GRL

Global Research Letters

Virtual Future of Research Series: Keeping our finger on the pulse

Welcome everyone to this. Our 12th and final webinar in the future research indian institute of pulse research webinar series. And today’s topic indian institute of pulse research is about keeping our finger on the pulse of our customer and consumer indian institute of pulse research and with so much rapid change and uncertainty which we indian institute of pulse research have witnessed over the past eight months and as we indian institute of pulse research go into a full week lockdown. No doubt more of this to come. My name is pippa bailey. I’m head of research indian institute of pulse research innovation at ipsos. Murray and um we indian institute of pulse research have a number of speakers uh in this session today who are going to talk about the different ways in which we indian institute of pulse research can keep our finger on the pulse of our customer and consumer indian institute of pulse research so that we indian institute of pulse research can stay relevant to them and make sure that we’re assisting them um and communicating them in a way which is useful um at a particular point in time now there are many ways in which we indian institute of pulse research can keep our finger on the pulse of the customer and the consumer indian institute of pulse research and these will be more or less relevant depending on what the business question are is. What the context is so during this session. We’re going to use the analogy of distillation so we indian institute of pulse research will have felicity edwards. Who’s an associate director in our social intelligence and analytics team. Who will be looking at how we indian institute of pulse research can use search i.e google indian institute of pulse research search to provide a very raw and volatile. Read on what people are thinking doing feeling and wanting and these can be used to kind of preempt potential change we indian institute of pulse research will then have becky who’s head of communities at ipsos who will then discuss how we indian institute of pulse research start to see how these reactions occur and how these very volatile elements via a community forum. Start to kind of separate out so we indian institute of pulse research can understand some of the truths and then we indian institute of pulse research will have john harper. Who’s a senior director in our brand tracking team. Who will discuss how this all distills out at the end to provide a very pure read on brand health but to set the scene. I’m now going to hand over. To ollie. Sweet who’s head of ethnography at ipsos. Who will share with us. How through a digital ethnography program we indian institute of pulse research can get to an understanding of the process and change over the past eight months over to you.

Um uh thank you pippa so um i really like this. Uh analogy of the distillation process that we indian institute of pulse research have here. Um because it’s very helpful for us to understand the the inside process that’s needed for brands and i’m going to start off by almost taking a step back to show why that inset process is is actually very important and when we indian institute of pulse research do research indian institute of pulse research properly it really gives us some big ideas and i’m going to do use that um and what i’m going to describe it through a recent study indian institute of pulse research that we’ve conducted which is an example of this so back in march um we indian institute of pulse research realized that the world was changing and we indian institute of pulse research started a syndicated ethnographic study indian institute of pulse research in six different markets around the world with 30 different households and those households sent us in video every single week sometimes four or five videos per week and what they were doing is they. Were keeping us up to date the whole time about some of the changes that were happening now. If you go back to march it was a time of constant change and constant flux and what we indian institute of pulse research were doing um is is is in a qualitative sense is we indian institute of pulse research were looking for the signals of change. So what was it about. Uh the the data wasn’t quite showing yet. What were the signals that were coming out from people’s behavior from these people who sent us in videos about their life and because we indian institute of pulse research syndicated the study indian institute of pulse research we indian institute of pulse research kept it very very broad so we indian institute of pulse research were looking at all sorts of things from politics to food and beverage to health to finances and all of these different things and the study indian institute of pulse research which is called covert watch. Really um has allowed us to keep our finger on the pulse in the last eight months but i want to sort of give you the narrative if you like of the whole um last eight months and i think that the most important thing and this goes back to the insight process that we indian institute of pulse research and the distillation process is that because we indian institute of pulse research did this properly as well. Is that what we indian institute of pulse research really saw looking back at. This is that we indian institute of pulse research were blindsided.

