Success stories from new research tools

[Joel Rubinson]

Can I ask you all to post success stories that you have? Where some new form of insights led to something you wouldn't have know otherwise and then to marketing programs?

[Robin Pearl]

Several years ago we hired a company (now part of Nielsen Buzzmetrics)to collect and summarize the messages that were being said about a few of our brands from various sites on the internet. Two brands were having some difficulties (I'll call it company A and B) and one was doing well (company C).

A: we bought this compnay: amazing that the consumer on-line complained about the exact three things the marketing dept. felt brand was struggling with-- the prices were highly critized, packaging was felt flimsy, and the consumer even talked about the brand's identity confusing. Following this, we conducted focus groups to dig into the issues more fully (with users and lapsed users) and the brand reacted to much of the feedback, then we went back in to hear what the customer was saying again. It was amazing how quickly the changes were being recognized and discussed. However, beucase there were a number of disconnects that were difficult to fix given the DNA of the brand, the brand was sold.

B: brand was once a leader but over the years lost some of its original spirit. When we contracted with this company to hear what consumers were saying,we discovered that they weren't saying much (extremely low level of conversation). I rmeember the brand managere saying to me that it was not worth the money to have paid based on how little conversation was posted. I told them that was the learning--that hardly anyone was talking about the brand! Since then we confirmed with a number of other studies that what we heard and the low level of buzz was in fact true.

C: this brand did receive a lot of positive buzz and it was correlating at the time with what we knew to be true. There were high levles of conversation, very positive, etc. But we did learn about one big issue with the website that the brand president insisted the on-line group fix immediately. Following that, we went back in to "hear" the conversations, and consumers were talking about it in a positive way.

[Joel Rubinson]

great example of the sensitivity of social media to marketing nuances.
Joel

Robin Pearl said:

Several years ago we hired a company (now part of Nielsen Buzzmetrics)to collect and summarize the messages that were being said about a few of our brands from various sites on the internet. Two brands were having some difficulties (I'll call it company A and B) and one was doing well (company C).

A: we bought this compnay: amazing that the consumer on-line complained about the exact three things the marketing dept. felt brand was struggling with-- the prices were highly critized, packaging was felt flimsy, and the consumer even talked about the brand's identity confusing. Following this, we conducted focus groups to dig into the issues more fully (with users and lapsed users) and the brand reacted to much of the feedback, then we went back in to hear what the customer was saying again. It was amazing how quickly the changes were being recognized and discussed. However, beucase there were a number of disconnects that were difficult to fix given the DNA of the brand, the brand was sold.

B: brand was once a leader but over the years lost some of its original spirit. When we contracted with this company to hear what consumers were saying,we discovered that they weren't saying much (extremely low level of conversation). I rmeember the brand managere saying to me that it was not worth the money to have paid based on how little conversation was posted. I told them that was the learning--that hardly anyone was talking about the brand! Since then we confirmed with a number of other studies that what we heard and the low level of buzz was in fact true.

C: this brand did receive a lot of positive buzz and it was correlating at the time with what we knew to be true. There were high levles of conversation, very positive, etc. But we did learn about one big issue with the website that the brand president insisted the on-line group fix immediately. Following that, we went back in to "hear" the conversations, and consumers were talking about it in a positive way.

[Joel Rubinson]

On Monday, TNS will present a great case on flat screen TVs that you would not have learned without mining social media. Perhaps they will post more about this...Jeni? Jim?