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Tag Archive for: competitive intelligence

Stall Points and Market Assumptions

Are Your Market Assumptions Still True?

November 19, 2016/in B2B Channel Market Research, B2B Go-To-Market Research, B2B Market Opportunity Research, B2B Market Segmentation Research, B2B New Product Launch Research /by Sean Campbell
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You could be on a collision course for a stall point. Many companies don’t even recognize their market assumptions are wrong until it’s too late!

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professional services firm

Avoid an Identity Crisis: Make These Tough Calls For Your Firm

November 1, 2016/in Blog Posts /by Sean Campbell
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Do you specialize in clients or method? This is a key choice you’re going to have to make right from the start.

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Know Thyself: B2B Usability Testing

Know Thyself: B2B Usability Testing

October 18, 2016/in B2B Usability Testing, Blog Posts /by Sean Campbell
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You can’t be unbiased when comparing your company’s offering to your rivals’.

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Will Market Research Jobs Survive the AI Revolution?

Will Market Research Jobs Survive the Artificial Intelligence Revolution?

October 3, 2016/in B2B Market Research Blog, Blog Posts /by Sean Campbell
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The surgeon’s hands. The detective’s analysis. The market researcher’s in-depth interview. Historically, human brilliance, practice, and skill have been essential to specialized professions. Artificial intelligence is about to change all that.

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Key Buying Criteria: The Path to ‘Yes’

Key Buying Criteria: The Path to ‘Yes’

September 21, 2016/in B2B Buyer Persona Research, B2B Go-To-Market Research, B2B Market Opportunity Research, B2B Market Research Blog, B2B Market Segmentation Research, Blog Posts, Key Buying Criteria /by Sean Campbell
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Understanding customers’ key buying criteria is vital to having a competitive edge. To give the people what they want, you have to know what they want.

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After the Sale: 11 Market Research Questions for B2B Customers

After The Sale: 11 Market Research Questions for B2B Customers

March 18, 2016/in B2B Buyer Persona Research, B2B Channel Market Research, B2B Competitive Landscape Analysis, B2B Market Research Blog, B2B Market Segmentation Research, B2B Usability Testing, Blog Posts, Key Buying Criteria, Win/Loss Analysis /by Isabel Gautschi
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Market research 101: talk to the competitor’s customers. Here are 11 key B2B market research questions for buyers who have opted for the competitor.

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B2B Market Research Ethics: The 4 Identities – Respondent, Firm, Client, Study: B2B Market Research podcast

July 22, 2015/in Blog Posts /by Sean Campbell
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In this podcast, we cover ethics issues unique to the B2B market research and competitive intelligence space.

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Victoria

Want Stakeholder Buy-in? Tell Better Stories – Interview with Victoria Lefevers of Carbonite

July 13, 2015/in Blog Posts /by Sean Campbell
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Today we’re featuring an interview Sean Campbell, CEO of Cascade Insights, conducted with Carbonite‘s manager of market and competitive intelligence, Victoria Lefevers.

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Bringing Agile Methodology to B2B Market Research – Interview with Discuss.IO CEO Zach Simmons – B2B Market Research Podcast

June 30, 2015/in Blog Posts /by Sean Campbell
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Episode #102 of the B2B Market Research Podcast

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/force-cdn/highwinds/competitiveintel/Zach-Discuss.IO-Episode102.mp3

During this podcast, we cover:

  • What Agile is and what it can do for your B2B market research efforts.
  • Why Agile is no longer limited to the technical software industry or product development.
  • How to leverage Agile for fast, optimal “no surprise” results for clients.

Thank you for listening to this episode! If you enjoyed it, please feel free to share it using the social media buttons on this page.

We would also be VERY grateful if you could rate, review, and subscribe to the B2B Market Research podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, or TuneIn.

Speakers:

Sean Campbell – CEO of Cascade Insights

Zach Simmons – CEO of Discuss.IO

[Modified Transcript]

[Sean]:

This podcast is brought to you by Cascade Insights. Cascade Insights specializes in market research services for B2B technology companies. Our specialization helps us to deliver detailed insights that generalist firms simply can’t match. To learn more about us, visit our company profile. Also, be sure to check out our free market research resources and don’t forget to sign up for our newsletter.

