Perfect Crowd

The power of divergence

Some of the large market research departments on the client side have gone through yet another round of soul-searching and introspection recently. Some have emerged with a new vision for the function, a vision that points out the necessity of a return to rigorous measurements and discipline and a return to traditional market research methodologies.

 

It seems that we have been misled in recent years by left-wing radicals who infiltrated the research departments and led us astray to extremes such as researchers sitting down in a circle with consumers, holding hands and chanting while under the influence of drugs and hypnosis; and even worse – they taught us to rely on our gut feel and intuition. Now, in the time of economic turmoil, we must come back to reason, numbers and indices.

 

The right-wing approach which calls for rigorous measurements would have been completely justified if events in the world moved in linear fashion. But it is not so. We can rigorously apply BASES volumetrics and feel good about the predicted 1,356 thousand tons of soap that we will sell in market X next year but we already know that this will not happen because of earthquakes, competitors, swine flu and people being what they are, (namely, irrational creatures) to name a few amongst thousands of variables.

 

Nonetheless, the desire to converge on one number that would offer an answer to complex questions is stronger than common sense. 

 

Good enough

In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell writes about the difference between convergence and divergence tests for measuring individual success. According to Gladwell, intelligence matters but only to a point – in terms of future success it doesn't really matter if my IQ score is 125 or 135 – at some point it simply becomes ‘good enough’. 

 

"If intelligence matters only up to a point, then past that point, other things – things that have nothing to do with intelligence – must start to matter more." [Outliers, p. 86]

 

‘The other thing’ is creativity. And so far the best possible measure for creativity are divergence tests which measure the ability to produce new ideas by seeing new associations between existing and seemingly unconnected concepts. Some innovators in the field of market research, such as John Kearon, are already using divergence techniques to identify creative consumers who are then invited into a process of co-creation.

 

This ability to uncover associations and connection is close to a definition of creativity. And it is a desperately needed ability in market research if it wants to play serious role in delivering innovation: in term of product and communication for its client and also in terms of new research techniques and tools. 

 

Convergence is useful up to a point but its importance in research is clearly overrated. Insight, new ideas and innovations are delivered through divergence: through interdisciplinary approaches that illuminate a variety of possibilities and solutions. 

(written for the September issue of the Research World)

Unilever goes crowdsourcing

via www.guardian.co.uk

"We believe Peperami is a brand that deserves radical creative solutions and are confident taking our brief out to thousands rather than a small team of creatives will provide us with the best possible idea and take our advertising to the next level," said the Peperami marketing manager, Noam Buchalter (from an article in the Guardian).

I think that Noam is right. I used to think that the crowd can only give you a direction for creative development but, after a first-hand experience with crowdsourcing, I believe that the creative could come from the crowd, given that the crowd is big and diverse enough.

Does it mean that the world has become our creative department and the big ad agencies can be closed down? I think it does, except for the planning department, that should stay open - the planners will connect the crowd with the brand.

How tarots help in marketing

Tarot cards have a long history of mysticism and prophecies. First of all lets look at tarot cards what they are. For the marketing sake we're fine with the basic card deck of 22. I am aware that I will talk about tarots in a rather simpler way - so all tarot experts have to excuse this as this is an extremely brief introduction of an alternative approach.

Tarot cards maybe understood as a somehow typical lifecycle from the very beginning (the card  of Fool) to the very end - the absolute enlightment and wisdom (the card of World). This lifecycle covers both good and bad things in life and holisticaly is dual and incorporates in different cards various life crossroads.

In simplicity the cards point to situations in life which if handeled, you are pushed into a different  stage, you observe your lifecycle on a different card. The rich symbolism and colours create the entire setting and it may serve as an inspiration to draw parallels,to get inspired on how to solve situations or simply get new ideas to think about. There isn't a good or bad card, there are cards and all of them are dual in there essence - that gives you the power to interpret.

Marketing is absolutely the same, your campaign, your brand copies a certain lifecycle and we need to understand it. We need to get inspired and see the symbols connecting back to our target groups.

Why not use tarot cards if they have proven symbolic value and a tie-back to people and it follows narrativity. Yes tarot cards can even help you build up an archetypal story - the narrativity - so much needed to connect with consumers. Not to just give them the flashy "5% off next month", but to establish an emotive connection with your ad, campaign or brand.

I find a small, but a useful helper in tarots. I use them dominantly for inspiration, but sometimes
when I want to build up a story I mess around with the deck and just visualize in a different angles the story - where it's going and what it's doing. Sometimes I try to look at the various roles in the campaign - or what have you - through this tarot prism. Some times it's a waste, but sometimes I come up with interesting stuff. Well maybe if you're right now in an inspirational blind spot, this might help you.

