Creating Shopper Insights – New E-Book

Probably one of the most common questions we receive from clients and attendees at conferences is “How do I create shopper insights?” To be honest I’ve always found it a little tricky to answer: because its not always clear what the individual means by ‘insight’ and also because the way we create insights isn’t straightforward to describe: its a blend of art and science. But, after being pushed and prodded over the last few years, we’ve pulled together this e-book on creating shopper insights (and its free!). In it we’ve bundled in pretty much everything we know about creating insights – or at least enough to help anyone get well on the way to creating powerful shopper insights.

What is a shopper insight anyway?

Insight – It is one of those words that are used a lot in marketing (and beyond!) to convey many different things. Each of us seems to have a different view on what can be considered an insight. For some people, almost anything can be thought of as an insight these days! Noticing that people who buy chips also buy beer is labeled as an insight. Is it? If it is, then any observation about behavior would be an insight. And this is where I believe, many are mistaken. For me, an insight must be more than a mere observation of fact. In my view, an insight must be new, it has to have that whiff of surprise, and it has to lead to massive change versus what has gone before.

While we all might not be able to agree on a specific definition of what an insight is, we all would agree that insights are important and valuable, especially when it comes to marketing. Insights lie at the heart of any marketing as they are the keys that unlock significant change and help tap an opportunity. But still, many marketers struggle with exactly how to create insights, particularly really powerful ones.

At engage, we’ve worked with hundreds of companies in many countries and countless categories. Our clients come to us for many reasons, but one of those reasons is our ability to uncover ‘insights’ – our ability to look at data which our clients have scoured for ages or data that has been gathering dust on a shelf – and to pull nuggets out of it – to discover something (that’ll be the insight!) that helps them see their business in a different light.

Creating shopper insights – the art and the science

We’ve had lots of practice at uncovering insights. And through that practice, we’ve discovered some methodologies and ways of working that work really well for us. This e-book will share many of these. The e-book isn’t designed to be definitive in any way: we’re sure, there’re many other ways of digging out those nuggets. This is merely what works for us. And we’re sure; it will work for you too!

In this e-book we share our way of working in two ways: the core process we follow, and the ‘magic sauce’ that we use throughout that process to really make things zing! Creating insights is one of those things that make marketing so interesting – a blend of magic and science that somehow enables people to be able to conjure simple brilliance from apparently nowhere. Enjoy and please share with anyone you think might appreciate it!