaboration with Adrich allowed them to use sensor technology to measure things like product movement, usage amounts, and in-the-moment consumer interaction. This allows Reckitt to validate assumptions about product usage, such as how much toilet cleaner consumers actually use per application. These insights reveal discrepancies between recommended usage and real-world behavior, enabling adjustments to product design and marketing.</p>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation">Innovation Perspective: Understanding the intellectual property (IP) landscape and the depth of R&amp;D behind a product.</p>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation">Commercial Perspective: Evaluating market size, growth potential, and sales performance using tools like Amazon and Nielsen analytics.</p>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation">Social Media Listening and Online Reviews: Analyzing consumer conversations and feedback to gauge sentiment, identify trends, and uncover unmet needs.</p>
</li>
</ol>
<p dir="ltr">By integrating these data points, Reckitt builds a comprehensive view of emerging opportunities, from small startups disrupting niche markets to innovations that align with existing corporate strategies.</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Moving from Data to Action</h2>
<p dir="ltr">Innovation isn't just about identifying trends; it&rsquo;s about translating insights into actionable strategies. Behavioral data, in particular, plays a critical role in this process. For instance, understanding how and when consumers deviate from expected usage patterns helps identify pain points and opportunities for refinement. These findings are often validated through consumer testing to uncover deeper motivations and preferences.</p>
<p dir="ltr">This process exemplifies a balance between intuition honed through experience and data-backed decision-making. Erlick&rsquo;s framework involves presenting a curated list of opportunities to executives quarterly, showcasing potential market fits based on robust consumer and commercial insights.</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Collaboration Across Teams and Companies</h2>
<p dir="ltr">Innovation thrives in a collaborative ecosystem. Erlick emphasizes the role of cross-functional collaboration between R&amp;D, marketing research, and consumer insights teams. While R&amp;D focuses on technical feasibility, marketing research provides the qualitative and quantitative data needed to understand consumer behavior and validate assumptions.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Behavioral data further bridges these efforts, offering a more dynamic and accurate representation of consumer interaction with products. By incorporating tools like Adrich&rsquo;s sensors, Reckitt was able to test real-world usage scenarios, helping teams identify not just what consumers say they do, but what they actually do.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Piloting is the bridge between identifying an opportunity and proving its value. By starting small, validating assumptions in real-world scenarios, and adopting quickly, we can turn ideas into impactful solutions. A key element of my role focuses on creating collaboration opportunities between Reckitt and startups, combining the scale and resources of a large organization with the agility and creativity of entrepreneurial teams to fast-track innovation and deliver consumer-centric results.</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Lessons for Marketing Research Professionals</h2>
<p dir="ltr">For marketing research professionals, Reckitt&rsquo;s approach offers valuable lessons:</p>
<ol>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation"><strong>Leverage Behavioral Insights:</strong> Real-world data on consumer behavior provides a ground truth that often differs from survey responses or stated preferences.</p>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation"><strong>Adopt an Agile Mindset:</strong> Innovation often starts with small-scale pilot projects. Testing new ideas quickly and iterating based on consumer feedback can fast-track breakthroughs.</p>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation"><strong>Think Beyond Competitors: </strong>While analyzing large competitors is important, focusing on smaller startups and niche players can uncover unique opportunities to fill gaps in the market.</p>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation"><strong>Bridge Insights and Action: </strong>Collaboration between research, R&amp;D, and marketing teams ensures that consumer insights are not only understood but acted upon effectively.</p>
</li>
</ol>
<h2 dir="ltr">The Future of Innovation in Marketing Research</h2>
<p dir="ltr">The conversation also highlights the growing importance of platforms like crowdfunding sites for validating consumer interest and gathering early-stage feedback. As Erlick notes, these platforms act as a proving ground for ideas, offering invaluable consumer insights before products even hit the market.</p>
<p dir="ltr">By adding behavioral data to the innovation process, marketing researchers gain an edge in understanding consumer habits, preferences, and challenges. This data-driven perspective enables companies to design products and experiences that resonate deeply with their audience.</p>
<p dir="ltr">As the landscape of consumer behavior continues to evolve, marketing researchers must adopt a proactive approach to innovation. By integrating diverse data sources, fostering cross-team collaboration, and staying attuned to emerging trends, marketing research professionals can not only keep pace but also lead the charge in delivering consumer-centric solutions.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Innovation isn&rsquo;t a destination; it&rsquo;s an ongoing journey. And for those willing to embrace it, the rewards are transformative.</p>

Discover how innovation drives marketing research with insights from experts on identifying, testing, and implementing consumer-centric solutions for success.

Driving Innovation: Lessons from Reckitt

Getting It Right with Hunter Thurman of Alpha-Diver

Getting It Right with Zain Raj

Aligning Department and Organizational Goals with LeapFrog/VTech

<p><span data-preserver-spaces="true">Not long ago, I interviewed Stan Sthanunathan, formerly the Executive Vice President of Consumer and Market Insights at Unilever, for our series, </span><em><span data-preserver-spaces="true">Getting It Right -Achieving Success in Insights</span></em><span data-preserver-spaces="true">. Stan recently retired from Unilever, where he spent the past eight years. This interview was conducted just prior to his retirement. Due to technical issues with the recording, we turned this into a blog post rather than our more common recording and transcript.</span></p>
<p>Before Unilever, he was the VP of Marketing Strategy and Insights for Coca-Cola. Some of his other affiliations are patron and fellow at the Market Research Society, past board member of the ARF. He has been a regular speaker at many industry conferences (and I have had the pleasure to see him speak several times). Stan also lectured at Cambridge, Sloan, Yale, Wharton, Emory, INSEAD, IE School of Business, University of Wisconsin, and co-authored a book titled<em> AI for Marketing and Product Innovation</em>.</p>
<p>This post covers:</p>
<ul>
<li>How does Unilever define a successful insights organization?</li>
<li>How do the concepts of agility and data democratization fit into Unilever?</li>
<li>How does Unilever look to suppliers to help support growth?</li>
<li>Where are the insights function heading over the course of the next few years?</li>
</ul>
<p>Unilever is a giant corporation with over 400 brands such as in-home care, personal care, food and beverage, etc. They are in almost every country in the world. There are many major initiatives that Unilever as a corporation is taking on, and therefore there is a lot to do within the insights organization.</p>
<p>Considering organization structure, an overwhelming majority of Stan’s team members are either assigned to a country, or they are assigned to a division. A division is home care, personal care, etc. There is a very small central team, but the rest are all aligned to individual divisions.</p>
<p>But having said that, they are a functional organization, which is what makes them somewhat unique. Even though they are all located in various countries they are assigned to, they all functionally report into Consumer and Market Insights (CMI) as an organization. And that gives them a unique strength in terms of speed and agility. That, in short, is the broad structure of Unilever&#8217;s CMI function.</p>
<h2></h2>
<h2>How do you define success? How do you know that you have a successful insights organization?</h2>
<p>“Very often in my 39 years of work in an insight function, I&#8217;ve always heard people moan about not having a seat at the table. My consistent reply to all those people is, if you do not have a seat at the table, you are probably on the menu. So, it is better to make sure that we get a seat at the table.   A seat at the table is never given. It is something that you earn. And the way you earn that seat at the table is by adding value to your company. And adding value is all about driving the growth agenda of the business. If you can drive the growth agenda, then any given manager, any brand would want the value, and they will find you almost indispensable. And that is how you earn seats at the table.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>

        <div class="post-related-post">
            <h3>Related</h3>
            <h4><a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insights/achieving-success-in-insights-ford-motor-company">Achieving Success in Insights - Ford Motor Company</a></h4>
        </div>
    
<p>I always tell people, the way you do that is by creating enough and more ‘oh s&amp;!t’ moments. That, to me, is a significant KPI. How many ‘oh s&amp;!t’ moments will you create? How often your business partners come and look at you and say, oh my g*d, I never thought of it that way. And the more you create the more respect you will draw.”</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2>How do you design a system to kind of help those watershed (or, ‘oh s&amp;!t’) moments happen?</h2>
<p>“The watershed moments are, they don&#8217;t happen by default. They happen by the right people who have a very clear roadmap for making that happen. And the road map for that all starts with keeping the end in mind, and the end being realistic and not the art of insights. The art of insights, do not get me wrong, is important.  To me, it is a means to an end. The endpoint being if you do great work, but if the business does not grow, it is &#8216;just work&#8217;. So, it is all about how do you keep the endpoint of growth in mind? That is number one.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;The number two dimension is all around, do I want to present the ‘what’ from the research that I have done, or do I want to focus on the ‘so what’ and the ‘now what’ from the research? A good professional insight person would traverse the journey from the ‘what’ to the ‘so what’ to the ‘now what’. The more you do that, the more respect you earn, the more seats at the table you get, and the stronger the impact you create on the business.”</p>
<p>The journey implies that there is a close relationship between the business unit and the insights organizations. I asked Stan to talk about how he works with the business partners to make sure that happens as consistently as possible.  To make it happen he says you must be part of the team, not just part of the project, that is how you get into the fabric of the business.  The perspective is on how a problem needs to be solved, not about how a project needs to be done.</p>
<p>Our conversation shifted to agility and data democratization.  I wanted to understand a little bit about how Unilever is approaching these because it is very impactful for the speed of decisions. And sometimes the comprehensiveness versus the speed can be at odds with one another.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2>How does agility fit into Unilever’s insights system?</h2>
<p>“Historically, insights are disciplined. We have delivered two out of the following three—faster, cheaper, better.  You could only get two of these. You could never get all three. But not anymore. Now you can be faster, cheaper, and better, and current. And that last one has not been seen before.</p>
<p>To a large extent, that has been powered by technology. And more importantly, the pace of the world is so rapid right now. When the business is moving at the speed of light, there is no way you can work on insights the same old way. I need eight weeks. But in eight weeks, the world&#8217;s going to change completely.”</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2>How does data democratization fit into Unilever’s insight system?</h2>
<p>“It goes back to a comment that I made earlier.  If you believe that your role is all about the ‘what’, then you guard your data, and it is all about control. But if you genuinely believe that it would be more around the ‘so what’ and the ‘now what’, then you would let go.   Democratization powered by technology is coming at you, whether you like it or not. You might as well accept that reality and say, what am I going to do with it? And the key thing is to make sure that data and insights are available to everyone within the company.”</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2>Transitioning from the What, to the So What, to the Now What.</h2>
<p>“It is not an easy transition to make, but it is actually an incredibly enjoyable transition to make. So very often, people who are very good at change find it a little bit difficult. 90% of people will want to change but there will be some who think, why bother?  But when we embark on the journey, we find function at a different level.&#8221;</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2>How do you look to your suppliers to help support your growth?</h2>
<p>“Suppliers can be viewed as forced multipliers. When we work together, we are much stronger. And when I say work together, it is not as a transactional partner. I am leveraging a specific thought partner. And therefore, how do you liberate them to think with you. How do you bring them in deeper to help solve some of these bigger issues?&#8221;</p>
<p>Unilever’s performance management system incorporates many of the principles of an employee performance management system, including expectations, reviews, and recognition programs.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2>What trends do you see influencing the insights industry most over the course of the next few years?</h2>
<p>“I see the number one is democratizing. Today, insights are the responsibility of the insights department. But tomorrow Insights should be everyone’s responsibility.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;The second is Augmented Intelligence.  Let me explain that.  Augmented Intelligence is artificial intelligence plus human intelligence.  With only artificial intelligence, we run the risk of being limited in our vision.  When we add human intelligence, we can create a fabulous journey.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;The third dimension is the three I&#8217;s &#8211; Insights, Ideas, and Impact.  This mindset makes us think about what we do and our role.  When we think about the role in this way, we can think about &#8216;how is my role delivering ideas instead of just insights&#8217;.  And if we take that to the next level, how do we make sure that our ideas are launched.  That is going to be the next phase of the insights function.&#8221;</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><em>The Getting It Right series highlights both brands and suppliers that are making an impact in the insights industry. We discuss how success is defined, how to do it, trials and tribulations, successes and failures, relationships with clients and suppliers, and where things are headed next. </em></p>
<p>If you haven’t seen any of our other <em>Getting it Right</em> interviews check them out: <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insights/achieving-success-in-insights-organon-merck">Lisa Coutrade -Organon/Merck</a> and  <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insights/achieving-success-in-insights-ford-motor-company">Nick McCracken – Ford Motor Company.</a></p>
<p><strong><em>Photo by <a href="https://unsplash.com/@chuttersnap?utm_source=unsplash&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_content=creditCopyText">CHUTTERSNAP</a> on <a href="https://unsplash.com/s/photos/restaurant-table?utm_source=unsplash&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_content=creditCopyText">Unsplash</a> </em></strong></p>


Achieving Insights Success at Unilever

Achieving Success in Insights – Ford Motor Company

Lisa Courtade, Executive Director of Commercial Assessment, Insights &amp; Analytics for Organon, a Merck company talks about achieving success in insights with Gregg Archibald of Gen2 Advisors. Hear her perspective on the goals of the organization.