With us today is Zach Simmons, the founder and CEO of Discuss.IO. Discuss.IO is a very interesting company, not only because of what they do, but also how they do it.

Zach, why don’t I give you just a minute here to explain your role in the company and what you guys offer.

[Zach]:

Certainly, and thanks for that. Discuss.IO is really laser-focused on making the synchronous interview process more efficient and more simple. What we specialize in is having a single online platform where individuals can recruit, host, and execute interview sessions — and then analyze those results. We put it all in a nice DIY package that’s backed by our support team. This allows us to provide researchers and branding teams with a platform that provides Agile market research.

Agile

[Sean]:

Excellent. I think you might know where I’m going to go with my first question because of how we originally bumped in to each other, and that question centers on the importance of Agile.

I think a certain percentage of our listener base is saying to themselves right now, “I know what Agile is.” These are probably people that come more from a technological background, maybe even originally from a product development background. Then there is probably another section or our audience base that says, “well, you just mean how you can be more fluid, and be more dynamic when conducting research efforts.”

But Agile is a much bigger and broader subject than that. Given that, would you unpack the importance of Agile: what it is, and how it contrasts with Waterfall, etc.?

[Zach]:

Sure. That’s a very broad question, but at its core Agile is a new product development methodology. Agile differs from traditional Waterfall, like you mentioned, in that your process and turn around time — the horizon I should say – is significantly shorter when you are dealing with an Agile product development effort.

This process really impacts the downstream individuals that participate in concept testing and product testing, and matching that cadence is quite important at a business-unit level.

At a very high level, what we’re looking at is a fundamental difference in how products are brought to market. This approach started in tech but it’s continuing to migrate throughout the entire business landscape. It was pushed, in part, by books like Eric Ries’ The Lean Startup, which has helped popularize Agile-based methods in non-tech based sectors.

[Sean]:

Where you stopped there is a really key point. I think one of the things I’ve noticed, and I know you’ve noticed, is that the Agile mindset is impacting product development in a big way. Perhaps most in technology and software companies, but it’s broader than that, as Agile is now extending its reach into other business processes.

…the Agile mindset is impacting product development in a big way.

These processes are being asked to move forward using this very iterative and Agile heartbeat as well. I think that lines up with pretty well with what you guys do, in the sense you’ve obviously noticed something similar even in the world of market research.

Given that, please share your thoughts on how Agile is extending its reach into other types of business processes and how Agile is not just a software industry or product development thing anymore?

[Zach]:

Exactly. Market research and the marketing function as a whole really have to march in step with what the product development life cycle looks like.

Market research and the marketing function as a whole really have to march in step with what the product development life cycle looks like.

We have to start with that context as researchers, or as any support function. We have to recognize that if our end clients are ultimately changing how they are developing their products then we have to, as support functions of that life cycle, go and match the same cadence as they have.

Those kinds of impacts are where we see market research being shaken up because traditional agencies, by and large, have not really adjusted their processes around how they bring results to their clients. We’re still very much in the world where most agencies are not Agile-ready, and they are still taking months to go through, set up, and execute a project.

Ultimately, that turn-around time is the key difference that we see from agencies that are focused on Agile: they understand how it works versus those that still are working within a Waterfall methodology of 20 years ago.

[Sean]:

Exactly. Generally speaking, as competitive intelligence professionals, I think that’s one of the things that’s a little bit different between CI and B2B market research vs. traditional B2C focused market research, let’s say. We’ve always been a little more investigative, and more “agile,” simply because the samples we target are harder to reach, hence the approach has always been a little more iterative.

Obviously everyone hasn’t quite taken it to the degree we’re talking about, where you are working in two-week sprints and structuring research so it can done in chunks, thereby matching the stories, timelines, etc.

