An Assemblage of Insights for Meaningful Brands

In this episode of the Consumer Insights Podcast, we speak with Dr. Emmanuel Probst, Global Lead: Brand Thought-Leadership at IPSOS.

In order to succeed, brands need to transform us, as well as the world we live in. And insights are essential to doing that in a meaningful way.

In this episode of The Consumer Insights Podcast, Thor is joined by Dr. Emmanuel Probst, Global Lead: Brand Thought-Leadership at Ipsos and Wall Street Journal best-selling author.

They cover:

• The role of insights in brand building and strategy

• Why insights are essential to help brands see their blind spots

• How insights help to mitigate risk 

• Why foresight and integration are the future of market research

• The role of context in consumer decision-making

• How the “curse of knowledge” and imposter syndrome are interconnected

• How market research tools have evolved 

• Why brands and products need to provide people meaning 

• The big ideas behind Emmanuel’s books, Brand Hacks and Assemblage

• How brands can stay consistent and still evolve with the times

• Why knowledge and curiosity are more important than age or experience

• Why marketing and insights professionals need to be open to co-creation

If you’re interested in exploring how to leverage insights to build transformational brands, tune in to this episode of The Consumer Insights Podcast.

You can access all episodes of the Consumer Insights Podcast on Apple, Spotify, Google, or use the RSS feed with your favorite player. Below, you'll find a lightly edited transcript of this episode.

Thor: Hello everyone and welcome to the Consumer Insights Podcast. Today I'm excited to have a remarkable insights leader joining me for what I know will be a fantastic conversation. 

I'm thrilled to introduce today's guest, Emmanuel Probst, Global Lead of Brand Thought Leadership and Senior Vice President of Brand Health Tracking at Ipsos, one of the largest market research firms in the world.

Emmanuel has over 15 years of experience in the market research industry and is the author of the Wall Street Journal bestseller Brand Hacks. He's also an adjunct faculty member at UCLA. Thank you so much for joining me today, Emmanuel.

Emmanuel: Thor, thank you so much for having me on the show, it's great to connect with you everyone, wherever you are.

Thor: Firstly, could you take a couple of minutes to tell us about yourself, your journey, and how you came to work in the role you're in today? How did it all begin?

Emmanuel: Sure. You gave a great introduction about where I'm at now, by the way, so thank you for doing so. 

I started market research really randomly. Long story short, I was studying for my MBA and I needed a job. That was in 2004, back in the UK when I lived in London.  And I landed a job in a call center, supervising phone interviews. 

When I graduated, at the time the online market research, online data collection method was really developing, and upon graduating, I found this job at ResearchNow, because they had created online panels, and they were expanding.

And ever since I've been in this industry. What has always been compelling to me and what is not different today than it was back in 2005, is this passion to understand why people do what they do. And note that I said people, not consumers. 

It's fascinating to me to understand how people go about completing a specific mission, how people go about fulfilling a specific need. And these don't have to be products and brands. It can be about their health, about their wellness, about everything else.

The role of insights in brand building

Thor: I think that's a great point, Emmanuel, because you're reminding us that they are really consumers for only a very brief moment of their existence as human beings.

As a thought leader in this brand space, how would you define an insight, and how would you describe the role that insights play in brand building? Do you have any stories that you could share to illustrate this?

Emmanuel: That's a great question. The word insights is ill defined very often. To me an insight is something that is based on evidence. And this evidence is in the data or in the research, and it's something that's not obvious. So that's how I define an insight. 

It's something that is not necessarily front and center, you have to scratch the surface to find it. You can back it up with evidence, and this evidence comes from your research, from your data. That's what an insight is about. 

So for example, last night I was preparing a presentation for a client in the spirits category. And we unveiled some insights in terms of how people consume tequila. 

It's something that is not necessarily front and center, you have to scratch the surface to find it. You can back it up with evidence, and this evidence comes from your research, from your data. That's what an insight is about. 

