Following on from my last post – 2012 Resolutions for the Market Research Agencies – I wanted to talk more about how we make these resolutions a reality by creating new agency roles with distinctive new skills sets.

1. Technologist

The MRX Technologist is primarily responsible for keeping up to date with new digital trends and is able to help the agency develop and pilot new research methodologies. This may take the form of designing new platforms from scratch or being the lead decision maker when it comes to buying 3rd party software. Alongside innovation, the Technologist plays an increasingly important role on project teams where the research briefs are UX or Service Design Orientated.
Skills: User Experience, Digital Project Management, Data Analytics

2. Community Manager

Communities are social places and need to be nurtured by people who are experts in digital communication. With the rise of MROC’s the fastest growing role in MRX agencies is that of the community manager. In fact, most of the problems associated with bad MROC research is when the agency does not have this person on the team. The Community Manager is responsible for setting the rules of the community, setting the tone of voice, making a personal connection with members and ultimately ensuring good quality engagement with the project. The Community Manager is also increasingly leading the way when it comes to applying game mechanics to research and is growing in influence when it comes to shaping research projects.
Skills: Copywriting, Video production, Project Management

3. Social Media Researcher

Real time social media monitoring is now commonplace but many companies are still struggling to interpret the data and use it to make strategic decisions. This knowledge gap is being filled by The Social Media Researcher who is responsible for developing strategic KPI frameworks for social media tracking programmes and harnesses social media data to help answer adhoc brand, product and comms briefs. The Social Media Researcher is quickly becoming a very important role, as they are both an objective and strategic voice advising clients about the ROI of their growing digital spend.
Skills: Quantitative Research, Qualitative Research, Social Media strategy

4. Co-creation Consultants

Companies are opening up and embracing more collaborative ways of working with third parties – including their consumers. Co-creation Consultants are responsible for the successful interaction between all parties on a project. Many of the touch points for this type of co-creation occur in workshop environments of one kind or another that require very skilled facilitation to get the best out of a wide variety of participants. Co-creation Consultants cover a wide range of disciplines, most often those from innovation, brand strategy and planning backgrounds.
Skills: Facilitation & improvisation, Planning, Qualitative Research

5. Big Data Scientists

We are living in the age of data, enabling companies to be more forward looking. Big Data Scientists are hot property in the research world as they are responsible for developing predictive data models & algrorithms using a wide range of data sources including dynamic social media data. Big Data Scientists primarily come from computer science, hard sciences, engineering and business backgrounds.
Skills: Mathmatics, Statistics, Computer programming

1. Learn how to tell better stories

We all know a good and engaging story when we hear it and our clients are no different! 2012 should be the year in which we take the art of MR storytelling seriously. Let’s ban the 100 slide reportage debrief and develop the skills of our teams to communicate findings in more engaging ways. Spend 10% more time on thinking about how we tell the story using imagery; video, graphics and customer voices will make a huge difference to the reputation of the MRX industry.

2. Ask less questions and listen more

As researchers we like asking questions. If we are totally honest, most of us think we know the answers before we run our surveys and are simply testing our hypotheses. Today, we live in the age of social media data – consumers globally are talking about every aspect of their lives 24/7. We no longer need to second guess and ask as many questions about what consumers think and feel with so much data available. We just need to develop the skills of our teams to listen and interpret more.

3. Stop using the word respondent

We have all done this. But is it not time to stop using this word to describe people who we work with in research projects. In 2012 we must encourage our teams to develop collaborative skills so that we can see consumers as people who we can co-create value with rather than as lab rats to carry out tests on.

4. Have more fun

The MRX industry has a pretty dull image and we need to ask ourselves why. A large part is because we need to try harder to be creative and have fun with our clients. We should be encouraging our teams to spend time experimenting, by piloting new ideas with clients. In a world where things are changing so fast, this is not only essential but fun.

5. Don’t just embrace change – drive change

Above all in 2012 I think there should be an acceptance amongst researchers that the pace of change we are seeing in technology is just going to speed up and that the old certainties of Quant and Qual research are over. It is only then that we can help shape the skills of our teams to adapt to the challenges of a world where so much data is available and where consumers expect to collaborate with brands.

