Meredith’s Silver Bullet: Leading with Market Knowledge and Innovation. Women are Talking. We are Listening.By Britta C. Ware, Meredith Corporation and Manila S. Austin, Ph.D., Communispace CorporationBackground

At the January 2009 ARF Industry Leader Forum, Kim Dedeker challenged our industry to bring back the human element in market research. She argued that listening—genuinely hearing and heeding consumer voices—is no longer a core competency and that we have come to over-rely on metrics, measurement, and evaluation. This approach is hurting market research in a number of ways. Our focus on measuring diverts our understanding away from the human experience that underlies our statistics; and as a result we are not getting the kinds of insights needed to produce actionable results, bottom or top line. In today’s world, staying relevant is the key to competitive advantage. Yet, one-sided efforts to reach consumers—direct mail, telephone calls, email spam—turn off rather than engage people. Moreover, consumer skepticism (coupled with the power to screen or block unwanted messages) has prompted people to reject our attempts. This rejection is evident in the falling participation rates that have frustrated market research for years.

Searching for Consumer Insight in Online Social MediaBy Julie Wittes Schlack and Michael JenningsAs the social networking phenomenon grows exponentially in terms of usage, variety, and publicity, marketers are scrambling to understand how to make the best possible use of it.  While targeted online advertising is one obvious application, more companies are becoming interested in gaining insight, or a deep understanding of their customers, by engaging in conversations with them online. In this recent research, we conducted a study that compared three online strategies for obtaining consumer insight. 

Meeting Business Needs by Meeting Social Needs in Small Communities: Why Size MattersBy Julie Wittes Schlack, Michael Jennings and Manila Austin

This paper draws on the social science literature to present hypotheses about why smaller online communities fulfill individuals’ range of social needs, and in doing so, are more effective than large communities for gaining breakthrough customer insights and building long term relationships with customers.