Achieving Success in Insights – Organon (Merck)

COVID-19 Insights Leaders Roundtable: Edition 14

<p><em><strong>Editor’s Note:</strong> <i data-stringify-type="italic">This subsection is featured in the <a href="http://bit.ly/2UFn62V"><strong>GRIT Insights Practice Report</strong></a>. The GRIT Insights Practice Report</i><i data-stringify-type="italic"> is your #1 guide to brand success in the insights industry, featuring the GRIT Future List, client perspectives, and emerging methodologies. You’ll learn what’s making strides, what trends are worth following, and where your company fits into it all.</i></em></p>
<hr />
<p>At a fictional market research meeting, there are protesters outside yelling “What do you want?”. The throngs of client research buyers respond “Quality insights!”. And the journalists shake their heads wondering what they did to deserve covering this story. Because this story has been told many times.</p>
<p>Quality insights is what clients are buying and suppliers are selling. From such a perspective, our industry still has significant opportunities for improvement. Buyers’ satisfaction with suppliers is low at 55%. In 2019, the lowest-rated industry measured by the American Customer Satisfaction Index was subscription cable TV services. That industry has a 62% satisfaction score&#8230;</p>
<p>It’s therefore incredibly valuable for this GRIT edition to explore the drivers of satisfaction in our industry. These include, in no particular order: understanding the business issue, understanding the research issue, telling a compelling story, providing good service, conducting good research, and providing good recommendations. These component parts constitute the real definition of “Quality Insights”. It is hard to leave any one of these out and be successful – whether you are an internal research department or an insights supplier.</p>
<p>In some cases, we are already making those needed improvements. More buyers and suppliers are using a wider variety of tools that are closely fit for purpose to execute research targeted to client needs. And those organizations that follow this path are generally doing better, based on budget and revenue.</p>
<p class="p1">Additionally, our industry is making the necessary investments in people and technology to stay at the forefront. Data Analysts and Data Scientists are key hiring priorities for many organizations along with investments in analytic platforms and data integration.</p>
<p class="p1">From a consulting perspective, people with skills in storytelling and visualization expertise are in high demand. And again, the technology investment in dashboards and other visualization tools support the need for the insights to be aligned to performance metrics and actionable recommendations.</p>
<p class="p1">There are other positive developments to note such as increased efficiency illustrated by the somewhat inverse relationship between the number of projects being done and the amount of money to do them. Also, the use of iterative, agile approaches is making our insights timelier and more embedded in the overall business processes. The budget growth we’ve seen from last year is encouraging and points to someone doing something right! And lastly, the talent that is leading the industry today represents a wider variety of skills, backgrounds, and areas of focus than has ever been the case before.</p>
<p class="p1">We have a LOT of work to do, but we are getting there. And I for one continue to enjoy the journey, even if I would prefer to step a little harder on the accelerator &#8211; as long as we don’t smash into those protesters (I like them!).</p>


GRIT Insights Practice Deep Dive: Final Thoughts with Gregg Archibald

<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Every year in the GRIT Insights Practice Report, the GRIT Future List honors up and coming stars in market research. To give you a deeper look into what makes these folks so special, we’ve interviewed the 16 honorees. We hope you enjoy getting better acquainted with the future of insights. For more on the GRIT Future List Honorees, be sure to check out the </span><a href="https://www.greenbook.org/grit"><span style="font-weight: 400;"><strong>GRIT Insights Practice Report</strong>.  </span></a></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3><strong><img decoding="async" class="alignleft wp-image-24088 size-full" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Danielle.jpg" alt="" width="234" height="260" /></strong></h3>
<h3><strong>Danielle Todd</strong>, <span style="font-weight: 400;">Account Director, Relish </span></h3>
<p><b>What advice do you have for folks hoping to start a career in insights?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Follow your passion. It can be easy to try to fit in with a company, but your passions, your interests and your perspective all feed into shaping how you see the world. It’s this plurality of visions that are required to accurately represent the world in all its beauty.</span></p>
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<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="wp-image-24094 size-full alignright" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Mark.jpg" alt="" width="234" height="260" /></b></h3>
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<h3><b>Mark Micheli</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Vice President, Experience Innovation &amp; Product Strategy, Kelton Global</span></h3>
<p><b>When did you know you wanted to enter a career in insights, and what inspired you?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> As a journalist, I felt we did a great job of telling human stories but not of understanding our audience. So I rolled into marketing, where I found we did a better job of understanding our audience but lost the human connection that gave our understanding context. It was when I rolled into UX and human-centered design that all the seemingly disparate experiences I acquired suddenly clicked into place.</span></p>
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<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="wp-image-24093 size-full alignleft" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Marin.jpg" alt="" width="234" height="260" /></b></h3>
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<h3><b>Marin Mrša</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">CEO, Peekator</span></h3>
<p><b>What trends do you see making headway on the horizon of insights? What trends do you think will falter in years to come?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I think that we all are focused on the wrong things. AI and Machine Learning are pretty common these days and everybody is focusing on them. We will all use them, but we need to look to them as a tool for making our products and services better. </span></p>
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<p>&nbsp;</p>
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<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="alignright wp-image-24092 size-full" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Jimmy.jpg" alt="" width="234" height="260" /></b></h3>
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<h3><b>Jimmy</b> <b>Zollo</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Co-Founder &amp; CEO, Collaborata</span></h3>
<p><b>If you could change one thing about insights, what would it be?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">There are far too many organizations that view insights and marketing research as a “nice to have” and not a “need to have.” The industry must do a better job fighting for itself, especially given current economic conditions. </span></p>
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<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="alignleft wp-image-24099 size-full" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/alyona.png" alt="" width="234" height="260" /></b></h3>
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<h3><b>Alyona Medelyan</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">CEO, Thematic</span></h3>
<p><b>What trends do you see making headway on the horizon of insights? What trends do you think will falter in years to come?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">More and more people are becoming data literate, whether it’s understanding charts, relying on data rather than intuition or understanding the limitations of data. We will continue to see an increase in data literacy in the next 10 years and with that an increase in the quality of insights derived from data.</span></p>
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<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="alignright wp-image-24096 size-full" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Nihal.jpg" alt="" width="234" height="260" />Nihal Advani</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Founder &amp; CEO, Qualsights</span></h3>
<p><b>Where do you see the future of insights heading in the next 10 years?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I believe we will see the below 3 trends over the next 10 years:</span></p>
<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">An increased focus on generating deep/authentic insights but with much more speed/agility, thanks to advancements in video and AI and a blurring of lines between qualitative and quantitative</span></li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">A significant increase in gathering contextual insights and observed behavior techniques vs relying on recall-based methods or self-reported surveys</span></li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">The ability to capture data passively to get to true behavior observation &amp; understanding, powered by wearable cameras and biometric sensors</span></li>
</ol>
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<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="alignleft wp-image-24085 size-full" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Andrew.png" alt="" width="234" height="260" /></b></h3>
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<h3><b>Andrew Konya </b><span style="font-weight: 400;">CEO, <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/company/Remesh">Remesh</a></span></h3>
<p><b>When did you know you wanted to enter a career in insights, and what inspired you?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I was inspired by friends in conflict zones in the middles east who were being negatively impacted because their governments did not understand them. It became clear that understanding populations better was really hard, and that doing it better could have a large positive impact on the world. At that point, I decided that I wanted to shift my career away from physics and focus on the problem of enabling anyone to instantly understand a population.</span></p>
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<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="alignright wp-image-24091 size-full" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Hannah.jpg" alt="" width="234" height="260" /></b></h3>
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<h3><b>Hannah Marcus </b><span style="font-weight: 400;">Strategist, Discover.ai</span></h3>
<p><b>If you could go back in time to when you first started your career, what advice would you give to your younger self?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> I wasted a lot of time when I was younger grappling with imposter syndrome – I’d want to tell myself that there is no ‘secret answer’ to how to be a semiotician or a researcher; what you learn from the people around you is as valid as any official training course. Also not to stress as much about finding the ‘perfect’ job – it’s the unexpected twists and turns that have brought real value and excitement. </span></p>
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<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="alignleft wp-image-24097 size-full" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Olivier.jpg" alt="" width="234" height="260" /></b></h3>
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<h3><b>Olivier</b> <b>Tilleuil</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">CEO &amp; Founder, Eyesee</span></h3>
<p><b>What trends do you see making headway on the horizon of insights?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I expect that in the next decade, we will witness the needle move from 20:80 to 80:20 in favor of implicit vs. explicit insights. We see a more widespread awareness and use of the unconscious measurements – and the clients that try it and stay with it. Further, in-context testing is something that will become commonplace, with the testing environments as accurate as possible. </span></p>
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<h3><b>Athena Lam</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Lead, Piccolo Portfolios</span></h3>
<p><b>What challenges do you see facing newer MRX professionals as technology advances?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">As with numerous industries, technological advances have lowered barriers for creating new projects and types of surveys. A deeper challenge, which may not seem like one initially, is giving due attention to MRX foundations. Technology is only as effective as its user is self-aware. </span></p>
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<h3><b>Ujwal Arkalgud </b><span style="font-weight: 400;">CEO, MotivBase</span></h3>
<p><b>Where do you see the future of insights heading in the next 10 years?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The ability of machine intelligence to get better at interpreting and decoding the subtext behind what people talk about all over the world.</span></p>
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<h3><b><img decoding="async" class="alignright wp-image-24089 size-full" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Ellen.jpg" alt="" width="234" height="260" />Ellen Pieper </b><span style="font-weight: 400;">Chief Client Officer, Research Results, Inc. </span></h3>
<p><b>Where do you see the future of insights heading in the next 10 years?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">In data collection, we are often so wrapped up in the details that sometimes we miss the problem we are trying to solve. By focusing on the problem, we remain focused on the WHY behind what we are doing, and it will help us think outside of the box. As more aspects of the research process become automated, and we use new data sources, it will be even more important to make sure we are keeping the WHY in mind.</span></p>
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<h3><b>Amy Greenwood </b><span style="font-weight: 400;">Head of Research &amp; Insight, FlexMR</span></h3>
<p><b>What do you think the key characteristics or qualities of a leader are? How does this play into MRX?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I think there are two key defining characteristics that any good leader should strive for. The ability to make decisions even under difficult circumstances, and the capacity to place their team first.</span></p>
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<h3><b>Fraser</b> <b>Bruce</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Consultant, Customer Reach, Canadian Tire</span></h3>
<p><b>Why are you excited to be a GFL honoree? Or what does being a GFL honoree mean to you?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">It’s always a great honor to be recognized for the work you’ve done over a period of time. I was airdropped into insights with zero experience and being an honoree confirms I’ve come a long way since then. Having seen past Future List honorees, I know I’m in an extraordinary company. The Future List contains people working on the cutting edge of insights in various industries. I’m lucky, proud, but most of all humbled to be surrounded by a very impressive list of honorees.</span></p>
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<h3><b>Muriel Silva </b><span style="font-weight: 400;">Consumer Research Manager &#8211; North America, Lactalis Canada</span></h3>
<p><b>What is the most valuable lesson you have learned from market research?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Business empathy: the key to a successful market research outcome is the brief. You need to understand the business need and really grasp the implications to be able to recommend the course of action and ensure at all stages of the project that you have that end goal in mind</span></p>
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<h3><b>Barb Paszyn</b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Research Management Director, Sklar Wilton &amp; Associates</span></h3>
<p><b>If you could change one thing about insights, what would it be?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I feel like a lot of research is being commoditized and the quality of work isn’t being considered. Some clients just want insights quickly. But those insights take time and care to develop. We need to value ourselves as professionals. Otherwise, other people won’t.  </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">In getting better acquainted with these honorees, it’s clear the future of insights is as bright as ever. For more on the GRIT Future List and the future of the Market Research industry, you can check out the </span><a href="https://www.greenbook.org/grit"><span style="font-weight: 400;">GRIT Insights Practice Report</span></a><span style="font-weight: 400;">. </span></p>


