Is your organization hungry for strategic intent?
We are living and working in an environment that is full of volatility and change. Many organizations are hungry for strategic intent, a term used to describe the intended direction, purpose, and plans that leaders put in place to achieve their organization’s vision.
SIVO Insights helps organizations set their strategic intent, by leading and facilitating the strategic planning process. This strategic planning process can be summarized into three steps. Leaders must:
1. Assess,
2. Align
3. Articulate
STEP 1: ASSESS
Leaders must gather and assess relevant trends, consumer insights, market intelligence and institutional knowledge to answer critical questions across the 5C’s Assessment Framework.
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STEP 2: ALIGN
With this knowledge in hand, leaders participate in a facilitated strategic planning session to review their assessment of the 5C’s, to ideate, prioritize and most importantly, to align on the mission, vision, and values that will carry the organization into the future.
STEP 3: ARTICULATE
Lastly, leaders need to articulate their strategic intent—the vision, mission and values as well as the plan—to employees, collaborators, stakeholders, and in some cases to consumers and customers. This communication needs to happen repeatedly, in multiple forums, in-person or virtually, in internal documentation, as well as, in external communication. Strategic Intent can’t be communicated enough to ensure it is internalized by all parties.
In this time of continuous change, with a refreshed grounding in foundational insights and market intelligence, combined with solid strategic planning (i.e., Assess, Align and Articulate), you can give your organization and your stakeholders what they are hungering for . . . strong strategic intent. Let SIVO help with strategic intent consulting!
Schedule a discovery with SIVO to learn how you and your leadership team can create or re-establish your organization’s strategic intent.
by Julie Rose
Did somebody say recession? Unfortunately, recessions are a normal part of the business cycle. There are periods of economic growth and periods of economic slowdown. During a recession, the economy slows, companies struggle with sales, people lose their jobs, and the stock market suffers. The point where the economy officially falls into a recession depends on multiple factors, but many experts indicate that two consecutive quarters of decline in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is a sign of recession. The recession in 2020 occurred when the pandemic impacted our economy. The Great Recession in 2008 was caused by the collapse of the housing market. We are seeing signs for the next recession too, with some experts predicting late 2022 or early 2023. According to the Washington Post, the economy contracted in the first three months of 2022, by shrinking at a 1.4 percent pace.
Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/05/19/recession-economy-markets/
One common result of recession is that unemployment rises. Companies sometimes employ “hiring freezes” to maintain profits, while they wait for the economy to stabilize. This puts stress on the rest of the workforce so companies must look for ways to protect their current employees from burnout while also ensuring the most critical work gets done.
It’s common for businesses today to look for creative ways to expand their bandwidth to continue to achieve short and long-term goals. For companies that don’t want to make the long-term commitment of hiring full-time employees or are trying to conserve budgets, hiring temporary or “on demand” professionals is a low-risk, cost-effective option.
Recession-Proof Insights Talent from SIVO On Demand Talent
SIVO On Demand Talent can help with skilled Consumer Insight and Market Research Professionals that ease your team’s workload and help you achieve your business goals while also relieving you of the financial risk that is common during a recession.
We offer flexible solutions, like short or long-term assignments for fill-in roles or finite projects. Additionally, we can serve as an extension of your internal Consumer Insights Team, what we like to call your “back-pocket” consultants. For some clients, our talent serves as the virtual CI team, supporting initiatives in a cost-effective way while also ensuring high quality insights.
SIVO On Demand Talent offers far more flexibility than full-time employee expansion. Plus, you don’t have to spend your valuable time searching for, hiring, and training talent. We take care of it all for you, freeing you from the burden of a lengthy process.
Let SIVO help you manage through the ‘hiring freeze” by temporarily meeting your Insights, Analytics or Market Research talent needs.
Reach out to ondemandtalent@sivoinsights.com for a consultation.
We can all probably agree that we are living through one of the most disruptive events of our generation. With our worlds turned upside down, it comes as no surprise that the way people work in America has also vastly changed.
Just as news stories cropped up about 2021 being the year of the Great Resignation, other stories followed asking the question ‘where have all the workers gone?’ I’ve pondered this question as well, seeing the ‘short staffed’ signs everywhere I go and hearing from countless businesses about their struggle to retain talent.