We indian institute of pulse research were blindsided by everything that was happening and the world stopped. And what do i mean by blindsided. Well you know. I’m going into the kind of psychological construct of willful blindness so which is a situation where a person avoids making an undesirable decision by intentionally keeping themselves unaware of the facts. We indian institute of pulse research knew what was happening in wuhan in january and governments businesses individuals. We indian institute of pulse research all didn’t like the decisions that we indian institute of pulse research had to make and because we indian institute of pulse research didn’t like the decisions we indian institute of pulse research hadn’t had to make we indian institute of pulse research didn’t like the consequences. We indian institute of pulse research intentionally kept ourselves in the dark about the facts and this is why i think that the insight process is so important and that we indian institute of pulse research we indian institute of pulse research actually run through the insight process so that we indian institute of pulse research don’t block ourselves from the facts that are coming up and that allows us to keep our finger on the pulse so to continue with the narrative of what happened over the last eight months. And what we’ve seen on this project is uh the world stopped through being blindsided and and what it did actually is. It shone a light on humanity. You know we indian institute of pulse research clapped for carers. We indian institute of pulse research sang from our balconies and we indian institute of pulse research realized how important it was to give our family a hug and we indian institute of pulse research wanted to be close to people and we indian institute of pulse research wanted to be close to our communities and what that did as a result is it showed us what we’re no longer willing to accept as a result. One person’s problem became everyone’s problem and we’ve seen that from the black. There’s the the you know near universal support of black lives matter. We’ve seen that in the support of care. Workers and key workers on the doorstep. And we’ve seen that one person’s problem is now everyone’s problem. Um there’s a a guy called rob scotland who’s head of strategy at mccann. Who’s been part of this project with us. Who says globally. We indian institute of pulse research are closer now where only three people away from someone that had the disease. That’s had a food shortage or will be made redundant which is why we’re at a tipping point with black lives matter because progressive white people were at home and were forced to watch this man die and he’s not that far away anymore the level of proximity that we indian institute of pulse research had to each other at the beginning of the pandemic was something that we’ve never really seen before certainly for a very very long time.

Everybody’s trying to map out what this new normal is or. I would argue from from watching people’s behaviors. It’s actually a strange normal and that’s because we indian institute of pulse research can go back to the same places those normal places before but we indian institute of pulse research can’t behave the same way and if you can’t behave the same way when you go there your rituals and emotions are lost. They changed and so what was normal is now strange. And that gives us this sense of loss when we indian institute of pulse research go to places that have that familiar feel to us. That don’t longer feel good but so what so. What does this mean for us. Where are we indian institute of pulse research going with this. And why is this. Why is this all important. Well one of the things that we’ve done is that we’ve linked this study indian institute of pulse research to um our global trends survey so our global trend server is one of the largest pieces of work that ipsos does it’s about 33 000 interviews in 36 countries. And what it does is it maps people’s values to and themes them up and to create trends so the trends are the uh are the descriptions you see on the inside of the wheel there just there and they’re listed out some of them are listed out there on the left now. One of the things that we indian institute of pulse research wanted to investigate is did kogi change. Everything has the pandemic utterly changed the world. Well the answer is yes and no and what we indian institute of pulse research did as part of the global trend service you normally run every three years. We indian institute of pulse research ran it last round in november 2019. And last month. We indian institute of pulse research re-ran the same questions and we indian institute of pulse research found that the values and the trends that held true before. The pandemic have simply been supercharged since we indian institute of pulse research haven’t seen any great disruption other than the fact that all of these trends have now just got accelerated so and these trends are based on value so a value is something along the lines of um.

I believe that we indian institute of pulse research need to change. The we indian institute of pulse research need to live more sustainably before it’s too late or climate change is a problem. We indian institute of pulse research need to deal with it before it’s too late. That’s a value but what we’ve seen in covid is those values are still there but the context in which those values are expressed has changed. I’m going to run through a few of those because i think these become very interesting. So one of the big trends prior to the pandemic was the reactions to inequality we indian institute of pulse research were no longer willing to accept levels of inequality before and that was expressed through things like the gender pay gap. Now we indian institute of pulse research see that value just as strong as before but it’s now being expressed in a different way through black lives matter through respect for key workers and people come and deliver your your goods on the doorstep right for care workers. We indian institute of pulse research saw a big fiasco over the biased algorithms that were created in the uk. Um we’ve also seen when we indian institute of pulse research look at uh the trend around authenticity as king so brand authenticity. And it’s really we’ve really seen during this period the importance for brands to actually show up and actions matter and brands have a role to play in this crisis and what we indian institute of pulse research saw particularly at the beginning with this real rush to look for a lot of brands to to to get tvcs out there is that we indian institute of pulse research saw some of those brands. Were sort of doing corona washing adverts. Where the brand wasn’t doing anything at all. Maybe it was just on furlough but actually um and those adverts really weren’t when stacking up with our with our respondents but what we indian institute of pulse research did see. Is that the ads. That were talking about the realities of everyday life. The difficulties in cooking new things every day the the the importance of safety for customers and staff. Those were the ads that were doing well so that’s more authenticity in place. Health has obviously been a very important one for the whole of this pandemic and i this value has also strengthened enormously.

