Marketing market research and agility: Your Marketing Week
At the end of every week, I look at the key stories, offering my view on what they mean for you and the industry. From the need to market market research to the marketing strategy behind Yum! Brands, it’s been a busy week. Here’s my take.
Marketing market research
There are lots of words, phrases, platforms and theories ubiquitous now that were unknown or niche when I joined Marketing Week a little more than 10 years ago. Chief among them is the need for ‘customer centricity’ and to ‘put the customer at the heart of everything you do’. Both are noble pursuits. Both should be the modus operandi of every marketing organisation, B2B or B2C.
Yet, at the same time that the numbers preaching the need for customer insight has grown, the amount spent on the means to identify and satisfy the needs of customers – market research – has dropped steeply, according to an exclusive analysis of spend we published this week. Is this evidence of hot air and a failure of market orientation, or indication of new, more efficient but no less effective investment choices?
It is possible there is a cheaper, digital means to the same market research end, as explored in a separate article we published this week. From conversations I have had in recent months, however, it’s also true customer insight teams and the marketers they serve are not making a strong enough case for investment in the process of discovery or in the tried and trusted means of understanding the market and the opportunity.