Let me switch this to what I think is a really important part of Agile projects, which is the relationship with whom Agile folks would call the “product owner,” whereas a market research team would call it the “key stakeholder,” and same with the CI team. So how do you produce Agile insights and then deal with the consumption of those same insights in an Agile way? Because one of the challenges with Agile, of course, is you have to have an involved product owner. Otherwise, you basically just ship a bad product in smaller chunks.

I find organizations like the idea of Agile, but they have a harder time actually doing their part when it comes to Agile.

So, what’s the best way to deal with the consumption of those insights? Because, I find organizations like the idea of Agile, but they have a harder time actually doing their part when it comes to Agile.

[Zach]:

That’s a very good point. Let’s take a step back and first talk about the concept of the product owner.

The product owner is the keeper of the product vision. They are the individuals that are driving, walking, and tackling the development of the roadmap and those kinds of things. Basically, the product owner is not just a stakeholder, but also the one with the most questions. When you are supporting that product owner they should be able to identify what the critical questions are for the next two- to eight-week time frame.

Normally, they’re answering individual questions and are not looking for exhaustive conclusions. Rather, they are focused on developing a continuous strings of insights, and obviously the questions will change as they’re navigating their own roadmap.

[Sean]:

What’s a good set of best practices when it comes to coaching the stakeholders and product owners on what they are about to receive?

Those are all really good points. Let me ask you a follow-up question: What’s a good set of best practices when it comes to coaching the stakeholders and product owners on what they are about to receive?

I imagine, like most things that are different when it comes to business processes, that people carry their preconceptions with them a little bit. I imagine there might be a little bit of, “Well that’s great! You’ll give me more stuff more quickly, faster, I’ll see it more often, and I’ll have as much time to decide as I used to.” And they think they have all the time in the world to give you feedback.

How do you guys go about essentially educating? Obviously you’re working with the agencies in this regard, but I imagine there’s a lot of discussion about how those agencies educate their end stakeholders.

Zach:

Exactly right. It’s very much a training and “feeling each other out” scenario, and we learn as we go with our clients.

One of the key characteristics is the concept of ongoing deliverables. Small pre-selected kinds of things that you build a set of studies or deliverables in your mind; having that steady stream of deliverables so you are always actively engaged as more than just the market researcher, but you are the information partner that is delivering insights throughout that process.

Your deliverables may not even be clear to you as you enter into an engagement for something that’s three months down the road. Rather you have committed to, under some kind of retainer model or such, creating that type of recurring insight — and you’re again a partner at the table when people are doing what they call the “sprint planning cycle.” Being involved and knowing what those critical questions are that the product team need answers to as they’re starting to form is really the best way to insert yourself as, again, a key partner in the process.

Being involved and knowing what those critical questions are that the product team need answers to as they’re starting to form is really the best way to insert yourself as, again, a key partner in the process.

[Sean]:

True, but one of the things I’m sure listeners are thinking about is this: What happens when my stakeholders, in singular or plural, have left the building? Perhaps for no fault of their own; they’re just completely unable to interact with me, perhaps for weeks at a time. Is your recommendation that the project, by necessity, must pause if there’s no meaningful backlog to work through, or if there’s a real chance that the story prioritization has to really change and you have to wait to get said feedback?

Because I think one of the “benefits” of the larger scale projects, if I might put it that way, is that some people think the vendor will continue to work without my interaction to some degree. Agile presupposes that the stakeholder / product owner is fairly well engaged, and that you and the research vendor have an ongoing seat at the table.

But we both know that in the real world, sometimes the stakeholders check out and it’s not so much their fault as they’ve just moved to other things for a period of time. So if they don’t have the ability to pay attention to the project, or to tell whom they report to, I imagine that can create some real challenges in terms of project flow.

[Zach]:

Yeah, this is a very good point that listeners should pay attention to. It’s very important you develop a relationship with your product owner and your stakeholders that recurring and ongoing research is something that happens whether or not they are involved directly.

Having some kind of database of questions, we will say for simplicity sake, is vital because the moment that a week goes by without any contact or deliverable – and if the bus just stops – then you’re dead. The whole project no longer is a continuous stream of deliverables.