16 Insights from the GRIT Future List Honorees

<p>By now we all know that the virus is going to have an impact on the research industry.  The questions are around what will the impact be, are there winners and losers, and what will it look like on the “other side.&#8221;</p>
<p>Currently, this is all anecdotal.  As the situation on the ground changes multiple times each day, this perspective could be outdated minutes after this is posted.</p>
<p>We know that this has an impact on our society and consumer behavior, possibly greater than any we’ve witnessed in our lifetimes – or at least it has that potential.  If we look back over the past 30 or so years, we’ve seen some wars, some recessions, terrorism, and some health scares.  Some of those changed how we interact with each other and with brands, some didn’t.  I believe that this one will change consumer behavior.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2>Short-Term Revenue Impact on Agencies</h2>
<ul>
<li>Certain industries are going to all but shut down research activities.  Expect to see the industries that are hit the hardest by the economic fallout to pull back all most the most critical research activities.  Airlines, hotels, food &amp; beverage, automotive, etc. will all be in a position to conserve cash for critical operations.  Any research will be targeted to this time frame and be very cost-effective.</li>
<li>Other industries are going to boom (and anecdotally – are booming).  Healthcare, In-home entertainment, Gaming, Robotics, Delivery &amp; Logistics, Telecomm &amp; IT, Virtual Work and Productivity, etc.  MR spend appears to be up or at least flat.</li>
<li>Mixed messages:  CPG appears to be the one area where there is not a lot of consensus.  We know of companies that have cut spending and other that have shifted their spending.</li>
<li>Methodologies – We have seen both synchronous and asynchronous online qualitative boom.  Communities appear to be booming.  As this situation changes rapidly, quick is better than thorough.</li>
<li>A “back of the envelope” guess based on the anecdotes and spending patterns is that overall industry spending will be down somewhere around 20% as companies cut back on MR.  The duration of this is completely a guess.  My personal guess is that spending will start to tick back up in 4 months.  There is only the most limited ability to guess at this.  Any other guess is likely as valid.</li>
</ul>
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<h2>Long-Term Revenue Impact</h2>
<ul>
<li>Even after we get on that “other side,&#8221; consumer behavior is going to change.  What will the nature of entertainment look like? Will education and work life change forever? What about vacations (cruises or international travel)?  And we know that economies are going to change – particularly the dependence on one or two sources in the supply chain.  And finally, we know that the competitive landscape will change as businesses either focus on a more narrow set of products, small businesses either fold or are hurt.</li>
<li>When we get to the “other side,&#8221; companies will need to know what these changes are and how to navigate the new normal.  In order to understand this, clients are going to have to reassess all the foundational knowledge that has helped guide them up to this point.
<ul>
<li>Expect a significant increase in some of the foundational work &#8211; Attitude &amp; Usage, Brand Health, Market Landscape and Opportunity studies.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>There will likely be an opportunity for suppliers to not have to compete with some of the industry incumbents that have the traditional norms for acceptance, persuasion, etc.  It is reasonable to think that the norms have less comparative value.  What do norms mean when “normal” is not “normal?&#8221;</li>
<li>Brands will also have to assess if their message is on point on when we&#8217;re done with the crisis.  There will be a focus on the more human side of the connection between the brand and the consumer.  Expect a lot more work to be done on the emotional connection between the brand and their customers.</li>
</ul>
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<p>I believe that the net result will be a LOT of new insight needs.  Once we get to the other side, this spending will be a boom for the industry.</p>
<p>We&#8217;re going to be continuing to engage deeply on this topic; look for information soon on our new <strong><a href="https://greenb.lpages.co/covid-19-round-table-registration/">Insights Leaders Roundtable</a></strong>, where we will be talking with a panel of industry leaders weekly on navigating the present and future in this rapidly evolving new business situation.</p>


The Near and Long Term Implications of COVID-19 for the MR Industry

<p><em><strong>Editor’s Note:</strong> <i data-stringify-type="italic">This subsection is featured in the GreenBook Market Leaders Report. The </i><a href="https://www.greenbook.org/grit"><b data-stringify-type="bold"><i data-stringify-type="italic">GreenBook Market Leaders Report</i></b></a><i data-stringify-type="italic"> is your #1 guide to brand success in the insights industry, featuring the U.S. Top 50, and in-depth analysis from leading CEOs. In its inaugural edition, you’ll learn who is in the lead, who is rising towards the top, and where your company fits into it all.</i></em></p>
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<p>This report has a long and useful history and its many iterations reflect the changes we have witnessed in our industry. This GreenBook Market Leaders Report continues that tradition.</p>
<p>I read through this document carefully making notes on interesting data points and ideas. Two hundred notes are not particularly helpful but what stood out the most was the thinking expressed in the CEO Perspective sections that represent the ideas, opportunities, and threats that will preoccupy the industry’s leaders over the next few years. There are many areas that I cannot properly highlight here—privacy, changing consumer behavior, growth in talent, among many others—but the ones I mention below are critically important and permeate through the industry in one way or another.</p>
<p>Allen R. DeCotiis, Chairman and CEO of Phoenix Marketing said it best “The sea-change <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/market-research-companies/toronto-(on)">market research companies</a> have experienced in recent years has not been kind to the traditional, generalist research organizations”. Simplifying, possibly too much, the pain that the full-service agencies have experienced is underscored by the presence of all the different industry categories in this report. The growth in some of the full-service agencies this year would not have been possible without some of the companies represented in the technology, field service, and data and analytics categories.</p>
<p>Data has infiltrated every functional area of client organizations—marketing, operations, distribution, etc. And much of this information is customer information. This cultural change in client organizations has led to a hunger for answers to never before answerable questions (think about the old advertising adage about half the budget being wasted). Paul D’Aloia of LRA points to his optimism about the industry due to “our clients’ propensity to embed data and analytics into everything they do”.</p>
<p>Related to the above, there has been a proliferation of new(er) types of data such as social media, behavioral data, mobile information, advertising exposure information, deeper/larger qualitative data, and on and on. This availability of data along with improved analytic techniques gives us the ability to do things that we haven’t been able to do before. Antoine Harary of Edelman Intelligence notes that “With more resources at our disposal than ever before to uncover, understand and predict consumer behavior, there has truly never been a more exciting time to be a researcher. We are able to explore the nuances of historic decision-making and predict and model the future with amazing precision and accuracy.”</p>
<p>Technology such as automation, AI, mobile, etc. represent a future for our industry—one that is being partially realized but still with a long way to go. The change comes in different forms—how/what questions we can answer and what we do with the time that we saved. As Jim Lane of Directions Research comments, “easy projects are a thing of the past”. However, that also means that the time spent on the old easy projects now is often dedicated to more difficult projects. <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insights/authors/dsackman">Dave Sackman</a> of LRW perhaps sums it up: “The most significant industry trend &#8230; is the use of automation and AI. [It] will allow us to … provide more time for the creative, analytical, and consulting work”.</p>
<p>More demand for answers from clients, more capabilities, and more room for creativity. It shouldn’t be a surprise that we see solid growth.</p>


Market Leaders Deep Dive: Final Thoughts

<p><em><strong>Editor&#8217;s Note: </strong></em><i>With the launch of the latest <strong><a href="https://www.greenbook.org/grit">GRIT Business &amp; Innovation Report</a></strong>, we have published a series of “sneak peeks” and excerpts of key analyses. Today, we present Gregg Archibald’s wrap up, where he discusses larger implications for the industry. The points Gregg makes on business impact and what value means to different people and organizations are important for us all to consider.</i></p>
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<p>In every edition of the GRIT Report, we see positive news and we see challenges. This report is no exception to that history. Two themes keep coming to mind while reading this report: the first is that value means different things to different people, and second is that there is a LOT going on in our industry and it simply gets confusing.</p>
<p>First, the value question. In my early days of research, I ran the customer satisfaction research program for a division of a large (the largest at the time . . . now, not so much) telecom company. We defined value as “what you get for what you pay”. When companies operationalize this definition it works quite well if all the customers want the same “what you get”. However, if almost everyone has a different definition of “what you get”, it becomes very had to operationalize it. The “What You Get” part for our industry is quite diverse. As a buyer, you can “get” any of the following and much more:</p>
<ul>
<li>Faster – the value is that my organization can quickly get to a decision.</li>
<li>Buy-in &#8211; means that I go through a process to include all the stakeholder and have fewer hurdles when the time come to operationalize insights.</li>
<li>Data synthesis – the value is that the story looks at a variety of perspectives and gets me ‘closer to truth’.</li>
<li>Real-time &#8211; the value is that I can understand the consumer closer to the moment of truth or support my client in their time of need.</li>
</ul>
<p>I can go on and on with this – frameworks, data sources, stories, visualization, etc&#8230; But we need to beware that sometimes we lose the bigger story in all the detail. The core lesson is that all these things work together for one end goal – provide impact for<br />
our clients. The easiest example of this is reviewing the main reasons for organizations’ budget or revenue growth – they provided value (either internally or externally).</p>
<p>As previously noted, value doesn’t necessarily mean the same thing to everyone. So, the real question for all our clients is “what is valuable to you”? And that leads us into the next theme.</p>
<p>There is a proliferation of tools, platforms, methodologies, data sources, sample providers, and approaches in our industry. It is quite difficult to keep up with all the options. If we tried to keep up with all the changes and priorities, we would be left with no other job to do except ‘keep up’. And every organization is going through at least some change because of this proliferation. The key to success is not just knowing what you do as an organization, but more importantly – what you don’t do. While there are signs of improvement this year in the GRIT data, there is a lot of inconsistency on both the supplier and buyer sides about what the real role of the organization is. Are we the voice of the consumer? Are we strategists? Are we something else?</p>
<p>Until this question is answered in your organization, it will be almost impossible to focus on the right set of tools and skills to do your job to the best of your ability. And that focus comes from the question mentioned earlier. . . what is valuable to you?</p>


GRIT Business & Innovation Report Wrap-Up

<p><i><strong>Editor’s Note: </strong>As a companion to the previews of key findings from <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/grit">the GRIT Report</a> that we presented in the Blog before the report launch, we thought we would present Gregg Archibald’s wrap-up, where he pulls the findings together and discusses larger implications for the industry.  At this point, change is not theoretical, rather it is happening before our eyes.</i></p>
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<p>For years, people have been saying that our industry is changing. This edition of GRIT confirms that the change is here, but incomplete. There is a clear bifurcation in what makes up marketing research. The first has to do with data and the second has to do with consulting.</p>
<p>From the data perspective, this is about using tools that can help us gather traditional types of data in more efficient ways, gather new types of data, more effective analysis of data, and new ways to communicate that data to deliver impact. This edition of the GRIT study is encouraging in that more people are using these data tools to deliver greater value. We see this in the high number of studies that clients are conducting give the same budget (or smaller), we see this in the variety of methodologies that are being used, and we see this in the hiring trends and investment priorities of insights organizations.</p>
<p>These tools and capabilities cover a wide variety of applications – from method to business issues to research issues. Most of this can be attributed to technology (though there are some methodology and framework components in here as well). As of today, technology is still a differentiator, but the gap is narrowing rather than expanding. We are quickly coming to a time where the technology will be available to any buyer and any supplier of research. Fortunately, both buyers and suppliers are investing in technology – and not just the big players. The expectations of technology-driven research will be table stakes for all projects and all relationships.</p>
<p>The other side of the bifurcation is our ability to be consultative to our clients – be they internal clients or external. Many may have a better definition, but my definition is the ability to provide very actionable recommendations about what the business should do – and not just recommendations based on the results of a single study. This is difficult – and that difficulty is reflected in this edition of GRIT – client satisfaction with the strategic components of research is very low overall satisfaction of just 49% (Top 2 box).</p>
<p>We also know that this is important to clients. A single point of view from a single study is a lot less compelling than it was – particularly for very strategic studies. Data synthesis, multiple data streams, meta-analysis, and multidisciplinary recommendations are all components of being able to provide business recommendations, rather than just research results. Though we are seeing some clients and suppliers making these changes (evidenced by some of the investment priorities), this approach is still the exception rather than the rule. Until this changes, the satisfaction with being strategic partners in the business will remain low and the work will be transactional.</p>
<p>The data side of the bifurcation is on a solid path and I have no doubts about our continued innovation and improvement, albeit slower than most would like. The consulting side is in a more difficult place with significant process and intellectual changes needed to make this happen. The needs of internal and external clients will drive this change – whether through changing the organization or changing the suppliers that support the organization.</p>
<p>I know this feels like being “half full and half empty”, and it is. But there are signs that it can be more than “half full” – investment continues and is moving quickly downstream, we actually are doing more with less, and there are a LOT of very bright people in this industry (I know, I was one of the judges for <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/future-list">the GRIT Future List</a>). That is a very powerful combination of ingredients. Let’s get cooking.</p>


