A few days ago, we talked about Advertising Age’s article: 14 Product Launches That Rocked And Why; Secret To Nielsen’s Breakthrough Brands: Identifying ‘Unarticulated Desires’
But there was also other breaking news that same week: Omnicom Group and Publicis Groupe announced that the two giant firms were merging to create the world’s biggest ad company. Publicis chief executive Maurice Levy cited among the reasons for the merger the rise of Big Data – the ability to amass larger volumes of consumer information and make money from it in various ways.
So, here we had, within 4 days, two very different ways to plug into consumers. Is it going to be a battle of gleaning insights through interaction with consumers versus back room analysis of Big Data? RTi’s position is that this isn’t an either-or proposition; both have value and a role to play. And as market researchers, product managers, and ad execs know, raw data in either instance is just one piece of the puzzle. How you interpret and act upon it can make the difference between, … well, it can make the difference, between being 1 of the 14 thriving products among 3,400 new consumer products or gathering dust on a shelf.