At a high level, the insights are about “When and how do people consume tequila?”, and we identify that some people consume tequila in high energy type of moments, meaning for celebrations and in cocktails in bars. We also see that people consume tequila with foods at restaurants and food venues that associate with Mexican culture.

And interestingly, there is another segment of the market that - I wouldn't say intact, but definitely not serviced as intensely as it could - has to do with people collecting bottles and people keen on premium tequila, new releases. So there's a segment of the market here. 

And last but not least, there's a segment in terms of people searching for taste and knowledge around tequila.

So think about high energy moments versus low energy moments and things of associations with parties versus Mexican restaurants versus collecting new bottles versus a very low energy moment that is going to be a ‘tequila con vasos’ type of moment. All this is in the data, and all these are great avenues to work with our clients on where to go next with their brands.

The importance of market and consumer insights

Thor: I really like that because you're really highlighting the 360, right? It's a global perspective on the different human beings that make up the multiple consumers. If we drill a bit deeper into this, why are market and consumer insights important? What is it that they allow businesses to do? 

Emmanuel: I think market insights first allow businesses to see what they're missing. Because as marketing professionals, we are bubbled. And what I mean by this is we speak with people like us, and we read publications like AdAge  and Marketing Week, and we read posts and listen to podcasts, such as the one you are putting together, Thor.

That's all to say that we spend way more time in our world and with our brand and in our categories. Normal people, forgive my choice of words, they are not as knowledgeable, nor will they ever be.

So the first function of market research is to show brands what they don't see. And to me, a very important second function of market research is to provide advertisers or brands with evidence to mitigate risk. 

If we go back to my tequila example, it could be a very big deal for this client to invest 20, 30, 40, 60 million USD into pushing a new premium tequila to market and try to make it smart in the low energy moments and cocktail recipes type of markets. 

So we want to provide some evidence to back up or discourage this decision. At a high level, that's where market research is important. “Where am I going to place my bets?” I think that's the answer we are here to help solve. 

“Where can I own the market? Where can I really compete?” versus “What are the markets or the segments I should stay away from or maybe pull the plug on?” Why? “Because I'm number five on a market that's dominated by four very strong competitors, and it'll take me four years and 200 million USD to get there.”

How research and insights have evolved

Thor: I think you're highlighting some really core elements here. And since you've been in the industry for so long, what would you say how research and insights have changed over the years?

Emmanuel: You're getting me to step on my soapbox. In a nutshell, I think for many years the market research industry has operated in hindsights, and what I mean by this is we would report to clients about the performance of your product last summer, the performance of your product on 4th of July or July 14 or Christmas or Valentine's Day, but we would always report in hindsights.

And in the past five, seven years, market research would also operate in isolation very often. Mostly in isolation from marketing and branding departments. The future of market research, in my opinion, is to provide clients with foresights. “What should you do next? How do you plan the future?”, and number two is to integrate as seamlessly as possible with other marketing functions. 

And I'm thinking about eCommerce and I'm thinking about an omni-channel strategy. I'm thinking about what's happening at the store level. I'm thinking about media planning and ad impact and effectiveness. I'm thinking about audience discovery, and we could go on and on.

Insights fueling innovation

Thor: I think you're highlighting one of the core elements that companies and many people in our audience are struggling with to get right.

Maybe as inspiration you could give us an example of a time during your career when you've helped a company uncover insights that have fueled innovation and perhaps allowed them to build a better product or better campaign.

And maybe walk us through what was the insight that created the opportunity, how you identified it, walk us all the way to the end result.

Emmanuel: I will connect this to how the industry is changing because an example comes to mind, which I think further strengthens what we were describing earlier. It's also a client in the spirits category (a different one than I was referring to 5 or 10 minutes ago).

My client is Pernod Ricard, which has a very large portfolio of alcohol brands, which includes Absolut and Malibu and Perrier Jouet champagne and so on and so forth. This part is public, so I can talk to it, not in great details, but I can talk to it because we collaborated with ESOMAR about 6-9 months ago to write a paper on decision intelligence.

