6 Tips From – Insights Innovation Exchange (IIEX) Chicago 2016
Next week in Chicago I’ll be participating in two events: the IIEX Forums and IIEX IMD (Insights Marketing Day). I’ll cover IMD at the end of this post, but I wanted to first discuss the IIEX Forums.
The IIEX Forums Nov 14-15th are dedicated to the Nonconscious Consumer: How We Understand, Measure, & Drive Behavior. This is obviously a topic of enormous interest in marketing and research circles, as behavioral economics and other fields have provided new intelligence into how people make decisions and what really drives behavior.
The notion that people are not entirely conscious of the things that really motivate them—hence the “nonconscious consumer”—is something we’ve explored extensively here at OdinText. And we’ve seen time and again that what people say both explicitly and implicitly when they have the opportunity to provide feedback to open-ended questions tends to be far more predictive of actual behavior than responses to conventional quantitative survey questions.
I’ve been asked to chair the sessions on afternoon of the 15th and I’m delighted to have the opportunity moderate a Q&A with a very talented group of fellow researchers with expertise in nonconscious measurement.
In advance of the event I reached out to each of them and asked that they share one tip from their session. So, without further ado…
Unconscious Measurement: Six Tips
Tip #1: “Have a hunch about something? Curious about validity of a common wisdom or an urban legend? Test it out. It’s easier than you think and certainly easier than ever before to experiment and arrive to your own conclusions using research automation.”
Lev Mazin, CEO, AYTM
Tip #2: “Look beyond just @ mentions of your brand on social media for opportunities to engage consumers at the right time, right place. Consumers on social media are seeking engagement, affirmation, advice, and opportunities so if done properly, brands can win big if they can tap into the right moments on social.”
David Rush, CEO, Earshot
Tip #3: “We should always consider the role of consumers’ non-conscious motivations but we shouldn’t position these motivations as the silver bullet for all problems. Sometimes consumers’ are perfectly capable of telling us how they feel.
“The opposite of rational is not irrational! In fact, our gut reactions are often just as logical as our rational decisions because gut reactions are based on dozens—if not hundreds—of experiences and have proven themselves to be a helpful heuristic for navigating the world. I think it’s very dangerous for us to think of consumers as irrational decision makers when, in reality, they are simply following a systematic process that just happens to be outside of their conscious awareness.”
Charles Swann, Vice President, LRW (Lieberman Research Worldwide)
Tip #4: “Beware of researchers who can’t explain ‘priming’ or are not hyper-vigilant about it in their work.”
Daryl Travis, CEO, Brandtrust
Tip #5: “Gamification is most often seen as a tool for teachers and trainers, and improving the learning process. The principles are much more fundamental, however; gamification influences decisions and behaviors through the use of incentives and structured rules. It’s a great methodology for nudging consumer behavior.”
Jason Anderson, President, Datagame
Tip #6: “as we advance and apply the science of non-conscious motivation, be mindful of the business case.” [I’ve observed insights professionals using neuroscience for copy testing and various methods for creative development. Which is all good!!! Emotion–or non-conscious motivators–is also a largely undercapitalized business asset. This is a big opportunity for insights professionals to lead that charge]
Alan Sorfas, Co-Founder, Chief Intelligence Officer, Motista
What’s IMD About?
We could all probably do a better job of marketing our research. And after the Forums, IIEX will also host Insights Marketing Day (IMD), also in Chicago (but at a different venue).
IMD is a fun, smaller event where marketing research clients and suppliers speak openly about marketing within our industry. This year again I’ve been asked to participate in the Marketing Strategies of Successful Research Agencies Panel.
The panel will be moderated by Lukas Pospichal, Managing Director of Greenbook, and will feature Anusha Sthanunathan of Fetch Rewards, Gillian Carter of Brandtrust, and Ross Mclean of Over the Shoulder.
It’s always fun to see how the suppliers answer some of the same questions the clients get, rather differently.
I’ll try to follow up with a blog post after the events.
If you’re going to attend either event, please say hi!
If not, I’m happy to connect to discuss measurement, subconscious or not, using text analytics!
@TomHCAnderson
Tom H.C. Anderson | @OdinText
To learn more about how OdinText can help you understand what really matters to your customers and predict actual behavior, please contact us or request a Free Demo here >
[NOTE: Tom H. C. Anderson is Founder of Next Generation Text Analytics software firm OdinText Inc. Click here for more Text Analytics Tips ]