The answer to what is causing the Great Resignation might lie in the reframing of the phenomenon. A smart colleague of mine, Vina Klein, astutely calls it the “Great Values Reset.” I really like that. It gives more insight to what is happening. People seem more attuned to their values when choosing how to live and how to work. At the start of the pandemic, we were sent home and we slowed down, we took stock, and we re-evaluated our lives. That experience impacted our choices in 2021 and beyond.
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Now enter the gig economy. The gig economy has always been around, but something interesting happened as a result of Covid-19. Gig workers represented around 35 percent of the U.S. workforce in 2020, up from between 14 and 20 percent in 2014. The number of companies that fully operate on gig work has increased by 85% since 2014. That growth has only accelerated as a result of Covid-19. As workers reset values and put more focus on having some control over their lives, employees are leaving the confines of a 9-5 and corporate bureaucracy. The gig economy is where they land, and SIVO Insights has the perfect launchpad for these workers.
I’m very fortunate to lead SIVO Insights On-Demand Talent. I’m passionate about helping my consumer insights consultants find fulfilling roles that match their skills and talent. I’m also very much “in the zone” when I’m able to help our clients fill a specific need on their team or find the right talent for a project. Matching our clients’ needs with SIVO’s On-Demand Talent experience and skills is the best part of my job.
SIVO Insights On-Demand Talent allows people to choose how they want to work. It provides the flexibility and work-life balance that comes with the gig economy. For companies, On Demand Talent delivers flexibility, too. Whether an organization is struggling to find and retain talent or is not in a position to commit to a full-time hire, tapping into SIVO On Demand Talent is a win-win!
By Natasha Weith
"The great end of knowledge is not knowledge, but action."
- Thomas Henry Huxley
This sentiment resonates deeply in the market research world, where the true value of consumer insights is not in their discovery but in putting them into practice. In fact, one of the defining characteristics of a consumer insight is that it “can be applied to the business in a way that drives growth.”
Too often, valuable market research findings remain confined to lengthy, boring research reports that end up sitting in a file cabinet, collecting dust, and failing to inspire meaningful business actions. At SIVO, we have been thinking a lot about how we and our client teams can make insights land in organizations, inspiring stakeholders to engage in our market research findings and seize the opportunities that we have uncovered. We came up with five strategies to do this.
Here’s how to get insights to land in your organization:
Involving key stakeholders throughout the research journey fosters a sense of ownership and ensures that the insights resonate with colleagues who will act on the insights. Conducting insights activation workshops allows teams to interactively explore findings, brainstorm applications and prioritize the action steps. We also believe “persona immersion sessions” help clients experience the perspectives of their consumers, building empathy and deepening their understanding and commitment to business actions that will serve their consumers.
In addition to engaging the team, securing support from leadership and identifying internal advocates is a great way to influence business outcomes with insights. Sometimes teams employ the “meeting before the meeting” with key leaders to create space for them to think through the implications and ensure linkage between the research findings and organizational priorities. With leadership already on board, the cross-functional teams can feel empowered to act on the findings.
Of course, transforming data into compelling narratives makes insights more relatable and memorable. Employing storytelling frameworks, such as the hero’s journey, can illustrate the consumer's struggle, highlight opportunities, and propose solutions. Utilizing metaphors, analogies, or visual aids like infographics, consumer video reels and photos, further enhances the stickiness of the research findings, ensuring they resonate with audiences. Modifying the report for different audiences can also help, for example, R&D may want a “data-heavy” version while the leadership team will likely want a 3 to 5 slide summary.
To constantly remind teams that their primary role is to serve the consumer and make informed decisions on their behalf, CI teams can proactively “surround” teams with insights. For instance, you can develop and distribute "insight of the week" micro-learning moments through platforms like Slack or MS Teams, to keep teams regularly informed. Additionally, developing consumer reality-check posters for both physical and virtual office spaces can serve as constant visual reminders of the consumer's perspective. Incorporating gamification elements, such as quizzes and contests into standing meetings can further reinforce learning by engaging teams in a dynamic and interactive manner.
These days, CI teams can leverage AI to help with stakeholder engagement in research data and findings. For example, AI-powered dashboards are increasingly available for real-time tracking and scenario planning. Additionally, giving stakeholders access to AI chat tools that query both proprietary research data and public data sources help deliver answers to in-the-moment consumer questions and can increase engagement.
By implementing these five strategies, Insights professionals can bridge the gap between just delivering data and driving organizational change, ensuring that the insights we identify serve as a catalyst for informed decision-making and business growth.
