Customer-Centric Intelligence Smarts

The last ten years in the New Zealand market research industry have seen a range of interesting developments occur. Some research companies have sold themselves to overseas interests, many more smaller ones have been established, and some big names have disappeared.

One of the more exciting developments has been research companies' increasing involvement in their clients' operations. Research Solutions, for example, has been closely involved in clients' strategic "away days", agency and creative reviews, agency briefings, HR management, bonus schemes, company conferences and internal training events. That more research companies are forging such relationships with their clients indicates a growing realisation that a good market research company will be far more than a provider of just consumer information, but instead, a provider of business consultancy services which are based upon skilled insights into the consumer base as well as a sound understanding of marketing.

But things aren't stopping there. The need for smart business management has led to the evolution of a entirely new branch of research-based consultancy, referred to by us as "Customer-Centric Intelligence".

Customer-Centric Intelligence means integrating a consumer-focused approach into all facets of a business's operations - recognising that it's not just about managing services, products and advertising to sell more stuff to consumer group X or Y. Customer-Centric Intelligence means collecting, analysing and implementing information and insights pertaining to the entire operation - not just consumer research and feedback, but also data regarding vendors, markets, internal processes and the wider business environment. It means that businesses can bridge the gap between the worlds of their customers and their business operations - through measuring and understanding all the customer touch-points as well as the processes which connect them. Often, for example, the biggest difficulties in achieving business potential will be internal, structural factors, missed by traditional research approaches. A Customer-Centric Intelligence approach, by comparison, tracks all key factors as a coherent whole, thus identifying what needs to be done, and where, and how, in order to achieve better business success.

To illustrate, Customer-Centric Intelligence research programmes overseas will typically be measuring and analysing such aspects as industry, competitor, customer and prospect profiles; marketing / advertising objectives, strategy, planning and implementation; brand identity and position; customer databases; sales planning and implementation practices; internal organisational fulfilment processes; opportunity assessments; and more - for each and every channel.

The focus on these direct and indirect customer touch-points yields three valuable advantages when compared to traditionally separate research and marketing activities. Firstly, the typical providers of Customer-Centric Intelligence are those who know how consumers think and act: the researchers. Secondly, the Customer-Centric Intelligence approach means that the marketing operations become more customer focussed as well as better integrated into the wider operations within the company.

The third and perhaps biggest advantage in implementing a Customer-Centric Intelligence programme is the ability for businesses to tap into some of the biggest consumer changes of the last few decades. In summary, these changes are:

1. the rapid, sometimes alienating transformation of social institutions such as the church, neighbourhood, or family; and of traditional social values such as faith in the government and media, personal safety and job security;
2. and an increased inability to keep pace with daily life, within which heightened time and financial pressures have been exacerbated by a massive increase in multi-media information overload.

The result is a tangible rise in consumers' conscious desire to feel more socially connected, recognised and validated, without necessarily doing a whole lot more in an already busy life (ideally, less). This desire is of course one which has been fed by advertisers for decades, but generally at a basic level of "problem-solving" - the presentation of a product or service as a means to do or be something or someone better / easier / cheaper / sexier etc.

By contrast the Customer-Centric Intelligence approach is able to assess both a company's offering as well as consumer's desires and values, in regards to every one of the six crucial factors of access, experience, price, product, values and service. If a company uses Customer-Centric Intelligence soundly, it will improve its performance in all of these key areas - and the more of these factors in which a company excels, the more it will become the company which consumers actively seek out and prefer to use. The key is to meet both consumers' practical and psychological needs, using such a holistic approach that companies with true Customer-Centric Intelligence not only do a better job in catering to their customers, but also do a better job through more cohesive and efficient internal management.

In closing, two things are abundantly clear from the Customer-Centric Intelligence debates my colleagues and I have engaged in both overseas as well as locally.  Firstly, Customer-Centric Intelligence requires buy-in at all levels of all involved parties - the greatest gains only being made with full cooperation. Secondly, it is not enough for the managers of Customer-Centric Intelligence to be researchers only - they have to have a deep collective understanding of marketing, DM, advertising creative, data warehousing, branding and more. Hence the best Customer-Centric Intelligence practitioners will typically be collectives of skilled individuals and organisations, centred around a research company which can ensure that the measurement processes remain sound, and that both the consumers and Customer-Centric Intelligence companies gain and profit from each other .

Customer-Centric Intelligence in the National Business Review

Jonathan Dodd