Here are five things that you can do to help achieve this goal:
Research Consultants…
1. Think Like Marketers
Your end clients are marketers, not researchers. Tailor your approach to a marketing audience. Drop the research jargon. Words like methodology, data collection, regression analysis and coding have no relevance to marketers. These terms just distance you from your customers. Don’t get sucked into the minutiae. Always tie research back to the business issue. The goal is to tell marketers whether to move forward, how and who to target.
2. Be a Curator
Your job is to determine what is noteworthy and relevant to clients’ business issues; it is not to report back on every question ever asked. Putting everything into a report doesn’t require a great deal of thought and certainly doesn’t demonstrate strategic acumen. Resist the temptation to build the shell of the report before you get the results. You can’t possibly know the story until you hear from customers. Tell an eloquent story by curating results that provide solutions to the client’s business issue.
3. Develop Team Storytelling and Strategic Prowess
It is your responsibility to ensure that all members of the team have strategic prowess. Strategic thinking shouldn’t be the sole domain of senior team members. Bring junior researchers to client meetings and ensure they understand the strategic plan for the brand. During the design phase, ensure all team members know how each component of the research relates to the client’s business objective. Don’t relegate junior team members to crank out slides and then have senior consultants add recommendations at the end. Engage in team brainstorming to build the story.
4. Collaborate
It’s time for researchers to move away from just selling their own box and move toward a more collaborative business model. Keep in step with growing trends and take a page from crowdsourcing and the collaborative economy. Teamwork allows each player to capitalize on their strengths and collectively generate new, inspiring ideas. Tap into the plethora of new, innovative platforms now available to research firms to engage customers and generate new learning. Augment your visual storytelling by collaborating with creative professionals such as graphic designers, photographers and videographers.
5. Crank up the Delivery
Research lives or dies based on how well the story is told. It’s not only about the content; the delivery is crucial. As a rule, however, researchers aren’t riveting public speakers. Many break even the most basic tenets, turning their back to their audience and reading slides verbatim. As strategic consultants, you need to be dynamic storytellers – you need to be indispensable and offer more than what is in your report. Become exemplary public speakers. Killer presentations will not only ensure research informs strategy but will elevate market research as a profession.
What do You Think?
I’d love your feedback. Do these suggestions resonate with you? Do you take issue with any of them? What other approaches will ensure research informs strategy? Let’s collaborate and be more strategic.