I think all the research industry should adopt a CFO, because what the CFO wants to know is not whether that ad. tested better than that ad., but does the whole program move us ahead in making brands more valuable in peoples’ lives and therefore dropping to the bottom line. (Alan C. Middleton)

ESOMAR’s 2008 Congress is nearly upon us and in this exclusive preCast, BrainJuicer Chief Juicer John Kearon chats with three of the keynotes about how cultural and technological changes are impacting peoples’ lives, and how the disciplines of marketing, branding and research need to adapt to keep pace with such change.

John is joined by former senior JWT executive Alan C. Middleton, popular anthropologist Grant McCracken, and design entrepreneur Richard Eisermann.

Listen to the podcast here

 STARRING 

• Alan C. Middleton, Assistant Prof. of Marketing and Executive Director, Executive Education Centre, Schulich School of Business, York University
• Grant McCracken, Anthropologist, Research Affiliate, MIT
• Richard Eisermann, Co-founder, Prospect
• John Kearon, Chief Juicer, BrainJuicer (host)

Listen to other podcasts in this series

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Common sense would probably tell you that stealing a bicycle using brute force in a high traffic area was nigh on impossible without being stopped or challenged. Well, think again. This video shows how easy it was for a guy to steal his own bike in busy NY using a bolt cutter, hacksaw and electric saw. And not just once but several times. He did this to try and understand how his bike kept getting stolen despite the fact that he secured it well. There’s a couple of funny bits towards the end: a police van drives right past him attempting the theft in plain sight, but intercepts the camera guy and cautions him not to stand in the car lane. Also, one person does eventually bother to intervene but there’s a twist that you really have to watch to believe. The result is a revelation not just for the guy himself but also for those manufacturing security chains and locks as it changes the assumptions they often work to.

via dvorak.org/blog

Series:MarketingTalk

The beauty of the internet for those keen to understand consumer needs and desires is that people naturally express these in social networks and other social media.

iWant is a simple, experimental tool we’ve built to mine this info from the twitter stream. Give it a spin if you dare

Series:AdTalk
Series:MarketingTalk

The assumption is that by-and-large, individuals make decisions on their own. My Herd point-of-view is that people influence each other, often without realising it

Mark Earls’ latest contribution to life, the universe and everything is gaining traction. His new book rethinks how people make decisions and discovers as a result that much of current research practice is fundamentally flawed in its assumptions and interpretation of consumer behaviour. Quite fitting for this self-styled ‘Contrarian’. The book provides psychology underpinning for many recent phenomena such as social networking, engagement, conversations, ethnography, blogging and predictive markets by showing how we act as groups and not individually. Part of our monthly column for ESOMAR’s Research World magazine

 STARRING 

• Mark Earls, author, Herd: How to Change Mass Behaviour by Harnessing Our True Nature, Head Honcho, Herd Consulting

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 EXCLUSIVE  Mark Jones of Lastminute.com talks about evolving their B2B offering to allow partner brands to take advantage of their infrastructure and content relationships. Flemming Ostergaard talks about how it took LEGO’s worsening financial performance to wake them up to the importance of directly connecting with kids through ethnography. And Michael Spang talks about the challenges involved in regionalising the Kodak global corporate website to make it more relevant and useful

 STARRING 

• Mark Jones, MD, Lastminute.com
• Flemming Ostergaard, Director Global Innovation & Marketing, LEGO
• Michael Spang, Eastman Kodak

Recorded live at the Euro MR Event 2006

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…being able to touch wealthy companies and having them make changes …to think much more holistically, will have an impact on people all around the world

 EXCLUSIVE  We like showcasing excellence. So why, you ask, does Anne Kirah deserve this accolade? Because she keeps things simple, she keeps it real. And while that may sound like a cliche, it’s what few clientside researchers do. Yet Anne has managed it at Microsoft. She and her team have got engineers thinking about the people who use their products. One team has even named part of their office Howard’s Corner as a legacy to an octogenarian man who forced them to design products and services for everyday folks and not just the tech savvy. Listen on, it’s inspirational and, as Vinny Jones would say, it’s emotional

 STARRING 

• Anne Kirah, Acting Dean, 180 Academy, formerly Lead Design Anthropologist, Microsoft

Recorded live at the Euro MR Event 2006

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 GUEST  Online research pioneer Pete Comley, Chairman of Virtual Surveys

 TOPICS  YouGov quadruples profits; BrandIndex tracker & word of mouth; Web 2.0. VS: Staying independent; Accidental genesis of VS and early challenges; Research 2.0; Blogging; Future challenges

 NOTABLE MENTIONS  Al Gore, BSkyB, Current TV, Ed Keller, Eric Berne, ESOMAR, The Future Place, Google, Greenfield Online, Harris Interactive, Henley Centre, Keller Fay, MySpace, Quentin Ashby, Ray Poynter, RI, Stephen Phillips, Trish Comley, YouGov, YouTube

Music Brother Love and Matthew Ebel from the PMN

Series:Weekly

 GUEST  Semiotician Dr. Rachel Lawes, founder of Lawes Consulting

 TOPICS  Launch of branded communities within MySpace; Researching social communities; Internet key to promoting movies; Advertising blending into content; Semiotics explained; Lawes Consulting breaking into new sectors

 NOTABLE MENTIONS  Halifax Bank, HBOS, Lynx, MTV, MySpace, Snakes on a Plane, Spring Research, Stephen Phillips

Music Brother Love and Slackstring from the PMN

Series:Weekly

 Sponsored by 
Want to know what Ethnography is, when best to use it, how much projects typically cost and how long they take, and how to overcome some of the inherent challenges?

Guest  Siamack Salari, CEO and Founder, EverydayLives
Guest host  John Griffiths, Planning Above and Beyond

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