Boredom at the Long Tail

In this scene from Tootsie (the first minute of it) Dustin Hoffman makes a mistake - he believes that people (women in this case) really want what they ask for:

The Long Tail allows us to ask for what we think we really want - my iPod is full of stuff that (I think) really interests me - the podcasts and the music. What is missing in my iPod is a surprise. A bit of a different tune coming from nowhere, a bit of pure otherness, oddness, difference and randomness needed for inspiration. In terms of music, last.fm seems to be the half-way answer: it can surprise with a song that you haven't heard...but it cannot really, really surprise since it is still taking you on a guided tour within the confines of your taste (culture?, class?).

The current big thing in marketing seems to be targetting people with messages that they have asked for (gave permission to receive) - because of their interest, hobbies etc. Sounds good but I feel that there is some inherent paradox in this - advertising needs to surprise, needs to be unexpected and often needs to annoy in order to provoke a reaction. If you give me just what I want, I might not spill a champaign in your face but I will definitely get bored and start to ignore you.

Carousel of nostalgia

The famouse scene from Mad Men - click here. 

The self-pitying poetry of an Adman:

Nostalgia

It’s delicate, but potent…
Teddy told me that in Greek, nostalgia literally means the pain from an old wound.
It’s a twinge in your heart, far more powerful than memory alone.
This device… isn’t a spaceship, it’s a time machine.
It goes backwards, forwards.
It takes us to a place where we ache to go again.
It’s not called the Wheel.
It’s called the Carousel.
It lets us travel the way a child travels.
Around and around and back home again, to a place where we know we are loved.
"Mad Men" Season 1, Episode 13, "The Wheel"

The sweet, decaying taste of nostalgia like 2 days old sacher cake behind a glass in Vienna. In the 18th century nostalgia was classified as a disease.  Today it is only a slightly sickening, paralysing desire to go back to the (not only Persil) soft mum and possibly to the hard, right-winged dad who will clean this place from immigrants who steal our jobs.  

The death of an idea

 

Lenin, Stalin and Brezhnev are taking a trip by train. Suddenly, the train stops in the middle of nowhere. The three leaders start debating what to do in order to get moving. “Lets explain to the engine-driver that it is in the interest of the proletariat to immediately fix the problem!” says Lenin. “Lets shoot the son of a bitch!” shouts Stalin. “No,” says Brezhnev, “lets just hop up and down on our seats and pretend that the train is still running.”

 This is one of the old jokes that delighted Eastern Europeans during the time of communism. The main point of the joke is that in the 1970’s and 1980’ the virus of communism was dead.  On the surface, there was still a ideological war going on; it seemed that the Marxist-Leninist meme was full of life, threatening to flow over the Berlin war and compete with the ideology of capitalism – but the folk wisdom knew better: communism was dead and we were hopping up and down, pretending that it was still alive.

 Interestingly, if you had sneaked across the iron curtain at the time and conducted a tracking study with the Eastern Europeans, exploring the image of the communist party you would have probably learned that the communist meme was sound and well – scoring high on attributes such as dynamic, vital or innovative. You would have learned this because people would have lied to the interviewers – protecting themselves from troubles, splitting their personas into a public and a private one.

 The meme of communism seems dead today. The victor is the ideology of capitalism and its great insignias – the global brands. The global brands that have laddered up far, far up from functional benefits to the heights of human truths. The brands that have, from their heights, pointed a way for their consumers – to success, happiness…and greed and neuroses.

 The Western (and Eastern) European consumers are still dutifully answering in tracking studies, assigning attributes such as “dynamic” or “fun” to global brands of lemonades. They don’t lie but they answer mechanically – most of the tracking studies are designed to support such mechanical attribution of statements to brands. Idealogical memes are like stars: we see their reflections long time after they are cold and dead. 

 The “brand ideals” and ideology, full of optimism and endless possibilities begin to really contrast with the real lives of their consumers who are worried about their jobs and the roofs over their heads.

 What smart brands might want to do now is to join their consumers on the way down the snakes - from the heights of Maslow pyramid and an obsession with self-expression, to the basics and back to home. And, as many observers have pointed out already, it might be a healthy home coming that will let people rediscover forgotten values of togetherness and simple pleasures. Brands could help down there by adding real  value and by being humble, helpful, incremental and entertaining without preaching. Lego is a great example of this, its sales are up double digits in the UK- as if consumers have suddenly remembered an old friend - real, solid, simple and also genuine and creative. I think that brands can also learn from the retail giants that have tried (mainly succesfully) to hide their real size behind humble facade: Tesco's  "little help" is a great promise in a time of recession. An then there are the entertainers, the "Fred Astairs" of this depression which are warming us up without preaching - the "Dancing Eyebrows" created by Fallon for Cadbury is a shining example of this trend. 

  It will be tough home coming for some other brands - the larger than life balloons of hot air with missions aimed at changing the world. Brands are ideas and ideas (and ideology in the sense of a system of representation) die when the gap between them and reality become too wide, too wide for even the dummiest consumer, brand manager or a party member to believe in them.