Technology is changing faster than consumers. Consumers are changing faster than organizations. Therefore, organizations need to change faster if they are to keep up. Many are finding this difficult to achieve.

A recent IBM Global CEO Study that covers 1,130 CEOs across 45 countries and 32 industries showed that organizations not only felt bombarded by change but many are struggling to deal with it. 8 out of 10 CEOs saw significant change ahead and yet the gap between the expected level of change and the ability to manage it had almost tripled since the previous study in 2006.

There are many different manifestations of this change (too many to cover here) from faster product life cycles and globalization (the shift of budgets to emerging markets), to changing demographics and the challenge of ageing populations on Western economies. But one of the biggest is the impact of the social web on everything we do. EMarketer predicts that the tipping point will happen in 2012 when 60% of all marketing budgets will become social. Linked to this is the arrival of Big Data. In 2010 the human race created 800 exabytes of information. To put this into context between the dawn of civilisation and 2003 we only created 5 exabytes; now we’re creating that amount every two days. By 2020 that figure is predicted to sit at 53 zettabytes (53 trillion gigabytes) – an increase of 50 times. As Hal Varian, Google’s Chief Economist said “We used to be data poor, now the problem is data obesity”.

This presents us with a number of new challenges that I have set out below as hardening client needs. I have concentrated on just a few with some suggestions on what research companies need to do to make sure they’re in a position to meet them.

1. Moving from Big Data to Big Insight

Making sense of all the data out there and simplifying it so that we can derive valuable meaning and insight will be one of 2012′s client mantras. Social listening will give way to social media insight. Having researchers in your team that are also technologists e.g. digital anthropologists that can help to analyse real time social data will become a required skill. Being able to augment different data sets from the virtual and real worlds so that we can help to create one closer view of our customer will depend on our ability to mix different on-line and offline methodologies in a coherent and credible way.

2. Quality without speed is not enough

One of the greatest demands from clients is how to deliver fresh, robust and relevant insight more quickly and cost effectively than we have ever done (or needed to do) before. Qualitative research companies need to lead in the use of technology so that we can become quicker, faster and more responsive in the ways in which we gather insight about our clients’ consumers. We also need to develop research and planning tools that are less generic and more focused on the CMI client needs of today and tomorrow.  This does not mean replacing human analysis – to the contrary the role of the researcher has become even more important than before because of the need to find real quality from the huge quantities of data that is out there. It must also mean we can do better than relying on tools such as the TGI Index.

3. Logic needs to give way to more magic

We are going to see more emphasis on qualitative research as a robust exploratory tool to understand better consumers’ emotional drivers as well as to help improve the quality and shaping of social ideas and social content before things go too far and way before the quantitative testing stage. Too much blind reliance on testing things to death has seen some of the “magic” and “creativity” in marketing lose out to the “logic”. Creating magic today means creating social brand stories that are contagious and can be propagated effortlessly by key consumer cohorts. Co-creating with these consumers, involving them much earlier in the marketing process, leveraging their content and creativity as part of the marketing process will have an increasingly important role to play here. If what goes in is rubbish then testing what comes out will be rubbish. The Coca-Cola Company is leading the way and I am sure other FMCG clients will follow.

4. Creating content excellence

There is a new marketing ecosystem where content is more important than channel, where audience passions/interests are becoming more important than demographics and where the media model has changed – placing more emphasis on created and earned media as opposed to bought and owned. Understanding which “big ideas” have enough social currency  (it’s not what consumers are doing with your brand but what they are doing with each other that counts) and can work effectively across all platforms will attract much more focus. Understanding the different consumer cohorts within a brand audience and their influence will also be key to understanding what content areas will have the most impact when it comes to propagating ideas. Researchers need to come up with a new model here: one based on rational, emotional and social metrics that is continuous and adaptive.

