Companies today have access to vast amounts of data. They know how much they sell, which products are moving fastest, how market shares are changing and when consumers are most likely to respond to promotions. The problem is that business data is very good at showing what happened, but much less often explains why.
Why does a consumer choose one product and leave another on the shelf? Are they really looking for the lowest price? What makes a promotion persuasive enough to drive a purchase? Is “high protein” genuinely a purchase driver, or simply a trend that gets a lot of attention? And are brands really competing only with products from within their own category? These are not questions worth answering on intuition alone.
A product category Is not enough to understand the competition
The food market is a good example. In our research into meat snacks, we are interested not only in which products consumers buy, but also in the situations in which they reach for them and the needs they are trying to meet at that moment.
A kabanos does not necessarily compete only with another kabanos. Its competitor may be beef jerky, a high-protein snack, a sandwich or an entirely different product that offers a quick way to satisfy hunger. So instead of asking only, “How do we compare with other producers in our category?”, it is worth asking: “Which consumption occasion and which consumer need are we really competing for?”
We take a similar approach to the dairy category. Knowing which products people buy is not enough. What matters more is understanding why they choose them. Is the decision driven by taste, ingredients, protein content, convenience or perhaps indulgence? Is high protein content a genuine reason for purchase, or simply a positively perceived product attribute? Only then can we determine whether “high protein” should become the core of the communication, an additional benefit or simply one of the product features.
A promotion does not always mean an additional purchase
The fact that a consumer bought a product on promotion does not tell us what role the promotion actually played in the decision. Did they buy something they were already planning to purchase, just at a lower price? Did they switch brands? Buy more? Or choose something they had not intended to buy at all?
That is why our research looks at how different promotional mechanics affect declared purchase decisions. We compare responses to mechanisms such as price reductions, multi-buy offers, free gifts and loyalty programme promotions. This helps us determine which promotions have the potential to change consumer behaviour and which mainly allow people to pay less for a product that would have ended up in their basket anyway.
Is the ambassador really the right fit for the brand?
Research can also help validate communication decisions. The fact that an ambassador is popular and widely recognised does not automatically make them the right choice for a particular brand.
In one of our cross-category studies of the meat market, we also analysed campaigns currently visible in the category. One of the examples we looked at was JBB Bałdyga’s communication featuring Skolim. We examined not only campaign awareness and perception, but also how well the ambassador matched the brand, and whether his presence increased the brand’s appeal and encouraged consumers to consider its products.
A celebrity may attract attention, but recognition alone does not guarantee a good fit. Research makes it possible to assess whether the brand is genuinely benefiting from the ambassador’s presence or whether the ambassador is simply driving campaign visibility.
Research should lead to a decision
We do not need research simply to create another presentation full of charts. We need it when a company is facing a decision: whether to develop a product, which benefit to communicate, who to target, who the brand is really competing with and what is stopping consumers from making a purchase.
Sometimes the answer requires a large-scale research project. Sometimes a short survey, a few consumer interviews or a concept test is enough. The key is not the size of the study, but whether it has been designed around the right business problem.
That is why at Great Minds we are developing our own research unit, combining research with strategy and business interpretation of data. We conduct quantitative and qualitative research, explore categories, test concepts, products and communication, analyse shopper decisions and promotions, and carry out netnographic research.
We do not limit ourselves to a single method. Depending on the problem, we combine different sources of insight. Quantitative research helps us understand the scale of a phenomenon, qualitative research helps explain the motivations behind it, while the analysis of online behaviour and conversations makes it possible to capture context that may not always be visible in declared responses.
Because it is not only about what consumers say. What matters more is what those answers mean for the product, the communication and the brand’s next decisions.
Intuition matters. Research helps us check whether it is taking us in the right direction.