Final Thoughts on GRIT

<p><strong>By Gregg Archibald&nbsp;</strong></p>
<p>Growth takes investment.&nbsp; For some companies in our industry, that investment is much too hard to come by &ndash; especially for those companies that aren&rsquo;t either very large or tech driven.&nbsp; Growth Calculus is looking at the market a bit differently, with a focus on more traditional measures of opportunity &ndash; growth, service, product, profitability and potential.</p>
<p>In my role with Gen2 Advisors, I see many small and medium sized companies that are doing excellent work but struggling to find the knowledge and capital it takes to grow.&nbsp; We are pleased to see this fund filling a void in the market by supporting these suppliers.</p>
<p>We think the&nbsp;press release below from Growth Calculus explains their focus and underlines why this effort is important better than we can, so we are posting it in it&rsquo;s entirety. We hope the entire research supplier community will find this as exciting as we do!</p>
<p>Please note that Gen2 Advisors is supporting Growth Calculus in their effort to identify companies that are appropriate for this fund.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Growth Calculus, the growth capital investment and advisory firm, today announced the launch of its inaugural investment fund &mdash; the Service Evolution Fund &mdash; a sector-specific fund targeted for investment in specialized marketing services companies in the US and Canada.</p>
<p>The Fund seeks to invest in marketing services firms with a track record of revenue growth and profit earned by providing highly specialized expertise to Global 2000 companies across all industry sectors. It is currently evaluating investment opportunities in categories including:</p>
<ul>
<li>Customer experience consulting and analytics</li>
<li>Vertical &amp; application-specific research and data/reporting</li>
<li>Marketing optimization consulting and analytics</li>
<li>Forecasting and behavioral economics</li>
<li>Social media data collection and analysis</li>
<li>Marketing operations outsource management</li>
<li>Mobile marketing data/analytics and app development</li>
<li>Advertising production and talent cost management</li>
<li>Agency compensation and media auditing</li>
<li>Lead generation and sales effectiveness</li>
<li>CRM and customer loyalty consulting and analysis</li>
</ul>
<p>&ldquo;These are the types of highly specialized services companies that have terrific, un-tapped knowledge assets,&rdquo; said Patrick LaPointe, managing partner of Growth Calculus. &ldquo;But they need both capital and an infusion of very senior expertise in key areas to find their breakout growth paths.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&ldquo;We believe that marketing services companies are under-served by traditional venture and private equity investors,&rdquo; said Kathy Bachmann, managing partner of Growth Calculus. &ldquo;By uniquely combining growth capital of $1 million to $3 million along with intensive expert advisory support in areas like product development, sales operations, marketing demand generation and backroom process efficiency, we believe we can help create higher levels of performance and open doors to new solutions and new markets.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&ldquo;This new fund targets a segment of the market that is underserved with a combination of capital and counsel that can accelerate emerging marketing services companies&rsquo; growth,&rdquo; said company advisor Tony Pace, former CMO of Subway restaurants and chairman of the Association of National Advertisers. &ldquo;Changes in consumer behavior and technological advancement have given rise to many new enterprises in this space. Having worked with many good ones, the desire among them for expert counsel and investment capital to spur growth is nearly universal.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&ldquo;Having built, grown, and ultimately sold several companies that all started out in services and transformed into data- and tech-leveraged offerings, I&rsquo;ve seen how great service firms can create substantial value for their owners, teams, and investors alike,&rdquo; said LaPointe. &ldquo;The key lies in learning to &lsquo;productize&rsquo; to create more value for clients and greater operating efficiencies. When that happens, revenue and profit growth rates can easily match those of the best software companies and company valuations improve dramatically.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&ldquo;Studies in the angel capital universe show conclusively that investors who earn the best returns are those who are highly focused in their selection process, exercise discipline in valuing and vetting each opportunity, and then roll up their sleeves and work with the CEOs of their portfolio companies to help make growth happen,&rdquo; said Bill Payne, Angel Capital Association&rsquo;s 2009 angel investor of the year (Hans Severiens Award) and Growth Calculus advisor.</p>
<p>&ldquo;We also see great opportunities to invest in women-owned businesses,&rdquo; Bachmann said. &ldquo;These are substantially under-represented in the venture and angel investment communities today, yet which tend to deliver above-average growth, profitability, and efficiency. That&rsquo;s why we&rsquo;ve committed to invest at least 50% of our capital in women-owned marketing services businesses.&rdquo;</p>
<p>This press release is not a solicitation to invest in the Fund. Investment is only open to Accredited Investors and only after review of the Fund&rsquo;s Private Placement Memorandum, Limited Partnership Agreement, and Subscription Agreement.</p>
</blockquote>

Growth Calculus Launches Unique Investment Fund for Marketing Services Companies

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<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>By Gregg Archibald</strong></p>
<p>Welcome to the third installment of a new series that focuses on companies that won the <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insight-innovation-competition" target="_blank" rel="noopener">IIeX Competition</a>. Over the next several months, we will be interviewing these companies to discuss their place in the insights industry &ndash; successes, growing pains, advice, and other good stuff.</p>
<p>This installment features Nico Jaspers, Co-Founder and CEO of Dalia Research. As CEO, Nico drives the strategic development of Dalia and coordinates partnerships with leading research agencies.&nbsp; Dalia Research won the European <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insight-innovation-competition" target="_blank" rel="noopener">IIeX Competition</a> in 2015 for the most innovative startup in Europe in the <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/market-research-companies/new-zealand" target="_blank" rel="noopener">market research</a> and consumer insights space.</p>
<p><strong>We asked Nico to tell us, in a few sentences, what his business is all about.</strong></p>
<p>First of all, I would like to thank the IIeX team for their wonderful work and for their great support in this exciting journey. To answer your question: Dalia develops mobile research and sampling solutions for the insights industry. Over the past two years, we&rsquo;ve built a technology platform that enables research buyers to access millions of mobile respondents in over 80 countries around the world. Through a very large network of publishers, we&rsquo;re currently able to access users in over 40.000 apps and mobile websites to participate in research surveys. We&rsquo;re passionate about mobile because we believe that &ndash; with soon over four billion smartphone users around the world &ndash; you can&rsquo;t generate representative, high-quality insights without mobile. We enable the research industry to get better data by reaching mobile.</p>
<p><strong>What has changed for your business since winning the competition?</strong></p>
<p>The IIeX competition is an extraordinary experience in many respects and we&rsquo;d encourage all startups in the space to participate and interact with industry experts there. It is also a lot of fun. From a business perspective, the IIeX has given us a real boost: greater visibility that translated into new clients, including some of the world&rsquo;s largest research agencies; an improvement of our offer as a result of expert feedback; and of course an invitation to present at the Atlanta conference. In the wake of our success at the competition, we were also able to close a seven-digit seed funding round with leading venture capital funds to take the next steps in this exciting journey.</p>
<p><strong>Where do you see your business going in the next couple of years?</strong></p>
<p>The insights industry provides information that drives strategic decision-making worth trillions of dollars around the world, not only in the consumer goods segment but also in finance, media, government, consulting and countless other areas. We believe that, as the foundation for generating these insights, &ldquo;sampling&rdquo; is probably the world&rsquo;s most powerful industry that no one knows. At the same time, sampling today is very inefficient and technology can help to make it faster, more reliable and global. In particular, we see three, interconnected trends that will fundamentally transform the way insights are generated and used: the rapid increase in smartphone usage around the world; the availability of massive processing power to enable fully automated real-time analytics; and new possibilities to digitally interact with information and to turn data into strategic insights. We&rsquo;re seeking to push these trends on all fronts and&nbsp;aim to become a leading source for market and opinion data around the world.</p>
<p><strong>What has taken you by surprise?</strong><em>&nbsp;</em></p>
<p>One of the greatest challenges in building and growing a technology and data company is to attract exceptional talent to the team. What has taken us by surprise is how winning the IIeX competition has led to a boost in applications to join our team &ndash; we&rsquo;ve recently hired a highly experienced product manager from Google and a data scientist from Criteo, a leading ad-tech and retargeting company. Winning the IIeX has greatly helped us attracting talent to Dalia. We&rsquo;re currently looking to add more people in business development, engineering and product. If anyone who&rsquo;s reading this wants to join us, please send us a note.</p>
<p><strong>What is the most important thing you&rsquo;ve learned since winning the competition?</strong></p>
<p>The competition has given us great exposure to leading thinkers and decision-makers in the industry. As a startup you&rsquo;re always very product and technology-focused &ndash; which is good since it allows you to think outside the box and disrupt the way things are done. At the same time, it is very important to innovate with clients and not without them. Getting a better understanding of what clients expect from our technology was perhaps the most important learning from the IIeX experience.</p>
<p><strong>What advice would you give a company getting started in the insights industry?</strong><strong>&nbsp;</strong></p>
<p>The insights industry is a very peculiar beast &ndash; tremendously exciting but equally difficult to navigate and understand. As a tech company, we have a very data-driven and analytical mindset. One thing we underestimated was how important trust and personal relations are in this industry. In retrospect, this makes perfect sense: we generate information to support strategic decisions with potentially huge implications on the lives and work of many people. Clients want to understand the technology but they also want to get to know the people behind it. Trust is the most important currency in this industry so our advice to startups is to take this very seriously and start earning it as early as anyhow possible.</p>

Where Are They Now? Catching Up With IIC2016 EU Winners Dalia Research

<p><a href="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/logo_eu.png"><img decoding="async" class="size-full wp-image-15276 aligncenter" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/logo_eu.png" alt="logo_eu" width="732" height="254"   /></a></p>
<p><strong>By Gregg Archibald</strong></p>
<p>Welcome to the second installment of a new series that focuses on companies that won the <strong><a href="https://www.iicompetition.org/ideasboard" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">IIeX Competition</a></strong>.  Over the next several months, we will be interviewing these companies to discuss their place in the insights industry – successes, growing pains, advice, and other good stuff.</p>
<p>This installment features Neil Seeman, Founder and CEO of RIWI.  As CEO, Neil leads overall strategy for the company globally, with a focus on healthcare and international security solutions. He is responsible for overall company performance.  RIWI won the North American IIeX Competition in 2013 for its disruptive online data capture methodology.</p>
<p><strong>Tell us, in a few sentences, what your business is all about:</strong></p>
<p><a href="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/riwi-logo.png"><img decoding="async" class="alignnone wp-image-15237" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/riwi-logo.png" alt="riwi-logo" width="236" height="126"   /></a>RIWI is a global survey technology and risk measurement company using its proprietary, patented methods to capture a new stream of opinion data in any region of the world. RIWI offers access to true market and citizen opinion data in all regions of the world – including in otherwise hard-to-reach markets. These data can, for example, be descriptive or predictive of emergent <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/marketing-research/attitudinal-behavioral-profile-people-in-excellent-health">attitudinal</a> trends in brand affinity, purchase intent, civil unrest, human rights, or economic, health policy and risk or other indicators.</p>
<p><strong>What has changed for your business since winning the competition? (Listing on CSE: RIWI)</strong><u> </u></p>
<p>As of Aug 31, 2015, RIWI (CSE: RIW) was listed on the Canadian Securities Exchange. Listing on the CSE is a natural step for a company like ours. The CSE is a modern exchange that offers all the benefits of the public markets without the cost and burdensome attendant regulation for small companies. RIWI is a global data technology platform designed for rapid scalability and a public listing is a milestone enabling our reach, customer base, partnerships, and corporate professionalism to continue to grow.<u> </u></p>
<p>The press release announcing our public listing on August 31, 2015 is here: <a href="https://riwi.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/RIWI-NR-Aug-27-15-Final.pdf">https://riwi.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/RIWI-NR-Aug-27-15-Final.pdf</a><u> </u></p>
<p><a href="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Neil-Eric.jpg"><img decoding="async" class="alignnone wp-image-15236" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Neil-Eric.jpg" alt="Neil &amp; Eric" width="278" height="185"   /></a>Winning the I<a href="https://www.iicompetition.org/ideasboard" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">IeX competition</a> affixed significant brand value to our company, which, in turn, was instrumental in securing attention and revenue-generating contracts and strategic investments from angel investors in our pre-public company financing. Most important, I feel the IIeX events are self-selecting in terms of the attendees from other companies and clients who attend and who are therefore intent on seeking innovative solutions to short- or long-term data needs outside of the traditional boundaries of market research; this was helpful to me as an Internet and health policy researcher whose background in traditional market research was limited. I see RIWI as part of a growing ‘data ecosystem’ of diverse offerings that recognize that data solutions are often complementary. I attribute IIeX to cementing that vision in our strategic path.</p>
<p>Since winning the award, we have expanded our work in the global NGO sector, largely due, we feel, to the global recognition we have earned from the global data community that vouches for our reach into all parts of the world. The recognition from the award directly contributed to our data science in inferential analytics and geo-location that we worked on to support the 2013 and 2014 GRIT <em>Consumer Participation in Research</em> studies (published by Greenbook), which also reviewed the differential typology and respondent profiles of habitual vs. non-habitual survey respondents globally. We have expanded into the risk and security sectors, and, especially warm to my heart, have expanded into the global public health sector; this is pleasing to me since the roots of RIWI lie in pre-commercial work in government-commissioned pandemic surveillance in my former research unit.<u> </u></p>
<p><strong>Where do you see your business going in the next couple of years?</strong><u> </u></p>
<p>Our focus is expanding our customer base and growing our revenues. We expect revenues will, in 2015, be three times those of 2014 and we believe we have reached the stage where past efforts in development and sales, since 2012, are bearing fruit.</p>
<p>Like other companies in the global data ecosystem, we recognize that long-term partnerships and integration with other data suppliers and global analytics companies and in-market experts are critical to revenue-generating success. We see ourselves as the ‘plug-in’ that can enable any number of different companies in the technology and analytics sectors to expand globally, to reach more diverse and random audiences of non-panel respondents, and to reach voices that would not otherwise be heard. Specific applications include novel data-driven insights into issues ranging from human rights audits to the measurement of new global indicators to supporting research into the design of new policy solutions for human health challenges, such as the needs and gaps in caring for those with mental illness, Alzheimer’s or other diseases and conditions. We are, for example, very proud of a forthcoming academic paper that marks the first time researchers have measured mental health stigma globally and self-reported rates of mental illness in all countries. Although we have enjoyed many academic and expert reviews of our patented data collection methodology, this is a third party expert validation of the global replicability and falsifiability of our proprietary data stream in a prestigious scholarly journal (the <em>Journal of Affective Disorders</em>) and it is a data set of over 1 million people run over 19 months in more than 200 countries. Further, we know that it will help researchers understand baseline data in mental health stigma and surveillance, thus enabling intervention impact assessment.</p>
<p><strong>What has taken you by surprise?</strong><strong> </strong></p>
<p>The large diversity of sectors that has expressed interest in our random global data stream. Further, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the global nature of our enthusiastic supporters. We now self-identify as a ‘micro-multinational’.</p>
<p><strong>What is the most important thing you’ve learned since winning the competition?</strong><strong> </strong></p>
<p>It’s all about the people and the team; this includes every employee, client, board member, investor, advisor, consultant, mentor and friendly supporter. Our success is positively co-linear with the success of the global data ecosystem.</p>
<p><strong>What advice would you give a company getting started in the insights industry?</strong></p>
<p>Be wary of free and paid advice early on &#8212; nobody knows more than you about your vision. That said, I recommend ‘productizing’ your vision before anything else. Only bring people on board who share that vision passionately. Be confident but humble. Admit when you’re wrong and abandon innovations gone awry (credit to Steve Jobs RIP), yet, at the same time, be careful about leaning too heavily on the advice of anyone with impressive-sounding credentials despite the instinctive temptation to do so. This means being wary of advice from industry veterans, or from marketing mavens or self-proclaimed Internet ‘experts’. And it means asking a ton of questions.</p>