So here's what we did for this client. What we realized, what was insightful, is when people shop for vodka, for example, they don't "enter the category" as marketers will say. It doesn't work that way. 

You don't go to the store and think, “Today, I need vodka. Let me evaluate competitive alternatives at shelf.” People don't think that way. What we revealed is that what's most important in alcohol consumption are moments of conviviality, meaning “In what context do people consume alcohol?” 

This has very little to do with the demographics. It has to do with what drives the consumption. Let me give you some examples. If you want to host a barbecue with some friends on a Sunday, Saturday afternoon, in contrast, you might want to host a romantic dinner with your significant other on her or his birthday on a Saturday night.

This has very little to do with the demographics. It has to do with what drives the consumption.

Or maybe you want to celebrate a very special occasion that will be a wedding or a graduation ceremony, as an example. Or maybe you want a casual night in with friends. So maybe you'll invite 4, 5, 6 people, and you'll just eat some finger food.

So all these there are over moments of convivialities, but all these are opportunities you have to consume alcohol. And my point being that you don't go to the store thinking, “Oh, I'm going to buy vodka and consider my alternatives between Grey Goose, Absolut, and Belvedere." It doesn't work that way. 

You go to the store because you are shopping for this moment of conviviality that you are planning, and that is going to drive your selection of alcohol and associated companion products. And the same consumer can absolutely trade up and trade down. Again, it has very little to do with your demographics. 

If it's a graduation or an important birthday, you might buy your 65, 75, 85 USD bottle of champagne. If it's a night in with your buddies from university watching football or soccer, you'll be delighted with some beer or with a 25 USD bottle of vodka.

The curse of knowledge

Thor: I think when you put it that way, it makes perfect sense. But I realize that It's very easy to fall into the trap and not think about it this way.

And speaking of traps, I've understood that you've spoken about the curse of knowledge. Can you tell us a bit about this? And I think also for our listeners, what advice would you give our listeners and insights leaders in general looking to combat this?

Emmanuel: I could even link the curse of knowledge to the imposter syndrome, which a lot of people suffer from. And it's only recently I've been able to mostly address my imposter syndrome. 

Imposter syndrome is basically when you feel that you're a fraud. It's when you feel that you are talking with authority about something, but you don't feel within yourself that you have authority to talk about this topic.

The curse of knowledge is closely linked. It is, you are very knowledgeable about the topic, you just don't realize it because that's what you do every day. And I think the two examples I reflected on whether it is tequila or whether it's in the spirit category at large, I'm realizing that even I probably know way more about the categories than an average person would. 

The curse of knowledge is closely linked. It is, you are very knowledgeable about the topic, you just don't realize it because that's what you do every day.

So the curse of knowledge is this: you are well aware of moments of conviviality,  you're well aware of decision intelligence, so the science on how did we tease out those moments of convivialities, and you're well aware of impacts on the markets, yet you don't really realize it, because that's what you've been doing 20 to 50 hours a week for the last 5, 10, 15 years. 

That's the curse of knowledge, and as previously discussed, that's what I meant when I said we marketers are bubbled because we know so much about our products. 

It's great, and at the same time it's a limitation because we don't realize that we think of these products and these brands way more than people do, and I insist on the word people, not consumers.

Essential tools for insights professionals

Thor: I think that is such a powerful concept, and I think that it's something we actually need to be reminded of on a regular basis. 

Switching topics a bit, but thinking more about insight professionals, what tools do you believe are essential to support insights professionals and why?

Emmanuel: So here again, I will sharply contrast market research from 5, 7, 10 years ago, and the great opportunity we have for market research in the future. Whereby 7, 10, 12 years ago, we were limited mostly to qualitative, quantitative, secondary research. Nothing wrong with this, yet, it has limitations.

We won't get into details, but all sources of data, they all have forms of limitations. To answer your question precisely, the tools market researchers have access to today are way more diverse. Social media listening, ad impact measurements, clickthroughs, calls to actions, online to offline. 