Because what we’ve done is we’ve gone back to instinct when it comes to health because there is no cure apart from immunity. The power of natural is having a resurgence and so health has become obviously a very important one and climate antagonism. The biggest trend that we indian institute of pulse research saw pre-crisis has not gone away in the slightest it is simply strengthened across nearly all the markets that we’ve looked at um so previously this uh this trend and this value was it’s more described through sort of don’t drive. Don’t fly. Don’t engage in conspicuous consumption. And it’s more about rising temperatures then during the pandemic we indian institute of pulse research saw clean skies and no airplanes and and it was uh people weren’t driving anymore and the sting was taken out of it slightly but now it’s all returned. Uh one of our participants in the us described his continent as being on fire. Um and what we’re starting to see is a move to much. More sustainable ways of living as people are at home throughout the whole day. A lot more now. They’re starting to see the amount of waste that they’re producing whether previously that waste was dropped in different bins around maybe around the city on the way to work at work and coming back. Now you get to see everything and for uh new questions around. Sustainable living are coming up. So a very big and powerful trend there that we’ve been watching and this whole narrative has been formed because ultimately we’ve put digital ethnography um at the heart of of staying in touch during this pandemic and it’s been a brilliant way to monitor change because what we indian institute of pulse research have seen is while values have held strong people’s personal and social needs have started to change enormously through lock down through different forms of behavior the relevance of the different products and categories to people relevance of health related products has just changed enormously and as people move into a different channel and distribution model.

They’re making choices in different places from bricks and mortar through to online which changes people’s decisions. So the the ability to monitor everything as it happens has been hugely important for us. During this period and james sallows from gsk has been another very important sponsor of this study indian institute of pulse research and he says i think we indian institute of pulse research were all blindsided because we indian institute of pulse research believe that with our tech and our advances and our progression that we indian institute of pulse research were somehow able to cure everything and solve every problem. And we indian institute of pulse research couldn’t which is why. I think that this concept of blindsided has been very important actually when we indian institute of pulse research start to look at the whole innovation process the whole insight process. Sorry and and everybody’s trying to sort of predict what’s next and i’m not going to have a crystal ball here but i would say that you know we indian institute of pulse research as we indian institute of pulse research started with an epidemic that moved into a pandemic. We indian institute of pulse research now need to recognize that we indian institute of pulse research are going to be living with this virus for many years to come. We indian institute of pulse research are now living in what scientists are describing as an endemic and as we indian institute of pulse research go through this and we indian institute of pulse research just need to make sure that we indian institute of pulse research don’t. We’re not blindsided again by something like this. That’s happening. So that’s my overarching narrative of what’s happened in the pandemic but also why it’s important to have an insight process there that allows you to pick up on some of these signals and move them through and i’m now going to hand over um to flick. Who’s going to talk about some of the early stage of that. And how um uh how she has been looking at some of those kind of volatile reactions online so i should have been able to hand it over to you flick cool so hopefully everyone can see my screen now and thanks fully for that introduction and that really good reminder of kind of unsurprisingly why we indian institute of pulse research need to be keeping our finger on the pulse in these uh strange normal times um so for the rest of the conversation becky john and i are going to be talking through some of the the practical approaches we indian institute of pulse research can take to keeping our finger on the pulse.

And because i’m going first i’m going to take us back to the start to this this boiling pot of behavioral data. I’m going to start with a question. And that is what do people of the world do more than 3.5 billion times every single day. They google indian institute of pulse research and we indian institute of pulse research also know that 63 of each of these google indian institute of pulse researchs um are done from a mobile phone so probably not too surprising um but i think what came back from a search. Oh there we indian institute of pulse research go activated on my own phone um so probably not too surprising but um why is this important. And this is actually because google indian institute of pulse research has become the the go-to for when things um things change and people don’t know something so i know that i am. I’m personally guilty of stopping a conversation midway through to to look something up or perhaps when i’m uh particularly worried about something i will often google indian institute of pulse research it before i go and speak to anyone else and actually when we indian institute of pulse research look at this at scale because everyone does it it becomes this really rich insightful place and a really powerful way to start predicting behavior change so taking it back to to covet. We indian institute of pulse research think that there are three different ways that we indian institute of pulse research could have used search data to help um help us through this period. The first is predicting the virus and keeping ahead of the the movement. The second is having a rapid reaction to changing events so being the first out of your competitors out of the starting blocks in response to a change so thinking about the social media comms that kind of thing and thirdly it’s with the planning so slightly more longer mid to longer term planning based on on behavioral shifts so we’re going to go through each of these uh in detail now just to bring them to life a bit so beginning with predicting change so this is an uh a study indian institute of pulse research that many people may have seen before and it is the study indian institute of pulse research that looks at google indian institute of pulse research searches for a nosmia or loss of smell and taste and actually what the study indian institute of pulse research showed was that searches for these symptoms actually increased in a consistent way ahead of the first reported death in each country so it became a really really good proxy for this spread of the virus and i think this is interesting by itself but but to me and as insights teams.