Let’s keep pushing to effectively impact your business together!
SIVO, Inc. is a market research and strategy firm specializing in helping businesses understand people. We partner with world-class brands to answer key questions and identify opportunities that unlock business growth. Our team of insights market research professionals are masters at designing custom research plans, executing with excellence, identifying strategic insights and then helping client teams translate those insights into action. Our On Demand Talent solution places fractional insights experts into client companies to temporarily fill open roles, complete projects or expand team capabilities.
Contact us at Contact@SIVOInsights.com or visit SIVOInsights.com to schedule a Research or On Demand Talent discovery call so we can help you make an impact!
by Jennifer Dilley
What is a consumer insight? How do you know when you have found one? What does it look like?
These are questions that every marketer or consumer insights professional gets asked at some point. And while it might be useful to rattle off a definition in an elevator conversation, it is more important to internalize the definition so that when you are conducting consumer research you have a clear understanding of what you are looking for.
Definition of a Consumer Insight
So, what are we looking for? A consumer insight is an underlying motivation or need that explains why a consumer makes a certain decision or behaves in a certain way. But that is not all. When the underlying motivation is uncovered, it is only a consumer insight if it can be applied to a brand in an ownable way to unlock brand growth.
A consumer insight identifies consumers’ beliefs and values that drive their behavior. It provides a deeper understanding of why consumers purchase certain products and dismiss others.
Consumer Insights vs Facts
Be careful to distinguish an insight from a fact. There is a difference. A consumer fact is just a statement about a consumer behavior or the marketplace. Here are examples of facts:
These facts are interesting and might be relevant to a brand, but they don’t explain why people behave the way they do.
Consumer Insights Highlight Pain Points and Opportunities
Consumer Insights shed light on pain points for consumers and uncover potential opportunities for brands. As an example, an insight from the findings above could be articulated as, “People want a luxury car to signal their lifestyle and financial success.” This is an insight because it taps into consumers’ underlying motivation (often more emotional that functional) and a pain point, resulting in an opportunity.
Consumer Insights Must be Ownable
A consumer insight is only valuable if it is relevant and can be applied back to a brand in an ownable way. If competitive brands are already addressing a specific consumer need and motivation, then the insight is true but not necessarily ownable for a brand. A good insight will inspire ideas and communications that allow the brand team to communicate brand benefits in a unique way.
Note that an insight might link to a category benefit, but it can still be ownable by a brand, if it has not been adopted by the competition.
Consumer Insights Unlock Growth
The job of a consumer insight is to highlight the possibility for an emotional connection between a product/service and the consumer. It provides brand teams with the context that explains how the product can be relevant in consumers lives. Understanding the emotional connection between consumers motivations/needs and the brand benefits can fuel creative marketing ideas that will capture the attention and convert consumers along the marketing purchase funnel.
Consumer Insights May Not be Overtly Articulated by Consumers
Note that consumer insights are deeper motivations that are quite often subconscious. In fact, a good consumer insight is often described as an “Aha moment.” Good insights tend to be simple human truths that we don’t discuss, but are still there, right under our noses. Because of this, specialized consumer learning techniques are needed. Ethnography, in-context observation, consumer diaries, and projective techniques like mood boards and semiotics, are required to dig beneath the surface of what consumers say to uncover their actual motivations. This may also require us to look beyond consumers values and lifestyle to macro trends – demographic, economic, pop culture, health, and technology trends that are also influencing consumer behavior.
Tying back to the luxury car example, consumer perceptions are also influenced by economic and geo-political fluctuations such as, inflation, higher gas prices, climate change and the transition to electric vehicles. This can subconsciously change consumer beliefs and behaviors, leading to new consumer insights.
Consumer Insights Summary
The best consumer insights:
✔ Explain WHY? By identifying and articulating an underlying motivation, need or belief that is driving consumer behavior
✔ Address a pain point or point of tension
✔ Are ownable when applied to a brand/product/service
✔ Unlock opportunities, inspiring creative marketing ideas that fuel business growth
To discuss consumer insights with experts from SIVO, please reach out to our team at Contact@SIVOInsights.com
SIVO Insights brings together research, talent, and intelligent technology to help organizations navigate complexity with confidence. Have a business challenge? Let's talk!
We bring together research, talent, and intelligent technology to help organizations navigate complexity with confidence