We also do, at Ipsos for example, for some specific clients, we monitor legislative publications. We also monitor academic publications. We also monitor the news, specific news outlets. We measure sentiments around specific brands or even around specific needs, specific wants, specific missions.

All this, to put it simply: when I started in this industry, we had two primary research sources of truth, qualitative, quantitative, and then secondary research, and that was it. Today we have 5, 7, 10, 12 different data silos that we bring to the party, and we can harmonize and make sense of.

Why successful brands help people find meaning

Thor: I think you're pointing your finger at the evolution that has happened, which also of course brings a lot of opportunity, but also forces you to really think wisely about where to spend your time.

Going into some of the books you’ve written. In your first book, Brand Hacks, you wrote a lot about how successful brands are the ones that help people find meaning. Can you share what motivated you to dig into this question?

Emmanuel: I would link Brand Hacks with my next book that's coming out in a few weeks, that's called Assemblage.

My starting point is I look at the world through the lens of a consumer psychologist, not just a branding professional. In fact, I would not define myself as a brand strategist, per se. I bring the voice of the consumer, and with insights and leverage, utilize those insights so that they inform the brand strategy.

The starting point for Brand Hacks is that people don't care about most brands. What people care about is engaging in activities that are meaningful, things that have an impact on their personal identity...

So the starting point for Brand Hacks is that people don't care about most brands. What people care about is engaging in activities that are meaningful, things that have an impact on their personal identity, their self, who they are, on their social identity, that is how they communicate with people, and on cultural identity, how they fit into a culture.

And the starting point for my book, Assemblage - again, the book that's coming out -, is not dissimilar. It is to say, Assemblage is the arts and science of brand transformation. What this means is brands can no longer force us to buy plenty of products. To succeed, brands need to transform us and the world we live in. 

To succeed, brands need to transform us and the world we live in. 

Brands need to make a larger impact. So what's humbling, or at least that is my intention as a writer in both books, is to recognize that we marketers are certainly not controlling the narrative here. We must listen, we must understand what motivates people at a much deeper level, and from there build brands and products that contribute to people's fulfillment in life.

The power of transformative brands

Thor: I think this is so interesting, and I of course recommend people to get your book when it comes out. But maybe we could spend a bit more time at Assemblage? 

Without giving away too many spoilers, could you tell us a bit more about why creating transformative brands is so important?

Emmanuel: If we want brands to matter, they need to make a deeper impact on people than just providing you with a place to shave or shampoo that cleans your hair. We also see consumers across age groups expecting brands to make a positive impact on economic recovery, on society in general.

The book is called Assemblage because the concept is that brands are also not static. Brands are dynamic, and they evolve over time. 

The book is called Assemblage because the concept is that brands are also not static. Brands are dynamic, and they evolve over time. 

‘Assemblage’ is a French word that refers to the art of blending different wines to create a wine or a cognac or a spirit. But the concept is you pick and choose the attributes that are most relevant to your brand and most relevant in this day and age, so that your product is relevant to the consumers today.

In my opinion, a great example of this is James Bond. James Bond opens the book basically, whereby the spy has been around for 40, 50, 60 years now, and we have 36 movies, and the brand is still very relevant today. 

And you see many name brands, such as Omega or in the car industry, champagne, and so on and so forth, associate themselves with James Bond. So James Bond is true to his core brand identity, meaning he's a British spy, and he wants to fight evil. 

Yet the brand has evolved over time, whereby early on he will fight the KGB and the Russian villains, and this progressed into fighting more global and more tech- savvy types of villains. 

The core identity of the James Bond brand remains solid, consistent of the time, yet it has evolved to appeal to a younger, more contemporary audience. And that's exactly what brands should do.

Another example is his relationship to women. That has really changed. So again, he stays true to himself, whereby James Bond is an orphan. Yet, the way he's been treating women has greatly evolved over the last 40 years. 

And we can look also in these movies, how the characters evolved, whereby you have more people of color, and it's totally okay to have people that seemingly engage in homosexual relationships.