I think the learning here is that no behavior happens in isolation so a nosmia was just one of the many things that were bubbling up at the start of this pandemic and for us as brands and insights teams. It means we indian institute of pulse research really do need to be looking wider than just our brand or just our category to see what kind of lateral changes are happening. Um that could be affecting us next on to on to rapid reaction with a more uh topic indian institute of pulse researchal um subject and this is where we indian institute of pulse research looked at the google indian institute of pulse research searches um following the first of the trump item debates back in october. And what was interesting is we indian institute of pulse research saw the searches for move to canada. Shoot up um or the u.s based searches uh shoot up following the first night of the debate and what we indian institute of pulse research can see is if you look at it by geographically actually these tended to be in the democratic states or the then democratic states. So i haven’t actually uh managed to do an update on this but i think over lunch. I’m going to do a quick google indian institute of pulse research and see how this has changed um based on the votes. Now it’ll be interesting to see and finally the third example is the planning the longer term planning and before we indian institute of pulse research dive into the example i just wanted to reiterate one thing that i think is really important to think about um with with searches and that is the anonymity um that google indian institute of pulse research searches offer that no other outlet really does and the benefit of this is that it makes it a a beautiful source for the kind of personal and private industries like finance and healthcare and actually for planning teams. This becomes really useful because google indian institute of pulse research searches and search behaviors can become really indicative of a change or a behavior. That’s like too likely to stop such as mortgage holidays.

Um or again likely to start so we indian institute of pulse research see searches for can i go on holiday. Um increasing which is likely to have an impact on the tourist industry and the travel industry and even public health teams. Um so this is a really good way to kind of keep ahead of the longer term change so these are all really nice anecdotal examples but i thought we indian institute of pulse research would look at some branding category based a couple of them just to just to bring this to life a bit more and think about what this could mean for insights and brands teams so the first example is a really nice example of showing how search can be used to help with marketing strategies or digital marketing strategies. So from this chart we indian institute of pulse research can see that searches at the start of lockdown or the first lockdown. Um shot up in in march and actually and this is indicative of a big influx of new potential users to the tiktok platform which actually opens up a huge new source. Um or a channel. That brands could be active on. So it’s just something to to bear in mind. It’ll be interesting to see if we indian institute of pulse research see another peak um in this lockdown and the second example i think my favorite example is just shows the the the phenomenon of the lockdown puppy so this one’s a bit more straightforward but really just again indicating that if we indian institute of pulse research follow related search terms so so brands and consumer indian institute of pulse research questions around puppies and raising puppies actually for for the brand um and for the channel managers. This can be a kind of a good example as to where likely demand is going to be so hopefully we indian institute of pulse research have demonstrated the the benefit um and the real importance that search has in keeping our finger on the pulse. But what we indian institute of pulse research do know is that not every search is going to lead to a sustained behavior change um we indian institute of pulse research really need to dig into it in a different way. Um to to work out. What’s going to be sustained so with that. I’m going to hand over to becky. Um who is going to take us through the more controlled environment of work in a community environment just to see how these behaviors can start to be distilled and trickle into more articulated consumer indian institute of pulse research thoughts.

Thank you very much flick. I’m just going to sort my screen out which hopefully you can all see now. Did you look it and well thanks flick for taking us through. How search gives us those early warning signs and will communities. Uh are the next part of our science experiencement if you will and they allow us to observe and understand in real detail and the reactions as they play out both in the now and over the longer term so they have a role to play for brands and businesses and that they help to them to navigate and adapt to rapid consumer indian institute of pulse research change now. Online communities are digital spaces where members come together to discuss to learn to evaluate to co-create their really authentic spaces. They’re always on and closely moderated. And they build really authentic insight on consumer indian institute of pulse research-led agendas so i’m going to take you through now. A few examples of how our long-term communities at ipsos have been helping us to observe and understand these reactions as they play out through the pandemic so communities are quite special in that they allow us to go inside people’s lives and we indian institute of pulse research use tools and techniques like photo challenges and video diaries and digital ethnography to really observe. What’s going on in people’s lives now. During lockdown some of our community members have been showing us inside their wardrobes and it might seem quite a trivial thing compared to finances and things like this but actually what we indian institute of pulse research wear and what we indian institute of pulse research buy and what we indian institute of pulse research dress ourselves in has a big impact on who we indian institute of pulse research are and how we indian institute of pulse research feel as people. So we’ve seen a theme emerging through our um community around people taking charge of their wardrobes decluttering and i’m sure many of us on the call have been doing this ourselves and people have been showing us inside their wardrobes how they sift and sort and recycle and rediscover different items and whilst this is interesting in itself.