5. New measurement models

With the increasing socialisation of brands and the importance “connected” brands are placing on new metrics such as social brand value and influence (see below), helping clients to understand, validate and measure what ideas work best in the earned and created media space as well as why it works will be increasingly important. Finding ways of proving that the more customers of a brand are interconnected the more they are willing to pay for the product and the more loyal they will be is vital. Working out a more real time model for measuring which big ideas have the best potential for success; are the most likely to be propagated and can work across all media is another area that needs close attention.

1. Hubs

The value of data is only fully leveraged when multiple data sets are connected. Connecting the data allows us to understand the context of the dataset and turn figures into stories and insights. MROCs will evolve to become Hubs for consumer understanding by enabling clients to overlay other data streams, such as sales

2. Co-creation

The more experience clients have with MROC, the more they will understand that the power of these communities goes beyond gamification of online research tasks. By segmenting consumers by their ability and skill to co-create we will see more consumers being invited to work closely with brands to crack strategic brand challenges.

3. Real-time

MROCs will increasingly be connecting to the social media profiles of their members, thereby giving clients access to selected areas of their real-time social data. Such data might include their status updates, their musical preferences, their Likes, the people they follow on Twitter. This will mean as researchers we will use MROC to ask fewer questions and concentrate more on actual behaviours.

4. Mobile

As smart phone penetration increases, MROC members will be able to use apps to post pictures, videos, soundbytes, status updates, respond to polls, engage in discussions and generally participate in tasks on the go. This mobile interface will enable a richer contribution from members and a deeper and more seamless connection between what they do in their daily life and what they do in MROC.

5. Smarter

Automated analytics tools will enable researchers to gain faster and deeper understanding of MROC data. This will include natural language processing software to run semantic analysis of the contents and cluster consumer feedback by topics. Machine learning will also start to be overlaid to enable more effective categorization of textual, visual and audio content. Real-time interactive visualizations via dashboard will also be adopted to spot patterns quickly and guide in-depth analysis of content.

Face research director Francesco D’Orazio worked with Ben & Jerry’s Europe brand director Jochanan Senf on a co-creative approach to planning. This case study looks at the challenges and key opportunities of using a co-creative approach and explores the idea of creating planning playgrounds.

For more information on our methods, check out our Processes section or get in touch.

The consumers’ increasing desire to be listened to and involved more directly in what the brand does and says means This means it is no longer about what your brand does to the consumer but what consumers are doing to and with your brand. In a post digital and global ecosystem the continued success of brands hinge on the relationships and interactions consumers have with each other around the brand as well as with the brand itself, across multiple markets and through a dramatically increased set of touch points. Brand activity is re-mixed, re-appropriated, re-shaped and in the course of this process, brand meanings, perceptions and messages are re-thought and re-made. The fact is: consumers now control brands. In the next decade, we will see a shift away from the traditional branding model of agencies and clients starting with the brand to starting with the consumer. In this context co-creation is playing an increasingly important role in brand and communications planning.

We recently applied co-creation to help the Reckitts global brand team plan the launch of two existing household care brands into China. Our approach was designed to immerse the stakeholder teams deeply in specific cultural nuances, aspirations and needs of these new consumers. The combination of community research, crowd-sourcing and co-creation workshops helped to produce local “translations” of the global brand blueprint (conceptually, semantically, linguistically and visually). The blueprints are now the cornerstone for innovation and equity communications development.

The Co-Creation Process

This example along with many others is informed by our co-creation process which unites the consumer and their needs, the brand and its aspirations plus the expert and their knowledge of technology, trends and industrial capabilities.

Rather than simply look to the crowd for the answer, we look to the crowd for the inspiration, to give cause to re-assess. Experts working with consumers help shape these new thoughts, to prioritise, and to make things possible.

Co-creating Ideas

This triangular relationship is just as important when it comes to co-creating ideas as part of a well thought through innovation process. This helps to avoid Arthur C. Clarke’s two dangers when trying to see into the future – the “Failure of Nerve and Failure of Imagination”.

“The Failure of Imagination occurs by failing to discover vital facts or not even admitting to the possibility of their existence and the Failure of Nerve happens when with all the relevant facts at our disposal we fail to see their inescapable conclusion because they were not marshaled correctly.” So when it comes to using co-creation for innovation purposes there are some important principles that need to be followed. Here are just three of them.

