Discovering business opportunities

 Howard R. Moskowitz is president and CEO of  MOSKOWITZ JACOBS INC. . Dr. Moskowitz is both a well-known experimental psychologist in the field of psychophysics (the study of perception and its relation to physical stimuli), and an inventor of world-class market research technology. Among his important contributions to market research is his 1975 introduction of psychophysical scaling and product optimization for consumer product development. Whereas these methods are standard and well accepted today, they required a massive culture change in the 1975 business community. In the 1980’s his contributions in sensory analysis were extended to health and beauty aids. He has also developed and refined procedures which enable research to interrelate products, concepts, consumers, experts and physical test instruments, in order to accomplish product optimization and reverse engineering. Finally, his research and technology developments have led to concept and package optimization (IdeaMap), integrated and accelerated development (DesignLab)), and the globalization and democratization of concept development for small and large companies alike, in an affordable, transaction-oriented approach (IdeaMap Wizard; IdeaMap.Net).
Dr. Moskowitz developed the notion of RDE or research developing experimentation. RDE comprises easy-to-use Internet-enhanced experimental designs (similar to conjoint analysis), coupled with high-level, automatic analyses. RDE reveals what messages synergize to produce exceptionally strong performance, and what messages either work with each other or do not work with each other. RDE further segments people by their mind-sets, using direct responses to messaging, thus making segmentation immediately actionable.

He is autor of the book Selling Blue Elephants, awarded with Best 30 Business Books of 2007 Excellence Award by Executive Book Summaries.

1. How to understand the mind of the consumer?  What are the major tendencies in this area?

The big problem here is the drift of market research towards two areas. The first is tracking studies. These studies don’t tell you much. The second is observational research or ethnography. These are in-depth, but too expensive.

I favor experimental design of ideas, where you mix and match ideas, present these as test concepts to consumers, get ratings, and identify what works. If you do this properly you learn a great deal about the algebra of the mind. I have written books on this (see my website www.SellingBlueElephants.com – go to ‘about the authors’, and see the ‘books’. You have a table of contents. The books and chapters dealing with concepts go into this area of understanding the customer’s mind.

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Lydia Sugarman, CEO/Founder of Private Label InterActive, seminar speaker, specialised in providing marketing managers with an effective and measurable marketing platform that facilitates intelligent, segmented/interactive outgoing email communications with CRM tools; generate/manage lead generation; identify hot prospects keep the pipeline filled; demonstrate quantifiable ROI; website assessments, database management, online marketing strategy consulting.

1. What is the role of Interactive marketing nowadays? How do you see its future?

Interactive marketing is still in its infancy. Media will be more intimately integrated and, as devices and their users become more sophisticated, transactions will be more immediate. The millennial will have a profound influence on how they are reached, influenced, and how they react. As their disposable income grows, interactive marketing will have to respond.

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 Bill Brelsford, Owner of Rebar, Authorized Duct Tape Marketing Coach, helping small business owners and independent professionals attract more of their ideal customers

Thank you Bill, for your ideas!
 

How the SME can compete the big companies with big advertising budgets?

In Duct Tape Marketing, we define marketing as getting someone with a particular need to know, like, and trust you. Many big companies rely on big advertising budgets to help buy some of that know, like, and trust. SMEs on the other hand, have a significant advantage over big companies because of their ability to connect with their customers personally and talk to them on a regular basis. This allows them to build know, like, and trust without having to spend millions of dollars on advertising. People want to connect with and do business with people that they like. This is why we are seeing such an interest in blogs and social media. It’s up to the SMEs to leverage this advantage by listening to their customers and responding to meet and exceed their expectations.

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Mack Collier, Social Media Marketing Consultant, Editor/ Blogger about social media, community empowerment, and the death of big music labels at The Viral Garden

Thank you Mack, for sharing your ideas! 

1. The market realities and the marketing are changing. How social media influence these changes?

I think that marketers have slowly begun to appreciate the power of word-of-mouth in recent years.  And social media just makes it that much easier for customers to create and share information and content.  As marketers begin to get a handle on what social media is and why it’s important, I think they are beginning to incorporate social media into their marketing plans.

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 Gianfranco Chicco, Marketing Director at HSM Italy, (World Business Forum, the Annual meeting for the business community), specialized in strategic planning, alliances with media partners and associations, online strategy, partnership agreements and development of new events. You can find his blog here

Thank you, Gianfranco, for sharing.

 1) What is the importance of the brand today? Have it lost from his power?

Brands (as a concept) haven’t lost their power, how could they? What happens is that in the last 5 years or so, in most mature market-driven economies, there’s been a strong power-shift back to consumers. Some brands have resisted, others have disappeared or lost its fancy, and a bunch of new ones have jumped to stardom. Even a “no-logo” is a brand. I like Kevin Roberts (www.saatchikevin.com) classification of brands according to two axes: Love and Respect. This representation of brands creates 4 basic groups:
+ Love and – Respect: fashion brands with a short but intense life
 - Love and + Respect: most brands lay here, especially some classic ones
 - Love and – Respect: commodities
+ Love and + Respect: a lovemark! (www.lovemarks.com)

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