It’s more the the way it makes people feel that we’re interested in and actually through the sifting and the sorting our community members are talking to us about how it gives them that ability to take control of the chaos to order that confusion that they have and ultimately is one of the ways in which they’re seeking a simpler life and a look down. Then we indian institute of pulse research turn to our office workers on our communities and how. They’ve been changing in the way that they dress again a very simple thing but they’re now being seen from the neck up by their colleagues and vice versa working from home sometimes very comfortably on a bed or uncomfortably balanced on a desk and with kids hanging off their necks and so forth. So it’s really changed the way that with working and dressing and again a really simple thing just getting our community members to share their pre-covered work wardrobes with their shirts and cufflinks in some cases and they’re evolving pandemic wardrobes which get more casual as time goes on. And what’s been interesting is this. This has allowed us to have quite personal conversations with people about how it makes them feel how they portray themselves in a work environment in this new world order and how they’re coping with the diminishing boundaries between work and home life and then ollie talked to this as a big macro theme this idea of mindfulness and taking time but on a um a more intimate theme um some of our community members have been talking to us about time for change and how the lockdown has given them the space to think about the types of brands that they’re buying and a simpler life under lockdown for sun has shown a light on sustainable brands in the clothing industry and the importance of sustainable processes and practices when it comes to buying shipping making clothes and so we indian institute of pulse research start to see people exploring these sustainable brands and talking about them and feeling empowered by buying them now again. What’s interesting with our communities.

Is that when you have a long-term community we indian institute of pulse research can start to look at the seidu gap. So what do actually people portray um in terms of how they want to be recognized. And what ideas do they have about what they might do in the future and then to observe this behavior and see how it really plays out in reality over the long term so it’s quite a powerful tool in that way on to a second example and this is one about innovation so communities are hugely agile and they allow us to listen and watch and observe changing behavior to map out consumer indian institute of pulse research purchase journeys see pain points explore um emerging white space of which there is lots of new white space at the moment but they also enable us to go through a really quite energizing and exciting tasks of actually developing propositions with our community members and to iterate those propositions very rapidly by testing and learning and testing again so a really great way to innovate new products and concepts now brands. Who innovate at this. Time are going to be really well. Placed to adapt to rapid consumer indian institute of pulse research change as these new normals emerge. So let’s have a look at one of our multi-market category communities where we’ve been really getting to understand the very emotional journey that our community members have been going on when it comes to these particular personal day-to-day items that they really depend on in their lives. And how that purchase pattern has evolved. And how their usage patterns have evolved over the lockdown in the pandemic. So we’ve seen how our community members have gone through this period of heightened emotion. Where will i get my products from. Do i need to start stockpiling. How will that impact though in terms of spend and when at a time when i need to conserve my money. And what about my usage patterns will it change and disrupt them and they’ve gone through this process of the tension between self-preservation and wanting to really and take time for themselves and be more healthy but going through this immense time of stress.

Where actually it’s um a form of um drinking water and perhaps consuming more nicotine and eating more is is pulling apart those different um um actions that they’re taking and we’ve observed their um their usage moments and seen them shifting and changing as they start to work at home with kids around and maybe they’ve gone on to furlough and their social life has diminished and then reawakened again on zoom. And we’re coming in and out of lockdown so a lot of shifting and changing um in purchase patterns like we’ve not seen for a quite a while and we’ve been able to map out through this period the online and offline purchase journey and to add a real rich emotion and behavioral lens onto that and ultimately to help the client to evolve concepts when it comes to next generation online ordering now to our third example and this is one from the financial space. And we’ve been living the financial ups and downs with our community members over the last six months now similarly to what flick was talking about research indian institute of pulse research. Communities offer these safe spaces they’re closely moderated and moderators act in quite a different way than we indian institute of pulse research do. In more traditional core for example we indian institute of pulse research share a part of ourselves and through that our community members do really open up to us and share some quite personal and sometimes harrowing stories in this case of life under financial lockdown. So we’ve seen a real dichotomy emerge where on the one hand. We’ve had some of our households that were quite financially stable suddenly flung into this position where perhaps through. One of the members being self-employed. They’re talking to us about not knowing where the next paycheck will come from. They’re working out quite strategically how long their money will last. And therefore how they’re going to pay their mortgage and bills and on the other hand households where um they’ve got quite an unusual and strange situation where they’re building up a savings pot um because of the reduced amount of spending on things like clubs and travel and holidays of course and this is quite an unusual situation for some of these households to have this money.