Where Are They Now? Catching Up With Insight Innovation Competition Winners RIWI

<p style="text-align: center"><a href="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/insight-innovation-competition_400_Trans.png"><img decoding="async" class="alignnone wp-image-8324" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/insight-innovation-competition_400_Trans.png" alt="insight-innovation-competition_400_Trans" width="648" height="329"   /></a></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<blockquote><p><strong>Editor&#8217;s Note:</strong> <a href="https://www.iicompetition.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Insight Innovation Competition</a> is one of the accomplishments I am most proud of during my time with <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/market-research-firms/focus-group-facilities">GreenBook</a>. We&#8217;ve helped a lot of companies launch and make a difference in this industry and perhaps most importantly, in the lives of the dedicated teams who have brought their visions to life. Since we&#8217;re prepping now to begin accepting submissions for our 2016 EU and North American competitions, it seemed appropriate to check in with past winners and see what&#8217;s changed since their wins. Gregg Archibald of <a href="http://gen2advisors.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Gen2 Advisors</a> (full disclosure, Gen2 does work with many of these companies in an advisory role as part of their wins in the competition) is leading that effort, and here is the first in what I hope will be an ongoing series showcasing these very cool innovators.</p></blockquote>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>By Gregg Archibald</strong></p>
<p>Welcome to the first installment of a new series that focuses on companies that won the<a href="https://www.iicompetition.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"> IIEX Competition</a>.  Over the next several months, we will be interviewing these companies to discuss their place in the insights industry – successes, growing pains, advice, and other good stuff.</p>
<p><img decoding="async" class="alignnone wp-image-14813" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/ParryBedi.jpg" alt="ParryBedi" width="141" height="141"   /> <a href="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/glimpzit.png"><img decoding="async" class="alignnone wp-image-14814" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/glimpzit.png" alt="glimpzit" width="139" height="139"   /></a>Our first installment features Parry Bedi, CEO of <a href="https://www.glimpzit.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Glimpzit (formerly SocialGlimpz)</a>.  Glimpzit won the European IIeX Competition in 2014.</p>
<p><strong><em>Tell us, in a few words, what your business is all about.</em></strong></p>
<p>As evident by the rise of platforms such as Snapchat, Pinterest and Instagram, visuals have become the de facto language of mobile consumers. GlimpzIt is a visual dialogue platform that enables researchers and marketers to speak this language. More specifically, we enable brands to have in the moment, 1-on-1 conversations with consumers &#8211; conversations for the purposes of gathering insights, soliciting rich user generated content and running fun interactive campaigns.</p>
<p>Our strength lies in the fact that we have taken the best of MR methodologies (e.g. direct solicitation, screeners, targeting) and married it with the strength of cutting edge technologies (e.g. computer vision, crowdsourcing and mobile machine sensing) to provide an offering that is quick, agile and cost effective.</p>
<p><strong><em>What has changed for your business since winning the competition?</em></strong></p>
<p>When we won the competition, GlimpzIt was little more than an idea in our heads. We had a primitive version of our platform and were manually supporting our initial clients. A lot has changed since then:</p>
<p>Our goal has always been to democratize access to insights. To that end, we just recently launched a completely free version of our platform. Now anyone can use the GlimpzIt platform to start a conversation and receive responses in the form of words, images and videos in real-time.</p>
<p>We are also continuing to receive a tremendous amount of customer and investor support. Our latest round was oversubscribed and we ended up closing $1.1M in equity financing backed by some of the very well known funds and industry veterans. From a customer perspective, we have over 30 well-known brands (from media powerhouses such as NBC to mid size digital marketing firms such as Tahzoo and established MR firms such as Research Now) actively using our platform.</p>
<p>Best of all, we finally moved out of our COO’s basement into a real commercial office!</p>
<p><strong><em>Where do you see your business going in the next couple of years?</em></strong></p>
<p>We firmly believe that the next few years will be transformative, not only for GlimpzIt but for the industry as a whole. Computer vision and analysis technology will further mature and visuals will become a means of communication on par with modern languages. Visuals, in fact, have the added advantage of transcending cultural, national and linguistic barriers.  Our hope is to continue to capitalize on these secular trends of our time with an offering that is compelling by virtue of its simplicity, elegance and speed.</p>
<p><strong><em>What has taken you by surprise?</em></strong></p>
<p>When we started a little over a year ago, people questioned the value of visuals and mobile. We received questions such as “are mobile respondents a representative sample?” and “can a picture really tell me something about my consumer?” At the time, the extent of mobile’s value was to deliver the same old surveys, resized for a smaller screen. Visuals, as well, were just seen as an additional data collection mechanism for diary studies.</p>
<p>What’s amazing to see is how quickly the industry has changed. People have realized that we live in a mobile and visual first world, and have adopted innovative ways to leverage them. For example, asking demographic questions in a survey is redundant now when you can passively obtain metrics through mobile machine sensing. In some cutting edge cases, people are even using platforms like Periscope to obtain market intelligence. What’s most surprising (and encouraging) to us is the exponential speed of market adoption.</p>
<p><strong><em>What is the most important thing you’ve learned since winning the competition?</em></strong></p>
<p>Clients like to be empowered. Partly due to where we were with our product, we started out with an outsourced approach to providing research services – we would gather requirements, go off, conduct our research and when done deliver results to the client. However, what we quickly learned was that clients, especially in-house researchers, wanted to get deeply involved in the process. They appreciated the data we generated, and the analysis and insights we derived, but also wanted to layer their expertise on top of it. We took that feedback seriously and improved our product so that users can take our analysis at face value or chose to add/modify as required. The platform regenerates dashboards on the fly with user changes. Needless to say this approach has been tremendously popular within the community.</p>
<p><strong><em>What one piece of advice would you give a company getting started in the insights industry?</em></strong></p>
<p>Be truly innovative. Platitude? Perhaps. But real innovation is hard and takes commitment. Let me explain.</p>
<p>Everyone loves the abstract kind of innovation – i.e. one that doesn’t fundamentally threaten their business model or way of doing things. For example, you will be hard pressed to find a company who does not claim to have the most innovative techniques, technologies and even culture as part of their mission statement. If they are big enough, then you most likely have a dedicated innovation department as well.</p>
<p>However if you scratch the surface, you will find that in the majority of instances, there is very little true innovation. The reason is that true innovation is extremely disruptive and it’s easy to mask incremental improvements as innovation. One of my favorites is when companies say, &#8220;We are truly mobile.&#8221; But once you dig in, you find what they have done is put the same old 50 question survey with grids galore on a tiny mobile screen!</p>
<p>True innovation involves entirely uprooting existing paradigms and inventing something brand new. Replacing existing methodologies might seem limiting, inadequate or even silly. For example, if someone told you in 2005 that an online social platform where you post 140 character messages would revolutionize communication, would you have believed them? In the faces of naysayers, you have to stay true to your vision, and if your idea is truly innovative, eventually customers will adopt your platform to the peril of the incumbents. Whatever you do, don’t lose focus or get disheartened and try to emulate the larger, more established companies.</p>


Where Are They Now? Catching Up With Insight Innovation Competition Winners Glimpzit

