Pitfalls in trying to figure out what consumers want

Center for Management Development
Pitfalls in Trying to Figure Out
What Consumers Really Want
John Patrick Finn, Ph.D.
Rutgers Business School
&
Cahill Finn Associates
Presented at ProductCamp NYC
November 6, 2010
held at Microsoft Offices, New York

“Rule #1 -- The Customer is Always Right”
“Rule #2 - If the Customer is Ever Wrong,
Re-Read Rule #1"
Stew Leonard’s Passionate Approach
to Customer Service:
John P. Finn
Rutgers Business School &
Pitfalls in Trying to Figure Out What
Consumers Want

Some Starting Assumptions
1. The consumer is the center of everything
2. No consumer ever buys a price
3. Every product/service purchased or used is a
solution to some aspect of daily life
4. As a consumer’s daily lives changes, products/services
are adapted, re-invented, or changed to fit new
circumstances
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

How Do We Find Out What Consumers
Need/Want ?
• Uncover Consumer Insights:
understand the “essence of something”
• In Practice, Consumer Insights
Extend along the continuum of consumer contact with a
product category, specific products, and Brands in a category
Pre- Purchase Purchase Consumption Post-Purchase
Range from the practical (i.e., functional) to the emotional
Reveal something about the consumer’s approach and beliefs
about the Brand or Category
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

• Well developed Consumer Insights depend upon
 in-depth understanding of measurable facts
 integrated with a well developed ability to ‘hear’ and ‘see’
the consumer
• Want to know how they approach selection of any
category/product, and this one in particular; e.g.
 ‘I only choose the highest quality’/’they are all the same’
 ‘I use the brand as guide’/‘I just read ingredient labels’
 ‘products are a reflection of me’
How Do We Find Out What Consumers
Need/Want ?
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

So How Do We Do It ?
We’re All Consumers, so What’s the Big Deal:
Just Ask the Right Questions, and
You’ll Get the Right Answers
Right ?
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

Truth is:
We Seldom Really Know
Why People Do the Things They Do
Because
We’re Usually Not Directly Aware of
What Influences Even Our Own Behavior
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

‘I‘ll KNOW IT WHEN I SEE IT’
But We May Not Realize We Saw it
The Strange Case of
Subliminal Perception
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

After viewing a brief film showing a car rear-ending a
stopped car, viewers were asked the following question:
“How fast was the car going when it smashed
into the rear of the car stopped at the STOP sign ?”
A second group viewed the same film and were asked
this question:
“How fast was the car going when it bumped into the
car stopped at the Stop sign ?”
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

Which Picture is More Appealing ?
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

How to Get College Students to Clean Up
…. Without Realizing Why They Did It !
Recent study demonstrated that
• When a dorm room was subtly infused with the aroma of a citrus
all-purpose cleanser
• More students cleaned up after themselves after eating in the
room than did a comparable group who smelled a product having
nothing to do with cleaning
• When questioned afterwards, the citrus group could not venture a
consistent reason for their behavior
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

Women Wearing Red Dresses
Judged More Attractive than the Same
Women Wearing a Black, Blue, or Any
Other Color Dress
The “Woman in Red”
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

We Humans
Can Tell You What
We Like or Dislike,
But
Cannot Reliably Tell You Why
We Like or Dislike Something
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

Why Words Often Fail Us
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

… But, There are Also Cognitive Illusions
that Can Be Barriers to Gaining Insights
• Most obstacles are in our heads, trapped in conventional
wisdom and accepted ways of making sense of a business
and the world around us
• These blinders of everyday ‘normalcy’ are the single biggest
impediment to developing true insights
 We have lots of biases built into ways in which we try to
make sense of the world: They push us to explain away
things we see/hear from consumers because they don’t
conform to accepted wisdom
 This leads us to fail to “connect the dots” (i.e., make obvious
connections), that only seem obvious after someone finally
does make the connection
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

What’s the One Sport That Does Not Belong with the
Rest ?
1. Football (American) ?
2. Field Hockey ?
3. Pocket Billiards ?
4. Baseball ?
5. Soccer ?
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

Some Cognitive Obstacles/Barriers to
Gaining Insights
 Sometimes We See Things That Aren’t There
 … And Sometimes We Miss Things That Are
There
 Sometimes There’s More Than One Explanation
 Sometimes What We See Doesn’t Make Any
Sense
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

SOMETIMES WE SEE THINGS THAT
AREN’T THERE
Ingrained societal expectations about people’s roles,
behaviors and expectations
 ‘women are passengers, not drivers’
 ‘men don’t color their hair’
 ‘everyone has kids’
 ‘older people don’t try new things’
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

Innovation
Hershey’s Dark Choc Kisses
Starbucks Coffee Cup Sleeve
Oreos 100 calorie packs
Ketchup in a squeeze bottle
Frosted Flakes
Coffee can with pullback seal
Panty Hose
Originally Insight
Introduced Introduced
1907 2003
1992 +/- 1999+/-
1920 2005
. . . A really long time
1924 1952
1920 2000
1800s 1960
… AND SOMETIMES WE MISS THINGS
THAT ARE THERE
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

SOMETIMES THERE’S MORE THAN ONE
EXPLANATION
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

SOMETIMES WHAT WE SEE DOESN’T
MAKE ANY SENSE
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

• Often Results in a Dismissive Attitude by Marketers Toward
Things They See Consumers Do or Hear Them Say
‘WHY Don’t CONSUMERS Understand ?’
• Should really be
‘WHY Don’t MARKETERS Understand ?’
 If consumers are product users, it means there
is something WE have missed, or
 If consumers are not users, it’s because WE
may have failed to communicate or maybe even failed
to understand the brand/product well enough ourselves
SOMETIMES WHAT WE SEE DOESN’T
MAKE ANY SENSE
Consumers Want
John P. Finn

Pitfalls in trying to figure out what consumers want

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Pitfalls in trying to figure out what consumers want