That's all to say that the core identity of the James Bond brand remains solid, consistent of the time, yet it has evolved to appeal to a younger, more contemporary audience. And that's exactly what brands should do.

From academic to practitioner

Thor: Thank you. That's a fascinating perspective and a very good example of a brand that has evolved with time and actually paid attention to how time has evolved.

You also teach at UCLA. What advice do you give your students, but also people that are fresh out of university looking to go from the academic side of consumer research to the practitioner side?

Emmanuel: Very clear answer. Be curious, keep reading, keep discovering new things. Subscribe to newsletters. By the way, to me knowledge wins. To me, it's not about your job title, and it's not about your age.

I just hired a young lady, and she handles some of my publicity and social media. That's all to say that I met with her yesterday afternoon, and she told me about three different books she was reading, and she told me about the painter Vasily Kandinsky and how he was translating the sounds into colors and the vibration of sounds into colors, and that's how he would go about this painting.

I'm twice her age, and I didn't know this about Kandinsky, and this was so valuable to me because now I can establish this linkage between vibration and sounds, which in turn can inform products. And we go into, the sonic identity of a brand, for example.

To me knowledge wins. To me, it's not about your job title, and it's not about your age.

That's all to say that in my experience coming up with smart soundbites like this, that has nothing to do with how old you are and how many years you've been in the industry. Conversely, you can spend the afternoon (hopefully you don't have to spend the afternoon) with a bunch of C level executives that yeah, they're very successful and make a lot of money. Yet they don't have anything interesting to say because they don't read nor write anything.

So be curious about the world around you, and bring something different and something quirky and something insightful to the table. Because when this 21 year old steps in to say that Kandinsky was linking sound to colors and how this can inform the world we live in today, Instagram, for example, or social media and the world of brands. At this moment, I don't care if she's 21 in the boardroom and all the other ones are 55, and all at C levels making millions.

At this moment, to me, she's the smartest  in the room by far. 

The DNA of a successful insights team

Thor: Well, that's a great compliment to her, but also to people that are curious and that are able to bring that different quirky element to the discussion table.

But the insights industry continues to change, as you've highlighted throughout this conversation. 

As this has changed, what is it that you believe will always be true in terms of the DNA of a successful insights team and you highlighted curiosity, is there something else that people need to think about?

Emmanuel: Yeah, and to me it's humility. It's the humility that comes with the industry, meaning: We're here to mitigate risk. We're here to provide directions. We're here to support decisions. We're here to inform decisions. We're here to provide foresights - and I'm insisting on the word foresights and not predictions, which predictions very often people roll the dice.

So where I will have to be humble is I'm here to guide your success and to mitigate your risk. I don't pretend to have a silver bullet. So much is not up to me – market conditions and supply chain and your internal politics and economic downturns, and we can go on and on.

There are many things that can impact your brand, in a positive or in a negative fashion that we marketers don't control.

There are many things that can impact your brand, in a positive or in a negative fashion that we marketers don't control. And as marketers at large, we have to be humbled about the difference between 10 years ago and today, marketers only guide the narrative and that's why I show in Assemblage, how can you guide this narrative?

Marketers guide the narrative. They do not control the narrative. You have to accept. I don't care if you are Nike, a massive brand, or if you're a coffee shop next door here in Marina del Rey, Los Angeles. You have to accept, you have to live with the fact that people will take your brand to social media. People will discuss your brand with their friends and family. People will want in one fashion or another to co-create the brand with you. 

You have to accept, you have to live with the fact that people will take your brand to social media. People will discuss your brand with their friends and family. People will want in one fashion or another to co-create the brand with you. 

And you have to work with this. And as a marketer, tools are very important, along with tools comes a mindset, and the mindset you absolutely have to be in is “I'm going to co-create this brand with my audience as opposed to fulfilling expectations.”

So for the longest time in this industry, we would talk about, “We're going to meet and exceed consumers' expectations”, right? That's what you would learn at an MBA in 2005, and the word expectations is fine, but it's kind of passive. 