You have to make sure that you, as an insight professional, have accumulated your own backlog, so to speak, of deliverables — and therefore you have a relationship in play such that the product owner knows that every other Friday there will be some kind of deliverable on their desk. If they’re really engaged it will be the exact deliverable that they wanted, if they were less engaged it might not be. They have the expectation that it is on them to help nurture and support you as a partner searching for the same insights that are keeping them up as a product owner at night.

[Sean]:

One of the really big benefits that I want to make sure we don’t forget to mention is that Agile avoids surprise endings — unlike a Waterfall-oriented market research or competitive intelligence study.

Yeah, excellent point and good coaching, too. One of the really big benefits that I want to make sure we don’t forget to mention is that Agile avoids surprise endings — unlike a Waterfall-oriented market research or competitive intelligence study. When the vendor goes off for x number of weeks or months and comes back and presents to the room full of executives, there can be a lot surprises at that point, and sometimes not always pleasant. What you are sharing may be accurate data and insights but it can still create surprise.

Hence I think one of the benefits of Agile is that you have the ability to socialize and essentially avoid surprise while still getting insight. I think that’s a really powerful coupling, especially when you are talking about research and large companies as your client.

[Zach]:

This is actually the original reason why Agile was created over a decade ago. Software developers were running into the exact same thing. They’d run off… take in requirements, talk with some users, spend nine months building something, and then there was a giant reveal.

They kept missing the mark. Projects would go over, they would be expensive. This is exactly what Agile is there to solve, and market research has paralleled to that same place. So today, you need to create an ongoing relationship and ongoing deliverables that engage the stakeholder. That engagement helps socialize the information, which makes sure that there are no surprises, and that helps to create buy-in. It’s a much more collaborative process and relationship with your ultimate consumer of those insights, and ultimately more productive as a result of that engagement.

Sean:

I agree, and I think that’s a good place to end it. With that, thanks for joining the podcast and thanks to our listeners for being along with us — hope to have you along on the next episode.

Your 10 Favorite Competitive Intelligence Podcasts: B2B Market Research podcast

June 23, 2015/in Blog Posts /by Sean Campbell
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What have I learned after recording 100 competitive intelligence podcasts? A lot. Here are the top ten B2B Market Research podcasts and the things I learned behind the scenes.

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/force-cdn/highwinds/competitiveintel/Episode101Best_of_100.mp3

In this podcast I cover:

  • What I’ve learned from producing 100 podcast episodes.
  • The top 10 posts as defined by Google Analytics and social sharing data.
  • Which topics resonated most with you and why.

Thank you for listening to this episode! If you enjoyed it, please feel free to share it using the social media buttons on this page.

We would also be VERY grateful if you could rate, review, or subscribe to the B2B Market Research podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, or TuneIn.

top-ten

Speakers:

Sean Campbell – CEO of Cascade Insights

[Modified Transcript]

After reaching 100 podcast episodes, what have I learned? That’s the subject of today’s podcast.

This podcast is brought to you by Cascade Insights. Cascade Insights specializes in B2B market research services for B2B technology companies. Our specialization helps us deliver detailed insights that generalist firms simply can’t match.

To learn more about us, visit our company profile, check out our free competitive intelligence resources and sign up for our monthly newsletter.

Back in January 2012, I launched the Competitive Intel podcast. Hence, I’ve been producing this podcast for over three years now, which has led to 100 episodes.

Given that, I thought it was the right time to reflect on some of the most popular episodes (based on Cascade Insights’ Google Analytics statistics), and even talk a little bit about what it’s been like to produce a podcast.

With that, let’s get into the top 10.

The top 10 competitive intelligence podcasts

1. Our most popular podcast is the one I did focused on the 5 essential truths of CI analysis.

I based that podcast in large part on an article that a CIA analyst had produced, reflecting on his 40 years in the intelligence business. I talked about each one of the truths he mentioned in turn. And the one that I want to return to is his third truth, “good analysis makes the complex comprehensible, which is not the same thing as simple.” That is a really, really good point to remember. Again, if you want to see the five in total you can always go back and revisit the page where we’ve got that podcast hosted.