(written for the April issue of the Research World, Esomar)

 

The Other Half of The Equation: with Virginia Valentine

Perfect Crowd is extremely pleased to welcome Virginia Valentine to Prague! Virginia Valentine pioneered the use of semiotics in UK market research. She is a fellow of the Market Research Society a multi-award winner and speaker at conferences worldwide. Virginia will lead us through a one day workshop on semiotics (19th of March 2009) more here

Third pill

Slavoj Zizek : Lacanian-Marxist, philosopher, "Elvis of cultural theory" and the greatest contemporary Eastern-European thinker:

 

In the Matrix, Morpheus gives Neo choice between red pill that would reveal the truth of the “Matrix” and a blue pill that would let him go back to the illusion. Zizek comes in at this point and expresses the need for a third pill. “What is the third pill? Definitely not some kind of transcendental pill which enables a fake fast-food religious experience, but a pill that would enable me to perceive not the reality behind the illusion but the reality in illusion itself.”

The influence of illusion - fiction, movies, advertising, brands - over our daily lives is much stronger than the influence of the non-symbolic (and inaccesible) reality.  Illusion - and movies most of all - says Zizek, is what teaches us how to desire...Clearly, the task of (marketing) research is to tackle directly the reality of illusion rather than trying to get to it through interrogation of consumers. We need the third pill. 

American Dream on the (Semiotic) Couch

The work of  Greg Rowland has been a great inpiration for me and for many people in Unilever. Here is Greg's analysis of the "American dream":

American Dream Election 2

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own.

The Innovation Trap

I have written the "Innovation trap" as an article for the October issue of the  Research World .  I received a number of  emails from people (agency and client side) who read it and who are also tired by the frentic (and usually pointless) search for new research methodologies.  "However", asks one of the emails, "where is the money in pure "consumer understanding?"  Great question. I am thinking about it, discussing it with people around me.  What do you think?  

Meanwhile, here is the article:

Researchers need to focus on understanding people instead of constantly inventing ‘new’ methodologies.

 I have spent the last ten years on the client side, where innovation and growth go hand-in-hand. Unilever or any other manufacturer innovates in order to grow its brand’s share, turnover and profit. The research industry has learned from its clients and has adopted this model: it measures its growth in value terms and  attributes a large portion of its growth to innovation of market research techniques.

 If innovation is at the heart of the research business, we should all frantically search for new ways of doing research. It is a seductive proposition for any creative researcher. However, I believe that the search for research innovations is a dangerous trap into which most of us have fallen.

 Market research is about understanding people and why they do what they do. Unfortunately, typical innovations in research obscure this understanding because they generate growth through developing research tools that can be sold quickly and in great volume. Again, it is exactly what the manufacturer does when selling its innovations.

 For instance, we might develop a new toothbrush designed for brushing the tongue. We know that the consumer might not have a genuine need for tongue brushing but we are smart enough to create the need. Rather than selling a product we are selling a myth.

 The great myth

What is the myth that market research sells to its consumers – the research buyers? The key myth is that of certainty and control over a world that is completely chaotic and unpredictable. Fear of the chaos out there has forced us – on the client side – into a make-believe world of benchmarks, persuasion scores and scales designed to measure emotions (the latest hype). We have subjected consumers to our reality of tongue-brushing while we are ourselves subjected to the reality of the major research agencies.

 A few years ago, the market research function on the client side tried to break free from the prison of benchmarks and scales. It re-branded itself and market researchers became insight managers. We promised to gather insight, transmit knowledge and educate our clients. If we had succeeded in this transformation, there would be less market research and more educated clients acting on gut feelings. The growth of the research industry would have halted as a result.

 Instead, the industry is thriving and its growth signifies our failure on the client side to listen to our intuition, take risks and come up with truly disruptive product innovation that would genuinely surprise and delight consumers.

 True research is about understanding people. And genuine understanding of people comes from years of learning, experience and true intuition. It comes down to talented individuals who are semioticians, ethnographers, and great qualitative researchers. These are the people whose insights add tremendous value to the business and who are able to energise and guide clients.

 I have a lot of respect for people who have established small agencies to fight the big players. The problem is that they soon adopt the structures of the large agencies and start their own frantic search for fast-moving research products. This seems to be the only way for a research agency to grow in size: they create the need for a new, high-tech, silver-methodology that will deliver pre-packaged ideas for innovations to clients' desktops.

 It used to be hard to challenge the agency system as agencies owned the necessary technical tools. Then came the internet revolution and today the tools that researchers need are either already out there or are being developed – not by research agencies but by the likes of Google, Facebook or Twitter.

 Because of this, there is no need for new innovative research methodologies. The true job to be done consists of unlearning, of throwing the obsolete research tool sets away. Instead of building new methodologies, we should build networks of creative people who can work together and truly help us to understand the world’s people and cultures.