And what should they do with it. Do they save it. Do they invest it. What happens with it but through all of this. It’s it’s an interesting time. Isn’t it because what about our usual financial classifications. What does social grade mean. What does household income mean when our consumer indian institute of pulse research base is in massive flux. How do we indian institute of pulse research define it and this leads into what. Our consumer indian institute of pulse researchs need from financial organizations and through this community. We’ve been able to see them. Talk to us about communications. They’re getting as they come through the door through the into the email email box on the mobile app for example and they’ll talk to us about how they feel when they receive these comments from their financial brands. Those commun communications. That aren’t landing because they’re too formal too stuffy. They don’t recognize their changed circumstances and then on the flip side the passion which they talk about those brands who have really made an effort to personalize and show compassion and understand their individual situations and give them time and support and beyond this. Of course we’ve got the really rich stories that we indian institute of pulse research understand from these people and they’re changing lifestyles that help us to analyze these comms and say why they aren’t working in a very different way than if we indian institute of pulse research didn’t have all of those those stories and understand where people were coming from and so you’ll see how communities are this test tube through which we indian institute of pulse research can observe reactions both in the now but also over the long term we indian institute of pulse research can use them to really explore white space and innovate and test and learn so they’re hugely powerful tools but ultimately they give businesses and brands the ability to bring the consumer indian institute of pulse research into their decision-making process. Which i think at this time is perhaps more important than it’s ever been before and so i’m now going to hand over to john who’s going to talk to us about um brand tracking and how um it’s a useful final piece to our puzzle.

Okay great everyone. So we’re coming to the end of the distillation process now we’ve sought out those raw signals via search and we’ve seen how they play out in real life fire communities which all fuels knowledge and learning. About how you can react. But at the end of the day at the end of the process you need a pure read on how your brand is performing and whether your interventions are working and that’s when brand health tracking comes into play so it gives you a pure read so it gives you a pure read on how well your brand is performing how it’s living contextually in the minds of your target audience. So you know whether you’re on track and whether you call whether you need to course correct or whether you’re taking appropriate action in the prevailing environment and absolutely absolutely sure that the crisis really heightened the focus on brand tracking as a way to keep the finger on the pulse as our clients. Were trying to understand how the evolving landscape was influencing the brand relationship and what we indian institute of pulse research discovered is the things that were important in brand building before covid became even more important during the pandemic and the crisis that followed so. I’m just going to briefly. Take you through three principles of good brand building that our tracking really has emphasized as being important guide rails to follow as you continue to try and manage your brand through this crisis so the first is. This is absolutely no time for platitudes. You need to have a clear position you need to be credibly intangibly helping your customers. If you’re not then your brand equity will come under pressure in the finance category. We indian institute of pulse research saw that lots of banks really rose to that to that challenge and showed they were acting in the best interest of their customers. But that wasn’t the case for anyone.

So this brand didn’t really have a strong brand position. They were actually kind of defined by a personality. They therefore got into into real trouble. When that person’s pronouncements at the start of the pandemic created a pr storm they also had some issues around an adjacent category where there was some perceived service failings. This really hurt them in terms of those softer customer associations particularly trust which really declined as you can see in the second half of the year a real problem for them. That actually bounced back a bit because these pr rumbles tend not to stick but they realized they needed to have a stronger brand position they needed to be helping with all those worries fears and aspirations that becky talked about that was surfacing in her finance community if they did that they would be able to withstand the next pr rumble because they truly were doing something to help. People principle number two is about brand investment. So this really isn’t the time to go dark. You absolutely need to keep the brand fires burning if you possibly can whether that means selling more stuff in the short term or investing to protect the brand in the in the long term. So although your media budget’s under scrutiny. Remember the lessons from history when that recession comes brands that maintain or increase spend during recessions. Come out a lot stronger. Let’s not forget the work of lesbian. A and peter field that reminded us of the importance of excess share of voice so brands that have a higher share of voice in their share of market tend to grow in the long run. That’s why we indian institute of pulse research need to be trying to carry on investing in our brand if we indian institute of pulse research can. We indian institute of pulse research really saw that play out very clearly. In the utilities category where one of the up and coming challenger brands absolutely increased their shares voice to way above their share of market they also crucially communicated lots of relevant messages around service and trust in the crisis that gave them huge increases in consideration more than double and of course great acquisition in terms of new accounts as well.