“Bottom up is not enough. Bottom-up processes are great but in order to be effective they need to be complemented by solid strategic direction and expertise. Successful innovations emerge at the intersection of three, sometimes very different, agendas: the consumer and his needs, the brand and its strategy (vision, strategy, commercial viability), the expert and his vision (market knowledge and expertise, market trends).

Allow group thinking as well as individual thinking. Group thinking is generative and provides elements of validation, but it is also skewed towards social conformity. On the other hand, individual thinking provides a more independent idea generation process but it’s not generative. The best ideas often come from building on each other’s contribution rather than coming up with the final solution in one go. A balanced innovation process needs to ensure both the dynamics are well represented.

Open up. Allow ideas to come from anywhere and allow consumers to take you to places you wouldn’t expect to be taken to. Opening up helps keep the Failure of Imagination at bay by enabling contributions by non-experts or non-professional users. This has been made much easier by consumers’ increasing desire to be listened to and involved more directly in what a brand does and says.”

From “Designing Relevance: How Open and Agile Research Methodologies can Help Complex Organizations Respond to Change and Stay Relevant” A Nokia & Face Innovation Case Study

More on Nokia & Face Project Relevance here http://www.facegroup.com/casestudies/nokia-designing-relevance

Wired magazine’s Jeff Howe, who coined the term crowd-sourcing back in 2006, defines it as the act of a company taking a function once performed by employees and outsourcing it to a large community of people in the form of an open brief. Procter & Gamble, Nike, Best Buy, Threadless and Starbucks have all created digital platforms that allow customers to respond to “open briefs” with a view to involving them in creating new products and messages.

Co-creation differs from crowd-sourcing in the fact that it brings brands and consumers together on the same level and involves consumers at the beginning of the process rather than at midway or at the end. Company stakeholders collaborate directly with selected (usually smaller) groups of consumers to work on a specific brief. C.K. Praghalad, a champion of co-creation, gives this definition. ‘What is fundamentally new here … is the convergence of previously distinct roles, enabling consumers to be involved not only in consuming but in the creation of value in the products and services … there is continuous dialogue with the customer and he or she is involved from the earliest stages of co-creation; this involvement reduces the risk that the customer will reject the end product.”

Although co-creation differs from crowd-sourcing, together they form a coherent research and innovation process – one that allows both group-thinking and individual thinking, roles for experts and consumers as well as structure and leadership for the crowd. This combination means we are increasingly applying co-creation to a range of different project types that are split into three broad areas: Co-creating Insights (using community research), Co-creating Ideas and Co-creating Brands. Over the next few days, the Face blog is going to look at each in turn, and give an insight into how we use co-creation, starting with Insights.

Co-creating Insights

Fostering and participating in conversations between people is fundamental to the idea of co-creating insights. These are either closed – created by bringing groups of consumers together with client stakeholders in a specifically created web based environment or are open – taking client stakeholders out into existing communities that are already live on the internet.

Netnography, a term coined by Marketing Professor Robert Kozinets, is a qualitative, interpretive research methodology that uses internet optimized ethnographic research techniques to study the social context in on-line communities. By working in a more natural communication mode we hear views expressed in real voices, and more importantly we end up discussing things and asking questions we didn’t even know existed or that we wanted to ask. Invariably this involves letting consumers take you to places you would not have thought of at the outset helping you to uncover new insights. This more open-source mentality to the way we approach insight work means researchers need to take a different role.  It means taking a step back, acting more as facilitators and enablers of direct contact between brands and consumers.  We need to see researchers more as part of a triangular relationship between brands, consumers and experts rather than a linear one where we stand between clients and consumers.

Tomorrow, we’re looking at co-creating ideas, so make sure to check back!

Last week, Face Associate Research Director Esther Garland spoke with Marilena D’Amone of Reckitt Benckiser at the Research New Product Development Conference – a day of talks looking at harnessing consumer insights that drive concepts, proposals and products – in the City of London. Their talk focussed on how co-creation can be applied to developing new products in BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India & China) markets.

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