In the world of market research, however, good change can be hard to come by. How do we know which new methodologies are going to stick around and which innovations will instead share the fate of the Segway and Honegar?

In a perfect world, every new methodology would be faster, cheaper, and better at providing deep and relevant insight. In the real world, methodology innovation is more likely to succeed when:

• It is done purposefully, with a business need in mind. Teams can innovate selectively by identifying questions that cannot be answered with traditional methods, or by finding gaps in existing knowledge.
• There are structures and processes in place to support and encourage innovation.

Unilever was able to reduce new products’ time to market by 20% with their Standards-Based Methodology Innovation Cycle. A detailed set of best practices provides a benchmark against which new information sources can be evaluated, and helps to create clear innovation priorities. Ideas are solicited from a select group of suppliers and screened through a resource-efficient evaluation process.

Unilever created a great support structure around smart methodology innovation by tying change to business needs. Stay tuned to hear more ways new and better methodologies can be successfully integrated into your active portfolio, and in the mean time, check out our latest observations on methodology innovation.

Related resources:

• Unilever’s Standards-Based Methodology Innovation Cycle
• Illuminating the Unconscious: Using Neuroscience Techniques to Gain Deeper Insight
• Applying Neuroscience to Business Decisions

Much of the recent buzz around neuroscience in market research has centered on expensive brain scans, but if your research budget isn’t quite on par with that of a large university lab, there’s no need to be discouraged. Research functions with fewer resources can still harness the power of neuroscience in more budget-friendly ways. Here are some “neuro-lite” options that utilize what we know about how the brain works in order to access consumers’ subconscious reactions:

• The Implicit Association Test (IAT) relies on the theory that people can make quicker connections between concepts that are already closely tied in their minds.
•  The Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET®) is built on the idea that the metaphors that people frequently use in conversation can reveal hidden meaning.
•  The Facial Action Coding System (FACS) classifies 46 distinct facial movements to identify consumers’ true emotions. FACS also aids trained observers in catching “microexpressions” that are difficult to fake or conceal and flash across the face only momentarily.

Read about other low-tech neuroscience options, as well as how and when to use them, in the Market Research Executive Board’s new white paper: Using Neuroscience Techniques to Gain Deeper Insight.

Neuroscience has a definite cool factor – but aside from pretty pictures of your brain on ads, is there real value in it for Research teams? Our answer is a qualified yes.

1. Neuroscience techniques can rarely be used alone. Neuro can provide unique and valuable insight when used to supplement existing research, but it is not yet poised to replace any traditional methodologies.
2. Research teams can get more value if they push past tactical use and explore the more strategic applications of neuroscience. Think outside the box of creative testing and use neuroscience in areas with high potential for new learning.
3. Teams should be judicious in their use of neuroscience. Important questions to ask are:
   1. How important is it for me to access my customers’ emotions?
   2. How important is this decision to my business goals?
   3. How confident am I in knowing how my customers really feel?
4. Take advantage of lower-tech neuro methods which tap into unfiltered reactions without actually measuring brain activity. In addition to being much less costly, these techniques can also give more contextual information.

For more information on incorporating neuroscience techniques into your research, read our new whitepaper: Using Neuroscience Techniques to Gain Deeper Insight

These videos are only intended to be humorous – stereotypes and sweeping generalizations are embraced and political correctness and cultural sensitivities are deliberately thrown aside. But in addition to provoking a knowing laugh (or righteous indignation), these videos also made me think about creative ways to collect, manage, and present knowledge about customers.

For Research to have the greatest impact on customer-related decisions, teams need to use effective communication strategies to engage their business partners. If your research team were to make a video titled “Stuff Our Customers Say,” what would it sound like? Would you need to adjust the way you think about segmentation? Not many of these Research videos would ever achieve YouTube fame, but our most progressive members are thinking differently about how to make existing information accessible to researchers and palatable to business partners.

Here’s an example of how Deloitte used video to highlight the many voices of its consumers. (Golf? Golf!)

MREB Members, read about how Heinz uses video to create an appetite for customer learning.

*This is a family friendly blog — the actual video titles all replace the word “stuff” with a more colorful 4 letter word beginning with S.

With the importance of good tools (and the importance of good insight) in mind, the Market Research Executive Board has compiled some of our best insight generation exercises, worksheets, and practice guides into one easy-to-use toolkit. (The best part? Our tools carry little to no risk of back injury!)

Insight generation is one of the most important and most difficult tasks of any market research function.  MREB research has shown that a shift to make quality insight generation a priority is associated with a 70% increase in business impact. These 15 hands-on tools are designed to support you and your team in scoping and focusing your efforts, thinking creatively, and framing your insights in an actionable and impactful way. MREB members, access the toolkit here.

You need to teach them to imagine knowledge that doesn’t yet exist and to focus on these unknowns in the research-scoping process. In other words, encourage your business partners to start thinking about IWIKs. What is an IWIK? No, it’s not a misspelling of one of George Lucas’ furry creations. It stands for “I Wish I Knew,” and it’s a great way of making sure you’re asking the right research questions.  

Because better data and better synthesis are often inadequate for producing differentiated insights, line partners must focus their questions on key drivers of consumer behavior so that we as researchers can collect the right information capable of propelling significant business impact.

MREB Members, read about how Eli Lilly successfully used the IWIK process to educate their line and ensure that key unknowns were translated into questions with high potential for differentiation.