Meanwhile the big lumbering major old-style players have been under-invested in their brands for years years versus their share of market and failed to absolutely come up with relevant messages so they declined on all the key image drivers whilst this more agile brand that had been invested in inappropriately made hay my final principle relates to communication and hearts back to some of those things that ollie talked about. Yes you had to change the creative development process at the start of the pandemic but too many brands rushed in to just communicate anything and they fell into what we indian institute of pulse research call the sea of sameness where everything started to look feel and sound the same people abandoned campaigns. They’ve been running for years and pivoted to something where to be. Frank you’ve got no idea what category or what brand is being advertised. That’s nine different brands in nine. Different categories on the imagery. Here i still don’t know who’s who after i’ve been looking at it for a few weeks. The great british public were picking on that picking up on that they were telling us that everything was starting to look and feel the same plus they wanted security and they wanted help but i also wanted brands to cheer them up a little bit as well. Bring a little sunshine into your life. That banster had license to do that too. I’m going to finish the example of someone who did fall into that sea of saying this day they’ve been having a brilliant campaign building up. Brancos intertwining the brand into the story. But they stopped all that just went for some generic images of help during the time of crisis recognition declines even though they were spending as much as ever and more crucially the association with the brand and the message distinction declined too which meant that kpis that were growing for six waves on the trot started to decline over time.

Really really disappointing too. Many brands forgot their brancos too. Many brands didn’t communicate in a way that was true to the essence of their brand during the crisis so to finish by keeping my finger on the pulse of our tracking. We indian institute of pulse research found that although some agility and contextualization is required the principles of good brand buildings. Still apply if you’re doing these before the crisis you’re in a better position in the first place and if you follow them during the crisis you and you’ve got the best chance of surviving and maybe even thriving when we indian institute of pulse research get through the endemic as as as oddie described brand tracking was more important than ever. Actually it gave you that pure read of how the brand was living. In the mind of people in an ever-changing context thank you. I’ll just hand over to pippa to wrap things up for us. Thank you and uh thank you so much john. So we indian institute of pulse research all need to make sure that we indian institute of pulse research don’t get blindsided as things continue to evolve and change with kobit and also unfortunately with the inevitable kind of recession that we’re likely to see following the pandemic we indian institute of pulse research need to leverage the relevant thinking and those critical insights to make sure we indian institute of pulse research truly understand our customer and consumer indian institute of pulse research so flick talked about keeping your eyes and ears open to the very earliest and most volatile signals which tap into how people are feeling what worries them and what their intentions are. Then becky discussed how in the trusted environment of communities it allows us to get closer to people and see how the uh how things evolve and how things kind of separate out and then finally as john’s just been talking about that distilled view so how the activities actions and communication that a brand undertakes play out in terms of overall perceptions. So um i now just like to if i could ask all the speakers just switch their cameras back on um and then we’ve got a few questions which are coming through. Um i’m just deciding who to pick on first with which questions so let me just have a look here at what we’ve got coming through.

I think john because you went last. I’ll pick on you first. Um so uh this is actually. This is something that we indian institute of pulse research had a lot of conversations with. I believe john um you know as everyone did in research indian institute of pulse research and insights about all kinds of what research indian institute of pulse research should we indian institute of pulse research be doing. What should we indian institute of pulse research start. What should we indian institute of pulse research stop. Um someone said not. Everyone has agreed that you should keep advertising. Uh during this pandemic and i know that uh byron sharp also chimed into this uh debate and praised a major drinks brand for holding back. What’s what’s your thoughts on that. Okay well yeah. It was got classic professor sharp that he didn’t actually say stop advertising. He said stop bad advertising so actually he was calling out the the sea of sameness and given how much he cares about distinctiveness that that shouldn’t have been a surprise. Clearly you know some people have more things to sell. Some people couldn’t sell at all. Some people have brands to to protect some people had had a reputation to reinforce but at the end of the day from in many categories. There was no better time to advertise. No more important time to advertise finance supermarkets and i think the issues was really that people just tried to start from scratch. They should have just been bringing their best self forward in the prevailing context with some relevant and engaging work. And if you weren’t showing how you were helping you weren’t helping at all. Those are the most important things when it came to what you should be communicating. I think cool and it’s a little bit. I like the analogy. Someone talked to me. You know if you’re on a if you’re on a plane and it starts getting bumpy um everyone looks to the air hostess to kind of like how do they look. Do they look comfortable and confident. And i think you know consumer indian institute of pulse researchs and customers do the same with the brands that they rely on right. I need some security to know that you know everything’s kind of uh somewhat um that i can trust and rely on them to deliver everything that i’ve i’ve always identified them um to provide to me so it’s it’s kind of um interesting.

