Missed our presentation at TMRE? On Wednesday, November 14, Kelly Garrett, Manager of Global Insights at Belkin, Inc. and Nicole Clinkinbeard, Director of Strategic Insights of Quester presented on the topic: Occupying the Consumer Mind: Bringing Your Customer Segments to Life.
During the presentation, Nichole explained that when Belkin approached Quester, they asked that we develop a foundational understanding of who their customer is. The ultimate goal was to develop a deep understanding of different customer segments, with the goal of identifying personas that truly “put flesh on the person”. Quester was asked to show exactly how a particular consumer would use their products at home. Using this information, Belkin would then build out actual rooms in their offices to reflect the product needs of each consumer segment.
Research background
Nichole started out by mentioning that the purpose of this research was to provide an understanding of the way a Belkin consumer thinks and operates, in order to segment and define different types of consumers and unique communication opportunities to each group. The main points were as follows:
- Explore the lives of customers to understand their daily activities, their shopping behavior, their values and how technology/electronics fit into how they approach their daily lives;
- Uncover, at a deep level, customer attitudes and needs in order to gain a full picture of the contextual components that drive their behavior;
- Determine the attitudes and behaviors that distinguish Belkin customers from one another.
The Quester methodology
Quester determined that 600 qualitative interviews would be carried out, in four countries (Australia, India, the United States and the United Kingdom). This, Nichole explained, is possible because we use our virtual moderator to conduct fully probed one-on-one interviews online with a large number of respondents spread out geographically.
We fielded results within a two week period. Researchers and trained linguists at Quester leveraged the firm’s proprietary analytic platform to identify and pull representative verbatims so as to bring consumer segments to life.
Consumer Insights brought to life.
What Quester presented to Belkin was more than what one would expect in a typical presentation. Nichole talked about how Quester developed visuals of consumer profiles, of which there were four, to show how they surround themselves with technology at home; the kitchen proved the ideal room for one of the consumer profiles. Quester supported the findings with numbers but also with specific verbatim identified during the analysis process. Since the study was conducted in four countries, Quester demonstrated the relevance of these findings in the context of each country. Nuances relative to specific attitudes and behaviors were highlighted for a comprehensive population representation.
Nichole thanked the Belkin research team, and Kelly in particular, for the opportunity to work jointly on this exciting project and added that we look forward to new opportunities with Belkin in the future.
