Bringing Life to Market Research Results

Have you ever delivered a big market research study, and had your internal clients completely ignore it?

It is an unfortunately common and painful experience.

Sometimes the challenge is that audience members find numbers too impersonal. They see charts and graphs and they just don’t seem to represent living, breathing customers. And nobody is going to take action based on market research data in which they don’t completely believe.

Customer Insights

Online Communities for Market Research: Let’s Not Oversell Them

Yes, online research communities have their place. I ardently believe that there are many organizations that can benefit from structured online communities (MROCs or ORCs, as many now call them), or even just well-run, online customer advisory boards (link). In fact, there are some markets for which I think online communities can be one of the best ways of getting honest, objective customer insights. But let’s not oversell it; if we do, we’ll only cause a lot of heartache (and wasted research dollars).

So, please, some reality checks: …

In-house Market Research Manager: It’s a Tough Job

Managing in-house market research is tough work. And your internal clients don’t make it easy, do they?

Your internal clients say they want powerful, fresh, objective customer insights. But too often, their behavior shows that they just want you to confirm their personal views.

Does Your Audience Hunger for Data?

A tricky part of successfully delivering client insight data is knowing how much data your audience really wants. So, be honest with yourself: do you understand your colleagues’ or clients’ data appetite?

Data Pointillism: Are You Too Close To Your Customer Data?

You may have collected thousands of data points. You savor them for a time (I know I do!), and that’s fine. But then it’s time to step back, and take it all in…unless something blocks you. It may even be that you have colleagues who are so hung up on examining the little dots up close, that you get stuck too.

Be bold. Break away from the crowd. Step back.