This year’s TMRE was held alongside Content Marketing World and LIONS in Denver, Colorado, where many insights leaders gave thought provoking talks surrounding new ways of working, AI, leadership and what the future holds for the insights industry.
Here are six quotes that capture some of the biggest ideas.
— Pamela Forbus, Senior Vice President and Global Chief Insights and Analytics Officer at Mondelez International
During her talk, “Leaders Make the Future,” Pamela highlighted how, as AI makes it easier to generate reports, synthesize data and surface findings, insights leaders have an opportunity to distinguish themselves through their judgment.
Her message was a call for researchers to move beyond presenting evidence and take a clear position on what the business should do next. That means developing a strong point of view, being willing to stand behind it and helping shape the future of the business — not simply reporting on what’s happening today.
— Douglas Healy, Head of Insights, Kraft Heinz
In his session “How Kraft Heinz Got Marketers to Love Research Again” with Julio Franco, Chief Customer Officer at Zappi, Douglas emphasized how insights teams can no longer afford to wait for the business to come to them with a question.
To have a greater impact, they need to anticipate what decision-makers will need to know, identify emerging opportunities and bring important questions to the table before they’re asked.
That shift means getting closer to business strategy and helping teams look ahead, rather than simply responding to requests as they come in.
— Elizabeth Oates, VP of Consumer Insights, Molson Coors
During the “Marketing Effectiveness Happen: The Power of an Insight” panel, Elizabeth Oates, VP of Consumer Insights, Molson Coors shared how a strong insight can do much more than explain consumer behavior.
It can give a team the direction and confidence to act on a cultural moment in a way that feels relevant to both the audience and the brand.
In relation to their Super Bowl ad, “A Case of the Mondays,” Elizabeth discussed the broader lesson was the value of building an idea around an insight that connects authentically with the brand and the moment — then finding ways to extend that idea beyond a single ad or event.
— Emily Weinstein, Head of Strategic Insights & Analytics, Danone
As brands create more content across social media, creator partnerships and other channels, it becomes harder to test every asset using traditional research approaches.
In her session “Can Creator Content Scale Without Losing the Brand?,” Emily explained how leaving that content untested can create blind spots. Even smaller pieces of creative can influence how people perceive a brand, making it important to find scalable ways to understand what’s working, what isn’t and where potential risks may lie.
— Lalo Luna, Senior Director of Strategic Insights, Growth and Foresight, Grupo Lala
Insights teams have a bigger role to play than confirming whether an idea is likely to work.
In his talk “Staying Human in the Age of AI: How Grupo Lala is building always-on consumer understanding,” Lalo explained how they can help businesses challenge their assumptions, explore unmet consumer needs and identify opportunities they may not have considered.
But that requires bringing research into the process early enough to influence decisions, with the goal of helping teams build stronger ideas and find new paths to growth as strategic partners.
— Gabrielle Union
Although Gabrielle’s perspective came from outside the insights industry, her message had a clear connection to how businesses respond to consumers. In her keynote, she spoke passionately about the responsibility to give customers the best a brand has to offer.
Sometimes, doing that means being willing to rethink an existing approach, respond to what people need and change direction when the original plan isn’t delivering. For insights teams, understanding consumers should help make those pivots more informed — and give businesses the confidence to act on what they learn.
Insights teams have an opportunity to become more proactive, more decisive and more closely connected to business growth.
That means taking a stand on what the evidence suggests, anticipating questions before they’re asked, finding scalable ways to test creative and challenging assumptions when the opportunity calls for it.
After all, the value of insights comes not only from what teams learn about consumers, but from how they help businesses use those learnings to make better decisions.