<p><a href="https://greenbookblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/tale-of-2-cities.jpg"><img class="wp-image-13125 aligncenter" src="https://greenbookblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/tale-of-2-cities-300x225.jpg" alt="tale of 2 cities" width="404" height="303"></a></p>
<p><strong>By Gregg Archibald</strong></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way&ndash;in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>I recently wrapped up the U.S. Conference season by attending the CASRO Annual Conference and The Market Research Event. Like The Charles Dickens quote from above, although each&nbsp;event was&nbsp;decidedly different in many ways, there were fundamental similarities in the overall view of where the industry is today and where it is likely headed in the future, as well as some pointers on how to get there.</p>
<p>Here is my&nbsp;take on both.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><a href="https://greenbookblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/14-ac-homepage-slide-show.gif"><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-13126" src="https://greenbookblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/14-ac-homepage-slide-show.gif" alt="14-ac-homepage-slide-show" width="630" height="260"></a></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3><strong>CASRO Annual Conference And The Tension Of Change</strong></h3>
<p>A few&nbsp;weeks ago in Denver, CASRO held their annual conference.&nbsp; It was their 39<sup>th</sup> conference and my first attendance at one.&nbsp; From those few days at the heart of the supplier side of the research industry &ndash; I took away a few key points that I will explain in more detail later.&nbsp; Ron Burgundy has nothing on these people &ndash; CASRO is classy.&nbsp; Change in the industry is affecting not only clients, but suppliers and associations.&nbsp; And lastly, everybody wants to move forward together.</p>
<p>I&rsquo;ve been to a lot of conferences in my life &ndash; good, bad, and, too often, ugly.&nbsp; For pure appreciation of our time and knowing that life is not 100% about work &ndash; CASRO gets it.&nbsp; From the facility (the Four Seasons) to the food (particularly good for conference food) to the entertainment.&nbsp; My favorite of the entertainment options was the cigar bar by the pool &ndash; but anyone that knows me could have figured that one out.&nbsp; Music, bike tours, brewery tours and more rounded out the options.&nbsp; What I&rsquo;m saying is &ldquo;Thank you CASRO for realizing that life is about balance&rdquo;.</p>
<p>So I&rsquo;ve told you enough to make you want to go next year and still haven&rsquo;t said anything about the content.&nbsp; There was a noticeable tension at the CASRO Annual Conference that I still haven&rsquo;t been able to completely define.&nbsp; This tension is characterized by the need to move fast and adapt quickly vs. the need to move thoughtfully.&nbsp; The debate moderated by <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insights/authors/schadwick">Simon Chadwick</a> was the most blatant example of the tension, and also the most optimistic sign of the transition that lays ahead for both suppliers and CASRO.&nbsp; The debate focused on a key question &ndash; is the change happening now simply another iteration of change that has happened so many times before or is it fundamentally different change that will lead our industry to new places.&nbsp; Both sides argued admirably, but the sway was to the team that argued the change is fundamental.&nbsp; I believe this is a good representation of the tension that I mentioned.&nbsp; Another example is the tension was exhibited by the winners of the CASRO awards &ndash; Ditto Labs and Morpace.&nbsp; Ditto Labs is a cutting edge approach to analyzing visual content in social media and <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/marketing-research/Susan-Semack-Receives-Promotion-At-Morpace-1000172">Morpace</a> is a very traditional agency that is doing the right things incredibly well.&nbsp; These companies could not be farther apart from each other in the spectrum of the research industry and CASRO could not have chosen two better companies to win these awards.</p>
<p>Let me say this loud and clear &ndash; I believe this tension is great for our industry and I believe that CASRO can navigate it.&nbsp; The somewhat opposing views aren&rsquo;t opposing views at all, but rather complementary with a bit of angst.&nbsp; <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insights/data-quality-privacy-and-ethics/casro-and-mra-join-suit-against-the-fcc8217s-new-tcpa-rules">CASRO</a> has recognized this and is working with suppliers and associations around the world to adapt from what has been the guiding principles of the industry to what will be the guiding principles.&nbsp; Having seen the balance represented in the Annual Conference &ndash; I&rsquo;m optimistic that CASRO&rsquo;s influence within the industry will stay strong.</p>
<p>Every conversation I had during this conference recognized the value of each of companies on either &ldquo;side&rdquo;.&nbsp; &ldquo;Side&rdquo; is misleading, but forgive me, but it is the best that I have to describe it.&nbsp; &ldquo;Side&rdquo; may be good as long as we think about adjacent instead of opposite.&nbsp; During the panel on innovation, one question focused on how we can take advantage of the newer approaches and the more traditional companies.&nbsp; It was noted that we simply need to be more open to the skills and abilities that each brings to the table &ndash; because the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.&nbsp; Maybe thinking about the &ldquo;Sides&rdquo; as adjacent will give us all a new &ldquo;angle&rdquo; (I am so sorry about that pun &ndash; but I&rsquo;ve spent the past 10 minutes trying to work it here).</p>
<p>I look forward to going to this conference next year to see the change that has been made.&nbsp; I trust the CASRO team will be leaders in this effort.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><a href="https://greenbookblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/TMRE-2014.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-13127" src="https://greenbookblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/TMRE-2014.jpg" alt="TMRE-2014" width="855" height="130"></a></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3>Flipping The Fundamentals at TMRE</h3>
<p>During a keynote speech at TMRE last month, Youngme Moon Senior Associate Dean for Strategy and Innovation at Harvard Business School, told us to &ldquo;flip the fundamentals&rdquo;.&nbsp; By this, she meant that we should look for ways to transform our business by upsetting the status quo&ndash; a philosophy to which I personally subscribe.&nbsp; As evidenced by the content of TMRE (please note that I am speaking in generalities for the moment), the market research industry has yet to truly embrace this philosophy.</p>
<p>TMRE was described by one client side participant as &ldquo;dependable, but much the same as three years ago&rdquo;.&nbsp; Having worked in market research for many years and having been to TMRE several times &ndash; I have to agree.&nbsp; But I think this is less a reflection on TMRE and more a reflection of the industry as a whole.</p>
<p>Throughout our industry&rsquo;s history, almost all innovation has come from important advances at the margins.&nbsp; Let&rsquo;s take trade-off methods for example.&nbsp; Conjoint was developed in the 70s and it was revolutionary.&nbsp; The important innovations of discrete choice and max diff improved upon conjoint during the 80s and 90s &ndash; again, as a result of work at the margins.&nbsp; The industry seems to be continuing in this fashion rather than truly upsetting the status quo &ndash; and this year&rsquo;s TMRE mirrored that.</p>
<p>There were moments of &ldquo;flipping the fundamentals&rdquo; as evidenced by speakers from SocialGlimpz and RIWI.&nbsp; Presentations on marketing mix by Heineken, data integration by Blueocean, predictive analytics, and real-time decision support were a few that stood out to me (and I did not go to all the presentations &ndash; there were a lot!).</p>
<p>TMRE covers a lot of topics which means that no matter what you need &ndash; there is something there for you.&nbsp; From mobile to management, from insights to influence &ndash; TMRE covers it.&nbsp; I heard a few concerns that there were simply too many topics covered and therefore too little focus &ndash; however, of all the problems to have, this is a pretty good one.</p>
<p>And one of the most important things that TMRE does is that it gets a LOT of us together in one place which, by definition, is healthy and valuable.&nbsp; We meet new people and re-acquaint ourselves with old friends, we learn from each other and grow because of that &nbsp;(and doing this in Boca Raton with days in the low 80s was not a bad thing!).</p>
<p>So thank you TMRE for another dependable year.</p>
<h3>The Best of times &amp; the Worst of times?</h3>
<p>While the tension of change was a key thread throughout both events, by flipping the fundamentals and embracing the innovation showcased at both the insights space can choose to focus on the best of times and build a future that is bright for all stakeholders in the industry.</p>

What The CASRO & TMRE Events Said About The State Of The MR Industry

<div class="mceTemp"></div>
<p>As we all know, our industry is in the midst of dramatic change – which has been covered by this blog, and many other places ad infinitum (not really, it just seems like it). This isn&#8217;t the first change our industry has been through and it won’t be the last. And with each transformation, the skills and abilities necessary for good research have evolved. The easiest example is the tech skills required to execute research – very few were required when I started and many are required now. In one sense, the skills required today are very different and in some ways, the skills that make a good researcher are exactly the same.</p>
<p>And this is the issue that was confronted by a symposium hosted by the Michigan State University Master of Marketing Research program earlier this month. The goal was to identify the traits, skills, and abilities that the researcher of the future will need to be successful. The symposium was attended by about 40 industry leaders representing suppliers, clients, academics, associations, and a few straggling consultants. It was sponsored by Michigan State University, Coca-Cola, Vision Critical, and Chrysler.</p>
<p>To bring this back to the first point, it was widely agreed that <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insights/brand-strategy/research-should-make-a-difference">making a difference</a> in our respective companies and being the thought leader that many researchers aspire to be requires the same thing that it always has – a good understanding of business problems, a good approach to understand that problem, and the ability to find a solution from information. We could certainly debate some of the finer points of that description, but we’ll put that off to another post. The difference belongs to the tools that we have available today to solve those problems – Big Data (which, as far as I can tell, still suffers from a self-identity issue), geo-location, mobile ethnography, and the list goes on. But the real opportunity for the future is data synthesis, according to Simon Chadwick of Cambiar Consulting (and many other attendees). The researcher of the future will be required to integrate disparate data sets to see the “truth” of what lays behind the interviews, focus groups, surveys, CRM systems, social media, and so on.</p>
<p>So the task in front of the researchers of tomorrow is immense, and very achievable (we’re just not sure how, right now). The real need for the market researcher of tomorrow is . . . agility, according to Kim Dedeker of Kantar. And as the new tools, data sets, and methodologies are still very much in their infancy – it was widely agreed that that the traditional skills and traits are necessary, but insufficient. Let’s take a look at the management skills, beyond today’s basics skills like leadership, communication, critical thinking. To meet both the concept of synthesis and agility, researchers will need to be able to:</p>
<ul>
<li>Collaborate across functional areas</li>
<li>Access information that is not actually owned by research</li>
<li>Have cross-cultural awareness, work as an entrepreneur</li>
<li>Contribute to innovation throughout the company</li>
</ul>
<p>While there are variations and nuances, it was “generally” agreed that synthesizing the data into the right solution and navigating the cultural change with the new skills are the most important components of educating the researcher of tomorrow &#8211; but the MMR programs are not prepared for that change. Out of date textbooks (even with 2014 copyright dates), lack of case studies reflecting the new approaches, lack of data sets (some are 20 years old) for training, and other issues are holding these programs back to a great degree.</p>
<p>But it’s not only that, there is more focus on the technical tools than problem-solving. Two opportunities were brought forward to address this to some degree – and they are cousins of each other. We need to learn from those we are teaching by giving the student real world problems, the resources they need, and the freedom to solve without being encumbered by the structure of the process. Similarly, many of us could do ourselves a service through reverse mentoring – a process that is just as it sounds and has the obvious benefit of getting us “older” people the skills we need and providing the benefit of our years to those younger than, well . . . I want to stop talking about age . . .for obvious reasons.</p>
<p>So what do we need to do as an industry? Several organizations at the symposium made a commitment to help – from blog posts (see above) to case studies. Several initiatives were outlined as a result of the symposium.</p>
<ul>
<li>An effort to take better advantage of case studies that exist</li>
<li>Development of the reverse mentor program</li>
<li>Engagement with local bachelor degree programs</li>
<li>Industry-wide communication of these needs</li>
<li>A study on the traits of the successful researcher</li>
<li>Internships designed to expose the future researcher to full opportunity</li>
<li>Association outreach and education</li>
</ul>
<p>And these are just a few. For a quick next step, look for a panel on this topic at IIeX North America this month. Expect to hear more in the coming months from me and others. If you want to help prepare young researchers (agencies, corporate researcher, whoever you may be), feel free to reach out to me and I’ll connect you to the right person.</p>


Educating the Market Researcher of Tomorrow is the issue that was confronted by a symposium hosted by the Michigan State University Master of Marketing Research program earlier this month.