Um ollie. I’m gonna pick on you next because i know that there you you talked in your presentation about humanity and um in this question it said some people said they felt a sense of humanity. Come back but given some of the kind of recent uprisings of political protest in different parts of the world has that um humanity now kind of left us yes very good question um particularly things we indian institute of pulse research are now arguably seeing some some rather large divisions again. Um so as i said when it when lockdown first started we indian institute of pulse research saw this wonderful community spirit and and the community spirit was was very giving and it was it was from a sort of evolutionary perspective. It was like we indian institute of pulse research were huddling for safety. Um things have changed since um and they’ve changed for a couple of different reasons one is. I don’t think we indian institute of pulse research believe we’re under such great attack. As we indian institute of pulse research previously were uh previously the virus was quite scary. Now a little less so uh it’s still got it’s still scaring us and it can still do harm to us. But but it’s a little less scary so that attack sensor has gone has gone away but importantly in a lot of countries that um that already had a highly polarized uh group of people so us uk others um then then. The response to the pandemic became politicized and as soon as it became a political agenda people went back to those camps around values. So what is my value. Who am i aligned to. And that’s when we indian institute of pulse research started to see you know the same level of polarization so the same thing was going on. You know every trend that happened pre-crisis accelerated polarization accelerated um during this period because the virus and the response to the virus became politicized. Um it’s very interesting as well if you look at countries like sweden uh who obviously dealt with virus in a different way very science first um the scientists were making the decisions and making the announcements and the politicians were hiding away um in the uk in the us.

It’s the politicians front and center making the decisions and and talking about what the science means and and that sort of picture alone shows you whether this is a politicized response or whether it’s a scientific and health response so it is changing it is shifting but it’s also being politicized brilliant. Thanks ollie um becky you mentioned um we indian institute of pulse research can use communities to observe the seidu gap. How do we indian institute of pulse research how do we indian institute of pulse research do that. Oh yes good question. Um well the i think. The sedu gap helps to illustrate one of the real strengths of communities. And that’s on the one hand that we indian institute of pulse research can look really in the moment at the um the things that are happening now the knee-jerk reactions um but then we indian institute of pulse research can look over the longer term with longer-term communities about how this absolute actually plays out so here for example we indian institute of pulse research might think about how we indian institute of pulse research portray ourselves the public perception and we indian institute of pulse research can do that by looking at um the the things that people have around them the possessions they have the the brands that they associate with um the the habits that they talk about and want to be associated with and then over the longer term um we indian institute of pulse research can use things like diaries and observations so we indian institute of pulse research work with our um ollie’s team and ethno to actually start to observe how these people are actually behaving what are the signs and signals. They have around them. What behaviors do they get. Involved in sustainability is a really good example. Are they recycling. Are they looking to buy an electric car for example. Um and and what’s the tension there and of course. We indian institute of pulse research don’t all do what we indian institute of pulse research say we indian institute of pulse research do. Even if we’ve got the best intentions and there’s no problem with that and it’s interesting for brands because that portrayal we indian institute of pulse research have in our say self is where we indian institute of pulse research want to appeal to in terms of marketing and comms and brand imagery for example and then our actual self the behaviors that we indian institute of pulse research display when we indian institute of pulse research um diarize them and we indian institute of pulse research observe them through ethnography and the places that we indian institute of pulse research can go to find the white space to build new products and propositions and things so both are equally relevant and interesting brilliant.

Thanks becky we indian institute of pulse research are rapidly. Well we’re running out of time but i’m going to squeeze one in for flick because i um as you uh easily demonstrated in your presentation where you said the word the g word um and and they’re at the uh uh your beck and call with. Uh what do you want to know. Um so you mentioned google indian institute of pulse research trends data do um do you and the team ever use other search tools to help uh technical um yes we indian institute of pulse research do. Um there are quite a lot of different tools that you can use so um we indian institute of pulse research tend to use. Uh well in this presentation anyway. We indian institute of pulse research use google indian institute of pulse research a lot because it’s um rapid and it’s free um and it’s again good good for trends but the the one thing about it is it looks at um indexed volume so not wall volumes so depending on your need. There are lots of different tools that you might want to use so if you need raw volumes um you might want to look at some tools like uh keyword io which is good because you can look for um searches on different platforms so say within youtube or amazon as well so it gives that breakdown. Um there’s other kind of tools like advanced to the public which allow you to visualize it really nicely um by kind of plugging in some c terms and seeing related terms. Um and then there’s other ones that are really good for seo and um kind of search engine results page stuff so yeah it depends on your needs. There’s lots um out there but um yeah if you want more information then then you can get in touch brilliant. Well thank you ever so much everyone for the presentations and your thoughts and thank you. Everyone for joining us on the call. Today the recordings for all of these sessions will be available. Um later next week early the following week using the same website that you are logged on future research indian institute of pulse research.

Itos.com so you will be able to look back um and share with your colleagues the recordings but all i’m going to say is thank you ever so much and thank you for joining us on these series of webinars over the last three months many. Thanks bye thank you bye thank you.

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