2. Our next most popular podcast is the one I did focused on the needs of product managers.

Product managers have questions that run deep, especially in the B-to-B tech sector. I covered a few of these in the podcast, 15 Competitive Intelligence Questions Product Managers Need to Answer.

In the podcast, I looked at a few things — for example, what kind of assets drove customers to pare down the list of vendors they actually engage with? This is a sign of when you’re perhaps losing early in the process and not even aware of it.

I also went into things like what personas were involved in the buying process and what roles were involved. Additionally, I discussed other factors, including the cost of the solution and the key buying criteria that drove the customer to consider a competitor’s offer.

3. The third most popular competitive intelligence podcast was the one that I did on the changing nature of the B to B sales and marketing process. I interviewed the author of The Challenger Sale for this, and talked a lot about how competitive intelligence must adapt to these changes. This remains one of the more popular podcasts in terms of actual social shares, even though it’s third on the list in terms of actual page views.

4. The next most popular podcast in the fourth position is the interview with Mark Smith on NodeXL. The NodeXL podcast is popular because NodeXL is of the best tools you can find that provide a “quick” introduction to social network analysis. That’s a funny way to put it, because I don’t think it’s really a quick way to do social network analysis. But NodeXL is the tool gets the closest to it, given it’s just embedded right in Excel.

5. The next most popular podcast is when I talked to Kris Wheaton from MercyHurst. MercyHurst is a great institution, one of the best ones out there when it comes to “growing” competitive intelligence analysts. I had a really interesting discussion with Kris about what makes a good intelligence analyst and the program at MercyHurst overall. That podcast was obviously of interest to a lot of folks.

6. The next most popular competitive intelligence podcast is when I talked about hiring world class analysts. In the podcast I talked about a lot of things that go beyond just pure analytical horsepower, down to the level of, “What’s the kind of person you’re hiring, and can they be a really effective consultant?” This, I believe, is key when you’re building a shared services team like a CI team.

7. The seventh most popular podcast was my interview with Wayne Jones of IBM. I think what probably struck people about this podcast is when Wayne talked about the research agenda and how important it is to establish a really good one if you’re going to build a well performing CI team.

8. The eight most popular podcast was on uniting competitive intelligence and market research efforts. I think the reason this podcast is so popular, is people have struggled to figure out the boundary between these two disciplines. The outer edges of each discipline is pretty easy to identify, but the boundaries between them as they merge into one another…well…that’s a little harder. I talked about marrying the customer-centric view of market research with the outward view of competitive intelligence — and I can only assume that that was one of the key things that resonated.

9. The ninth most popular podcast in terms of page views — although interestingly enough, this is one of the more popular ones in terms of actual podcast audio plays — is Three Key Ways that Competitive Intelligence is Different Than Spying. I talked a lot about how competitive intelligence professionals disclose their identity, how they practice their craft, and walked through a lot of the differences.

I think this is a question that many people have about competitive intelligence, including where the line is in terms of ethical and non-ethical behavior.

10. The tenth most popular podcast, 5 Fundamental Truths, distills key takeaways from the CIA analyst’s article I discussed at the top of this post.

What I’ve learned about podcasting…

In closing, I’ve also learned a lot of things about making a podcast. Audio quality is increasingly important. It’ll never be perfect, especially when you’re doing interviews — particularly if those folks are remote and in other countries –just because audio quality issues aren’t fully within your control. But I constantly strive to make those things as best as I can.

I’ve also learned that you like transcripts just as much as you like the podcasts, and I think there’s a simple reason for that. For some people, I think sometimes it’s easier to read it than listen to it. Hence, I’ve made transcripts available and will continue to make them available for our archived podcasts.

What’s the road map for the next 100? Well, maybe some better intro music and perhaps closing music. But if I actually get to that, I’ll probably have too much free time on my hands. :)

Then I’ll probably do some more interviews with luminaries in the CI space, and will also talk about how various disciplines interact with the world of competitive intelligence.

With that, I want to thank you for listening to this podcast.

Photo thanks to: iabusa

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