Educating the Market Researcher of Tomorrow

<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Gen2 Advisors recently did a quick survey to understand how things are going between marketing professionals and insights professionals.  The idea was to get a read on if things were improving, how things were improving, and if technology was a part of that mix.</p>
<p>The results were a little bit of a departure (but not completely) from some of the rhetoric we here in the &#8220;insights&#8221; space.  All in all, things may not be quite as bad as we sometimes believe &#8211; especially considering that we had a great turnout of the marketing professionals.</p>
<p>The bottom line? PEOPLE DRIVE CHANGE. TECHNOLOGY ENABLES IT.</p>
<p>We asked marketing and insight pros to share with us who, what, when, where and how they uncover insights.</p>
<p>We ended up hearing from individuals who described themselves as “upper management” and to a slightly lesser degree “middle management.” An overwhelming number of folks identified themselves as doing mostly marketing, and a little less than one-third of respondents said they do a little of both marketing and insights. As a result, <strong>we had an excellent group of marketers to draw upon for their ideas, suggestions, recommendations</strong> on how to better improve the relationship between marketing and insights–as well as <strong>the latest tools, technology and applications</strong> that you are leveraging to gather insights.</p>
<p><strong>Here‘s a summary of what we think are the most interesting and useful data points in our results. </strong>Grab a cup of coffee and enjoy!</p>
<p>In the past few years, marketing and insights have learned to play together. Let’s dig into how you (and your peers) are making it happen. Is it the people, the processes, or the tools?</p>
<h2 align="center">ROCK, PAPER, SCISSORS. WHAT’S DRIVING CHANGE?</h2>
<p align="center"><em>(Pssst…The answer isn’t that random.)</em></p>
<h2>You and The People Sitting across from The Hallway</h2>
<p><strong>You  (“the people”) are at the core of change and the driving factor in the improving (or declining) relationship between marketing and insights. </strong>If the boss is unwilling or the staff is unable, no amount of process improvement or technological tools is going to bring about the change that most marketers and insights professionals are hoping for. Not surprising!</p>
<p>In companies where the relationship between marketing and insights is improving, it is the leadership team that plays an important role. They can (or cannot) <a href="http://gen2advisors.com/advisory/">enable people or processes that drive positive change</a>. They sometimes won’t let go of outdated ideas and practices that hold the company back.</p>
<blockquote><p>“The boss is an old-fashioned phone dialer but we’re slowly proving that the new methods work.”</p>
<p>“Upper management does not understand the value of marketing analytics.”</p></blockquote>
<h2>The Process: How You Make It Happen Against All Odds</h2>
<p>Changes in process have also influenced the latest improvements in the marketing-insights relationship. Sometimes, the answer was as simple as agreeing upon a new report, a clearer division of labor or breaking down old barriers. We’ve heard of marketing and insights coming together to provide one integrated marketing solution. We also heard of a company’s conscious effort to integrate <a href="http://gen2advisors.com/reports/get-notified/">social media</a> into its overall communications plan, as well as use analytics to check if they were reaching the right people. Nicely done! Can we say we are proud of you?</p>
<p>But then, the unavoidable happened. Some of you let us know that red tape, bureaucracy and tight budgets are still contributors to less awesome synergy between marketing and insights.</p>
<h2><strong>Power Tools Give Power to the People</strong></h2>
<p>We got an interesting peek at how marketing and insights involving social media can bolster an organization.   For those who are <a href="http://gen2advisors.com/reports/">willing to dip their marketing toes into the insights pool</a>, the benefits far outweigh any hesitation.  For some marketers, something as simple as partnering on a survey has helped focus marketing strategies. Others have seen substantial growth in web traffic and social media interactions just from sharing analytics data.</p>
<p>The conclusion? Bringing together those with solid ideas and those with a strong understanding of insights tools is simply the right thing to do.</p>
<h2 align="center">THE MAGIC WAND AND WHAT WOULD DO THE TRICK</h2>
<p>We gave folks a chance to wave their magic wand once to change something that would bring the <a href="http://www.gen2advisors.com">marketing and insights function</a> together in a more seamless way. The answers (as you might expect) were diverse, yet with similar themes.</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>A more <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/insights/grit/continuous-improvement-and-a-holistic-approach-to-data-quality">holistic data</a> view.</strong> Why can’t we have one magical, integrated system that brings all data together? That’s what you are all wondering. And, we are too. This has certainly been a dream of nearly all insights and marketing professionals for decades. From a data storage and statistical analysis perspective, there have been substantial improvements in the past couple of years.  However, you still struggle to interpret all of this information into an accurate, nuanced and cohesive narrative.  You need more of a strategic view. The question remains how to get there.</li>
<li><strong>Better integration of the two functions.</strong> When marketing and insights are not well aligned, they can be saying the same thing, but be talking two different languages. It is important that both sides learn from each other.  It takes two to tango…and, in general, it takes both the insights person and marketer to develop realistic, achievable goals for a successful campaign. One recommendation that got the <a href="http://www.gen2advisors.com">Gen2 Advisors</a> seal of approval involved both functions getting together for planning meetings–both at the program and strategic level, much more often.  Another good piece of advice was including marketing folks in the process of synthesizing the learning from insights projects.  The value is not only to get more applicable insights, but also to build deeper knowledge in the organization.</li>
<li><strong>Better-looking ROI models.</strong> Yes, both marketing and insights have made significant strides in developing good ROI models. But it’s still a tough argument to make.  Tight budgets and intangible value are never good friends. This limits the ability for you to justify how insights help drive marketing effectiveness.</li>
<li><strong>More Happy Hours (We love and support this one).</strong>  Are you smiling? This is no joke! The benefits of “out of the office” work are great.  There’s camaraderie and connection.  The best “frameworks” we’ve seen generally started on a bar napkin.</li>
</ol>
<h2 align="center">NEW TECHNOLOGY: WHAT YOU DO, WHAT YOU SHOULD DO, AND SOME OTHER STUFF</h2>
<h2>Socia Media Analytics and The Eternal ROI Question</h2>
<p>With so many new tools available to aid marketers and insights professionals, <a href="http://gen2advisors.com/reports/get-notified/">Social Media Analytics</a> turns out to be the most adopted tool. Even those who are not using the tool realize its value; and the fact that they should be using it. However, social media and ROI don’t go as well together as peanut butter and jelly…yet.  Many are still racking their brains to understand <a href="http://gen2advisors.com/reports/get-notified/">how social media is tied to business outcomes</a> (and, how to get the peanut butter off the roof of their mouth…).</p>
<p>But <strong>for those using social media analytics, it clearly has proven to be worth the time and investment</strong>. For some, this tool has helped reach the right customer at the right time. As one person stated, “[It] provides us a barometer of when people are engaging, what they are engaging with, and what is driving the traffic to our sites.”</p>
<p><a href="http://gen2advisors.com/reports/get-notified/">Social media analytics</a> is a wonderful tool for supporting brand initiatives. Yes, it works for measuring attitudes and impressions of your brand. However, some have taken it one step further by using social media analytics information to transform the perception of their brand among those who engage with it online. And, to answer the eternal ROI question, some said the real benefit to social media analytics was the ability to prove the value and demonstrate the effectiveness of their efforts.</p>
<h2>Smartphones: The Trendy Device That Proved No Trend</h2>
<p>We were slightly surprised by the fact that despite the rapid, widespread adoption of smartphones globally, not many marketers indicated that they were using this tool for data collection. But you should. We know you would agree. (Wink! Wink!)</p>
<p>As far as the obstacles to adopting the use of smartphones, the lack of experience, finding the right vendor, and finding an appropriate project were most often mentioned. But <strong>for those who are using smartphones to support their marketing efforts, the ability to provide key insights into their highly targeted market has proven to be invaluable</strong>. And, of course, if your business uses an online app (as one respondent stated), “…using smartphones has been useful in getting feedback on app topics.”</p>
<p><strong>Online Research Communities – Or The Fancy-called MROC’S</strong></p>
<p>After social media analytics, Online Research Communities are the most used tool among marketers and insights professionals.  Again, if you are not using it, you should.</p>
<p>Not having a good understanding of the tool, experience or access to a reasonably priced option were the reasons cited most often for why marketers are not using this methodology. However, it’s exactly those same reasons that were pointed out among those choosing to use an online research community.</p>
<p>Additional benefits of using online research communities included: user-friendliness, customization, and the fact that they provide a way to keep a finger on the pulse of customers’ needs and attitudes.</p>
<blockquote><p>“Provides continuous feedback on a cost effective manner”</p>
<p>“Quick and easy access”</p>
<p>“They’re economical and provide the information we are looking for.”</p></blockquote>
<h2>Bioresearch – What’s The Face Value?</h2>
<p>Not many know the answer to that question yet. Bioresearch such as eye tracking, facial analysis, and biometrics are the least used data collection methodologies we asked about. This isn’t surprising as these techniques are not as adaptable or appropriate for many companies. However, a few of you still said you could see using this technology in the future.</p>
<h2>Engagement and The “Fun” Stuff: Gamification, Crowdsourcing and More</h2>
<p>Engagement Research includes techniques like crowdsourcing, gamification, and ethnography. Very few said they were actually using these techniques for marketing and insights. Although these methods may not always be appropriate, there seems to be some appeal for future use because of the opportunity they provide to understand customers more intimately.</p>
<p>Many of you still struggle to see how to implement these techniques into your current programs and worry about customers’ reaction to being engaged in these ways.</p>
<h3>What Next?</h3>
<p>Wouldn’t you like to be first on your block to know the latest info? Want to be on the cutting-edge of marketing and insights?  <a href="http://gen2advisors.com/reports/get-notified/">If you do, please sign up to be alerted when the next Gen2 Advisors Vision Report is ready!</a></p>


Marketing and Insights in Today’s Cluttered, Techy World

<p><img decoding="async" class="alignnone  wp-image-5654" title="Questions and Answers signpost" src="https://wp.greenbook.org/mr/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/bi-signposts.jpg" alt="" width="585" height="388"   /></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<blockquote><p><strong>Editor&#8217;s Note</strong>: About six years ago, when my old firm Rockhopper Research was beginning to experience real success I had the good luck to win some business from Genworth Financial, and my principle client there was Gregg Archibald. Gregg had been around the research industry for many years at that point, with leading roles with clients such as AT&amp;T, Marriott, and  Genworth. I guess we did a good job and we started to win a lot of business from Genworth and so I found myself chatting with Gregg often. In one of those cool gifts that comes to us in the course of our business lives, we struck up a friendship that carried over outside of our work relationship. Over the years Gregg has been a client, a colleague, a sounding board and most importantly a great friend.</p>
<p>I&#8217;ve been harassing him for years to start blogging and (I think to shut me up)  he finally acquiesced. Today&#8217;s post is the first of what I hope will be many from Gregg Archibald. I respect his experience, wit, and insight immensely and I think you will as well.</p></blockquote>
<p><strong>By Gregg Archibald</strong></p>
<p>At this point, I believe it is well accepted that we, as an industry, are in a state of change.  More is expected of both research suppliers and research departments.  We have all heard the need to do things better, faster, and cheaper.  ‘Better’ is the focus  here. According to a number of clients, ‘better’ is defined as more impact.</p>
<p>Marketing problems can be categorized as the strategic and the tactical.  To borrow an overused map analogy, the strategic is about defining our destination and the tactical about the next turn.  Tactical problems often lend themselves very well to the tools and materials that we use today – which are either data trends (e.g., satisfaction), point in time data (e.g., surveys, focus groups, some behavioral data) – and are finite in context of the consumer interaction with that product, company, or industry.  This is a necessary part of marketing research and one we do pretty well.</p>
<p>Strategic problems, on the other hand, need a lot more context than we as an industry often provide.  When attempting to define the destination, marketers typically approach this in the same finite context of product, company, and/or industry – rather than the more holistic world in which consumers live.  To be truly strategic, we need to view the consumer’s world more broadly.</p>
<p>Let’s take life insurance as an example, which has a problem with declining sales.  The emphasis of this product has been protecting the family in case the primary wage earner dies.  There have been hundreds upon thousands of communication, product development, and satisfaction studies in this industry, with limited success.  Much of the reason that these efforts are met with limited success is because the context has been limited to the ‘product, company, industry’ lens – rather than a consumer lens.  There are consumer realities outside the industry that effect life insurance sales – the rise of the two income household (which lessens the financial severity of the death of a wage earner), the delay or absence of children in the household, stagnant wages for most consumers, the rising cost of college, etc – and are all part of the competition for the dollar that once could have purchased life insurance.  These realities must be understood and integrated in order ‘draw the map’.</p>
<p>The need for this <em>contextual insight</em> may seem intuitive – but it is often missing in our efforts to help clients.  The consumer is a much broader entity than we are able to address in a single survey, series of focus groups, or any of the other tools that are being developed.  It is the integration of these tools, and many other tools that we have available to us, which is the key to developing contextual insight.  It is not easy.  It takes a broad world view, meta-analysis, consumer knowledge, industry knowledge, risk, and a compelling framework.</p>
<p>When it is done well, the outcome is better communications, better targeting, better positioning, better strategy, and more impact.</p>