What I mean by this is expectations is “What I'm going to receive” as a consumer is, is “Do me if you want”. Intentions are a process of co-creation, how as a consumer am I going to participate to creating my own narrative about this brand and maybe to co-create with the brand what the product and the narrative should look like. So that's very important, I think. 

Opportunities for insights professionals to make an impact

Thor: I absolutely love what you just said about the mindset of meeting consumers' expectations versus intentions, where you effectively, with the latter, have an emphasis on the co-creation. I think that is absolutely brilliant. Thank you so much for sharing that. Maybe building off of that, what opportunities do you think there are for insights professionals to make true business impact?

How can they challenge the status quo? Because you just did. I think what you just said is very much a challenge.

Emmanuel: In market research, we spoke about humility. That's important. We spoke about providing evidence, and the opportunity here is to provide directions on what you should do next, Mr. Advertiser.

Again back to this solid evidence that you can find in the research, in the data. So the opportunity, the greatest opportunity to me, is to help clients manage foresight because to be very humble, I think the shortcoming of market research for many years prior has been exactly this: when you report by late December, early January about the performance of a brand at Black Friday. 

Today, the opportunity is to provide brands with guidance on what you are going to do in months, in four months, in a year, in three years, in five years.

For those of you, who don't live in the United States, Black Friday is the last Friday of November, right after Thanksgiving. That's all to say that when you report on the performance of a marketing 10 point action, marketing activation that happened six weeks ago and only truly inform what you are going to do in 10 months from today or nine months from today, to me, that lacks the timely relevance. In contrast, today, the opportunity is to provide brands with guidance on what you are going to do in months, in four months, in a year, in three years, in five years.

Who Emmanuel would love to have lunch with in the world of insights

Thor: I think that's great advice. Thank you so much. Unfortunately, Emmanuel, we've come to the end of our conversation, and this really hurts me, but there's one last question I want to ask you, which is, “Who in the world of insights would you love to have lunch with?”

Emmanuel: I will expand the world of insights to people that inspire me in the advertising and branding industry, and I would go with Scott Galloway. Scott Galloway was the founder of Prophet, and I will describe him as a media personality. He's one of those guys who make his predictions and sometimes he's very right and sometimes he's very, very wrong.

But I wouldn't want to talk about his predictions. I'd be more interested to hear his take on how tech brands are evolving right now and how he sees the future of branding. 

So that would be my pick for lunch, and I'll stick with lunch with him because listening to his podcasts and reading his materials, I think it just sounds a lot safer to do a business lunch or maybe even a breakfast than any form of dinner, and whatever comes next. 

Summary

Thor: I think that that's a lunch or dinner or breakfast I would love to eavesdrop on. So thank you so much for sharing that. 

This has been such an inspiring conversation, Emmanuel. It's been fantastic to get your nuanced perspective on brands and the role that insights play in building and maintaining them. I think you've shared that the role of market research is about providing evidence to mitigate risk, to back up or to discourage decisions.

And you've also shared that for many years the market research industry has, as you reminded us, worked in hindsight and historically, often market research has operated in isolation. 

Now the future is about foresight, what to do next and to integrate whatever findings you come up with, with the other marketing teams, and that can imply, but all include but not limited to e-commerce, audience discovery and beyond.

I loved the learnings you shared and the sneak peek we got from Assemblage, but also the learnings from your first book, Brand Hacks, that people don't care about most brands, they care about engaging in activities that have an impact on their personal social identity and their cultural identity. 

“Be curious about the world around you” is guidance you gave to our listeners, and curiosity will allow you to bring something different, something quirky to the discussion, but remain humble. Remember that foresights are not predictions; you don't have the silver bullet.

Emmanuel, I know that I've learned a lot from talking with you today and I'm sure our audience has as well. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Emmanuel: Thank you so much, Thor, for a great invitation. Thank you to our listeners, your community today. It was great to share those parts with you. And I hope it was useful and mildly entertaining as well.