A marketing insight is an understanding of the change that can make a difference. Insights come from seeing a marketplace and recognizing a problem that frustrates, challenges, or is inconvenient. Data alone helps, but insight comes through observation, empathy, and creativity. Meaningful insights comes from having imagination and not being limited by how other’s see the world.
Marketing Insights
- What would happen if I could use my phone to get food delivered from a local restaurant?
- How would life be simpler if instead of a taxi that requires cash, I could have an account set up, and by clicking a button, a car picks me up and takes me to my destination?
- Imagine if instead of buying physical albums or music CDs spending thousands of dollars, I could listen to any music, any time, anywhere I am through a streaming service.
How to Uncover Marketing Insights
When I work on a project, I find that stakeholder interviews with customers (or clients) helps me hear their struggles, challenges, and frustrations. It might not be what they say but how they say it. Being a keen listener allows me to follow up with questions to get an elaboration on a topic.
Three techniques
- Ask people who are in the category, what frustrates them? Keep asking questions until the customer reveals something causing pain, frustration, or annoyance in their experience. Don’t try to solve the problem, understand what annoys and frustrates them.
- Understand how the brain works. Once you study neuroscience and learn more about buying behavior, you realize how irrational purchases can be. Seek insights about behavior and learn about the science of motivation. Read behavioral scientists work like Dan Ariely or Douglas Van Praet.
- Imagine how some well-known company would get into a different industry. What would Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream Company do to get into the wine business? How would Disney enter into the bedding category? What approach would Tom’s Shoes take to get into the cereal business?
Where is the best place to look for marketing insights? Watch, observe, listen, and learn from the people you want to serve. Ask them open ended questions and then be quiet. Listen carefully to what they say, how they say it and use your empathic superpowers to feel their pain.
Imagining things differently starts by being a compassionate listener.
You can set up a time to chat with me about your marketing challenges using my calendar. Email me jeffslater@themarketingsage.com Call me. 919 720 0995. Visit my website at www.themarketingsage.com The conversation is free, and we can explore working together.
Photo by Jeremy Beck on Unsplash