Towards a Holistic View in Market Research – Contextual Insights

<p>Forces of Change is a collaborative effort to help understand the overarching themes of the changes in the consumer and cultural landscape.  A report covering these themes and consumer perspectives on five industry verticals – Healthcare, Shopping, Technology, Financial Services, and Travel and Tourism – is <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/for-suppliers" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">available for download here</a>. Several industry leaders contributed their skills to develop a unique perspective on the impact of all the changes happening.  Sincere appreciation goes to BuzzBack, Consensus Point, Converseon, Embee Mobile, Panoramix Global, and Gen2 Advisors for their effort and dedication to make this work available to you.  There was also generous support provided by <a href="https://www.greenbook.org/market-research-firms/full-service">Greenbook</a>, Blue Ridge Insights, and Prodege. The original research was conducted in April of 2020. We have stability in the main themes that we identified, though how the themes are presenting themselves have changed somewhat.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3>An Uncertain Present</h3>
<p>A global pandemic is uncharted territory for everyone, particularly for consumers. People have been forced to adapt to personal restrictions, product shortages and job loss. They’ve experienced new realities when it comes to family, school, work, hygiene and entertainment.</p>
<p>As the days blend into months the uncertainty of the pandemic takes a toll<strong>. Buzzback</strong> research shows that feelings of restriction, isolation and anxiety are widespread and impact normal activities across all categories—cancelled plans, financial issues, working from home, less exercising, and concerns about the safety of visiting a doctor.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.greenbook.org/marketing-research/Consensus-Point-Adds-MR-Veteran"><strong>Consensus Point</strong></a> research shows that 94% of respondents predict that the most important development to feeling safe returning to normal activity is a vaccine. That’s when it will be safe to go back to offices, schools, stadiums, restaurants, and more.</p>
<p>With no answers in sight, the reality is that our only option is to live with uncertainty. The pandemic will undoubtedly change the world permanently in ways big and small. For marketers thinking about their customer, know that the generation coming of age will be defined by this pandemic and our global society will be scarred by devastating loss. Start redefining your customer profiles now and keep adjusting as new information comes in. Be a source of order and stability. Develop solutions that give customers a sense of control in their lives and in their relationship with your brand.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3>Sticking Together</h3>
<p>Our need for each other, a common enemy and a shared sacrifice reminds us of what’s really important. We long for a coffee shop meet up, a kid’s soccer game and every kind of celebration that’s been missed. The essential workers that keep our lives and communities running have come into stark relief and the outpouring of support and compassion to these people feeds our souls, reminding us of and reaffirming our interconnectedness.</p>
<p><strong>Converseon</strong> research revealed the important role that companies play as community leaders in this crisis. There is a heightened sense that companies have a responsibility to do what’s right by protecting the safety of employees and consumers, safe-guarding jobs, sharing sacrifices fairly all the way up to senior leadership, and responding with community relief efforts for those most affected.</p>
<p>A brand’s response to the crisis is a defining moment and companies are being scrutinized on social and traditional media. The 4A’s reported that “40% of consumers want to hear how brands are responding to the outbreak.” Those industries that responded immediately, like airlines and hotels, received positive social media coverage versus QSR that was slower to act. Brands who sit on the sidelines during the pandemic and the protests are called out on social media for failing to act and live up to their corporate social responsibility.</p>
<p>Social solidarity is a potent evolutionary force that will always power us through a crisis. But don’t underestimate consumers. Research shows that they have grown weary of empathetic ads focused on <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-these-uncertain-times-coronavirus-ads-strike-some-repetitive-notes-11587355261">“these uncertain times” </a> Instead, rely on the tested marketing rule of “solve don’t sell.” Make a tangible difference now and focus on selling later. Consumers are already checking to see how brands behaved during the pandemic on sites like <a href="https://didtheyhelp.com/">Did They Help</a>.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3>Protecting Health and Home</h3>
<p>Never has attention to health and safety been more important and top-of-mind. For many, adhering to shutdown orders is complicated by new sanitation needs, changed eating habits, interrupted activity patterns and anxiety from increased isolation and uncertainty. For others, fear was at the center of hoarding and the instinct to protect family and property. Now the pull of racial justice events and where and how to vote is posing additional challenges for how to stay safe.</p>
<p>Research from <strong>Buzzback</strong> shows that people consider ‘safety is the new currency.’ Brands will need to illustrate and visibly demonstrate how they’re incorporating cleanliness into their day-to-day experiences with consumers, whether it’s via products or product delivery</p>
<p><strong>Embee Mobile</strong> app research showed clear evidence that technology has helped keep us safe and one of the biggest changes was the boom of the delivery apps. Staying safe at home also includes distance learning tools such as video conference classes, GoogleClass and school platforms like Canvas and Aspen, so teachers were able to connect, instruct, and assist keeping kids engaged despite the massive change.</p>
<p>Opening the economy is vital to restoring normal patterns, but without a vaccine, consumers will look for safety measures in every space from movie theaters to hair salons and to the workplace. Technology will be a dominant part of the solution. Long term, the focus on healthcare will change the industry and our understanding of public health. Household and personal hygiene will be a lasting habit and technology will be the go-to solution for school, entertainment, touchless payments, room entry and more.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3>Bottled Up</h3>
<p>The limitations on people’s movements, social interactions and work have resulted in heightened emotions and pent up demand. . For some, daydreaming about travel keeps their spirits up. Others, tired of restrictions, have already welcomed loosening guidelines at beaches and parks.</p>
<p><strong>Buzzback </strong>has identified an increase in “heightened wants” as the desire for the freedom to travel to any destination, to see and travel with family and friends again and the simple pleasure of planning trips. Also uncovered are “new needs” in services to protect the investments they’ve made in trips, to ensure there is proper disinfecting while traveling, and the awareness to now use more caution and vigilance when planning and traveling.</p>
<p><strong>Buzzback</strong> also found a serious change in health-related behavior. People have put off the most fundamental use of healthcare with 2 in 5 people visiting medical professionals less and more than 3 in 10 visit a pharmacy or drugstore less.</p>
<p>On the other side of this equation, <strong>Embee Mobile</strong> app monitoring analysis tells the story of how technology is helping us fill many needs while we’re staying at home from Netflix to livestreaming to Zoom happy hours – technology is helping us find ways to keep connected.</p>
<p>For the near future life will be limited. However, people are naturally moved to rebuild the lives and freedoms they’ve always known and will gravitate to smart solutions.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3>A Blurred Future</h3>
<p>The future is blurrier than ever. Change is happening so fast that even huge cultural shifts barely register. Adjusting to the pandemic has created new awarenesses, new habits and maybe a few patterns that could yield a few positives.</p>
<p>So, what could happen post COVID? Which changes will consumers embrace going forward?</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Consensus Point research highlighted a few of the ways people predict our behavior will change:</p>
<ul>
<li>Consumers predict ‘visits’ with doctors will include both online and in-office, and mental health therapy needs will increase.</li>
<li>People want to be prepared for the future, so they do not have to “panic” purchase if there is another outbreak. 90% of participants predict that medical supplies will be the types of products people will continue to buy.</li>
<li>Because consumers have control of their vehicles and who travels with them, 96% say that driving will be the transportation activity most likely to return to levels before the outbreak.</li>
<li>95% predict that washing hands and practicing good hygiene will continue to help stop the spread and risk of disease.</li>
<li>For most categories including financial services, the migration to e-commerce and home delivery or curbside pickup will be the new normal.</li>
</ul>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>The pandemic is an accelerant for changes already underway and will have repercussions throughout the economy and society. </strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Take control of what you can: Bring your own business’ plan into focus through scenario planning, forward-looking research and keep innovating.</li>
<li>Remote-first workforces will change office real estate, surrounding businesses, infrastructure and the environment.</li>
<li>Virtual healthcare will bring access to underserved communities</li>
<li>Inequalities laid bare will drive boardrooms and the election</li>
<li>Automation and AI will be growing in acceptance for operational and economic realities</li>
<li>Demand for equitable pay and the growth of unions/worker rights is just over the horizon</li>
</ul>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>We don’t know where this will end up. But we do know that there is no “getting back” to normal.  When things become more stable, it will be in a different place with different behaviors and different values.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3 style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.greenbook.org/for-suppliers">Click here to read the full report</a></h3>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Feel free to reach out if you want to learn more.  Thank you.</p>
<div class="su-row">
<div class="su-column su-column-size-1-2"><div class="su-column-inner su-u-clearfix su-u-trim"><strong>Mary Meehan</strong><br />
Panoramix Global<br />
<a href="mailto:mmeehan@panoramixglobal.com">mmeehan@panoramixglobal.com</a><br />
</div></div>
<div class="su-column su-column-size-1-2"><div class="su-column-inner su-u-clearfix su-u-trim"><strong>Gregg Archibald</strong><br />
Gen2 Advisors<br />
<a href="mailto:garchibald@gen2advisors.com">garchibald@gen2advisors.com</a></div></div>
</div>
<p>&nbsp;</p>


Forces of Change: Exploring Our New Culture of Anticipation

<p dir="ltr">As usual, GRIT&rsquo;s Business Outlook is an information treasure trove that can shape our strategies for the next year in the insights and analytics sector. We&rsquo;re at a crucial crossroads, and several key implications jump out at us that we think industry leaders should pay close attention to.&nbsp;</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Technology Investment: A Must, Not a Nice-to-Have</h2>
<p dir="ltr">Foremost is the ongoing importance of technology spending. Research firms that leaned into technological solutions during the pandemic are reaping significant rewards, but the playing field isn&rsquo;t level. While some suppliers, particularly data analytics, flourish thanks to tech investments, others, like full-service providers, are lagging. Clearly, investing in the right technology has become essential rather than optional. Implementing tools that boost efficiency and deliver actionable insights is key, and failure to adapt risks being overshadowed by more technologically savvy competitors.</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Rethinking Research Budgets</h2>
<p dir="ltr">Another critical point is the shift in research spending habits. After a high of 46% reported research budget increases in 2022, only 31% report increases now, so it&rsquo;s time to rethink your resource allocation. Feeling the financial pinch, clients are splitting their spending between technology and research. Leaning too heavily in one direction risks missing out on key insights. Striking a balance between technology and staffing will be crucial to meet both immediate needs and long-term goals.</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Staffing: A Call for Strategic Optimization</h2>
<p dir="ltr">Struggling to balance tight budgets with performance expectations, full-service research firms&rsquo; personnel cuts are a wake-up call. Instead of hiring more people, why not optimize talent you already have? To significantly enhance your existing team&rsquo;s effectiveness, encourage cross-training and foster a culture of adaptability. This promotes skill development and improves employee engagement, increasing productivity without straining to add hires.</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Outsourcing</h2>
<p dir="ltr">The rise in outsourcing&mdash;particularly in data analytics and technology&mdash;reflects a growing recognition of the need for specialized skills beyond in-house capabilities. It might be time to reassess your outsourcing strategy. Look for reliable partners who can enhance your offerings and complement your strengths. A robust network of strategic collaborators can set you apart from competitors who continue to rely on outdated methods.</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Opportunities and Challenges Await</h2>
<p dir="ltr">The coming year is sure to bring both opportunities and challenges. Declining revenues and workforce reductions will lead to heightened competition, which could trigger a wave of consolidation. Smaller firms may struggle, creating openings for strategic partnerships or acquisitions.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Clients are increasingly tech-savvy, more demanding of research partners, and seeking real-time insights and integrated data solutions. Falling short risks losing clients, so meet with them, understand their priorities, and explore partnering to develop new solutions, some of which may be the foundation for strategic collaborations.&nbsp;</p>
<h2 dir="ltr">Strategies for Effective Growth</h2>
<p dir="ltr">Consider focusing on a few key strategies:</p>
<ol>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation"><strong>Make Technology Your Ally:</strong> Invest not just in software, but also in training.</p>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation"><strong>Focus on Skills, Not Just Headcount:</strong> Prioritize skill development and cross-training to boost retention and make the most of existing talent while driving productivity.</p>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
<p dir="ltr" role="presentation"><strong>Forge Strategic Partnerships:</strong> Partner with organizations that excel in areas like analytics or technology to expand your offerings and deliver greater value.</p>
</li>
</ol>
<p dir="ltr">By embracing technology, reevaluating budgets, leveraging your team&rsquo;s skills, and forging strategic partnerships, your organization can thrive in this dynamic environment.&nbsp;</p>

Explore key strategies and insights shaping the future of the analytics sector. Industry leaders must stay alert to critical trends for success in the coming year.

Navigating the Crossroads of Change

<p dir="ltr">In the merry-go-round of market research metrics, the GRIT Report serves as a conscientious scorekeeper, giving us the lowdown on who&rsquo;s up, who&rsquo;s down, and who&rsquo;s spinning their wheels. Last year&rsquo;s GRIT Insights Practice data took us on a bit of a roller coaster, showcasing a notable dip in the number of insights organizations who managed to exceed their organizational goals&mdash;a metric that feels like it's measured with optimism as its foundation.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Buyer-side market researchers and field services providers seemed to stick to their guns, with changes in goal achievement that could easily be statistical noise. Full-service research suppliers and strategic consultancies, who evidently found themselves a bit more bogged down, missing their overachievement badges by 5% and 6%, respectively.&nbsp;</p>
<p dir="ltr">The real head-turners are the technology and data analytics providers. They seemed to have left their compass at home, veering off by 20% and 12% (often their goals are very much stretch goals because they are capable of both substantial growth as well as substantial contraction). Yet, in a twist worthy of a daytime soap opera, budget sizes and revenue trends didn't always tag along with performance, hinting at a disconnect that even the savviest of financial analysts might furrow their brows at.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The real plot thickener comes with the curious case of financial rewards seemingly divorced from exceeding goals. Take technology providers, who despite their poorer show in 2022, saw a revenue increase of 19%. This definitely suggests that goals are not always in alignment with revenue.</p>
<p dir="ltr">It's possible that the pandemic years&mdash;with their changing bars and adjusted expectations&mdash;gave many a false sense of security or achievement, which the post-pandemic reality is now correcting. As we emerge blinking into the harsh light of a post-COVID world/pre-AI (at least, fully implemented), it seems that not only are the goalposts shifting, but they might be on different playing fields altogether.</p>
<p dir="ltr">So, what do we make of all this? GRIT&rsquo;s data paints a picture of an industry in flux, grappling with new normal, old habits, and changing needs. The insight sector has proven its resilience and ability to navigate change. But as we move forward, the challenge will be in aligning the feel-good factor of exceeding goals with the cold hard cash of financial metrics. After all, in the market research merry-go-round, the ride never really stops&mdash;we just have to get on a different horse.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Looking ahead, the biggest shifts in the insights industry could revolve around the integration of emerging technologies and evolving market dynamics. As GenerativeAI matures, we&rsquo;re likely to a shift in both efficiency and efficacy. Additionally, the increasing emphasis on real-time data and predictive analytics could redefine benchmarks for success in the industry. Market research is on the cusp of a transformative evolution, driven by technological innovation, massive data (public and proprietary) and the pursuit of deeper insights.</p>

Explore the intricate landscape of market research metrics through The GRIT Report, highlighting the hurdles organizations face in achieving their goals. 

Market Research Merry-Go-Round: Not So Merry

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