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112 PART 2 CAPTURING MARKETING INSIGHTS
• Unilever’s biggest and most successful hair-care launch, for
Sunsilk, was aided by insights into the target consumer the
company dubbed “Katie.” The Katie persona outlined the
twenty-something female’s hair-care needs, but also her per-
g
Marketing InsightInsight ceptions and attitudes and the way she dealt with her everyday
Marketin
life “dramas.”
Although personas provide vivid information to aid marketing decision
making, marketers also have to be careful to not overgeneralize. Any
Bringing Marketing Research target market may have a range of consumers who vary along a num-
ber of key dimensions. To accommodate these potential differences,
to Life with Personas researchers sometimes employ two to six personas. Best Buy used
multiple personas to help redesign and relaunch GeekSquad.com, the
To bring all the information and insights they have gained about their online site of its fast-growing national computer-support service.
target market to life, some researchers are employing personas. Using quantitative, qualitative, and observational research, the firm
Personas are detailed profiles of one, or perhaps a few, hypothetical developed five online customer personas to guide its Web redesign
target market consumers, imagined in terms of demographic, psycho- efforts:
graphic, geographic, or other descriptive attitudinal or behavioral infor-
• “Jill”—a suburban mom who uses technology and her computer
mation. Researchers may use photos, images, names, or short bios to
daily and depends on the Geek Squad as an outsourced service
help convey the particulars of the persona.
akin to a landscape or plumber.
The rationale behind personas is to provide exemplars or arche-
• “Charlie”—a 50-plus male who is curious about and interested in
types of how the target customer looks, acts, and feels that are as
technology but needs an unintimidating guide.
true-to-life as possible, to ensure marketers within the organization
fully understand and appreciate their target market and therefore in- • “Daryl”—a technologically savvy hands-on experimenter who
corporate a target-customer point of view in all their marketing deci- occasionally needs a helping hand with his tech projects.
sion making. Consider some applications: • “Luis”—a time-pressed small-business owner whose primary goal
is to complete tasks as expediently as possible.
• Chrysler designed rooms for two fictional characters—28-year-old
single male Roberto Moore and 30-year-old pharmaceutical rep • “Nick”—a prospective Geek Squad agent who views the site criti-
Jenny Sieverson—and decorated them to reflect the personality, cally and needs to be challenged.
lifestyles, and brand choices of these key targets for the Dodge To satisfy Charlie, a prominent 911 button was added to the upper
Caliber and Jeep Compass. right-hand corner in case a crisis arose, but to satisfy Nick, Best Buy
• Specialty tool and equipment maker Campbell Hausfeld relied on the created a whole channel devoted to geek information.
many retailers it supplied, including Home Depot and Lowe’s, to help
Sources: Dale Buss, “Reflections of Reality,” Point (June 2006), pp. 10–11; Todd
it keep in touch with consumers. After developing eight consumer Wasserman, “Unilever, Whirlpool Get Personal with Personas,” Brandweek,
profiles, including a female do-it-yourselfer and an elderly consumer, September 18, 2006, p. 13; Daniel B. Honigman, “Persona-fication,” Marketing
News, April 1, 2008, p. 8. Rick Roth, “Take Back Control of the Purchase,”
the firm was able to successfully launch new products such as drills
Advertising Age, September 3, 2007, p. 13. Lisa Sanders, “Major Marketers Get
that weighed less or that included a level for picture hanging. Wise to the Power of Assigning Personas,” Advertising Age, April 9, 2007, p. 36.
They may even decide to study the issues further and do more research. The decision is theirs, but
rigorously done research provides them with insight into the problem (see Table 4.2). 39
Some organizations use marketing decision support systems to help their marketing managers
make better decisions. MIT’s John Little defines a marketing decision support system (MDSS) as
a coordinated collection of data, systems, tools, and techniques, with supporting software and
hardware, by which an organization gathers and interprets relevant information from business and
environment and turns it into a basis for marketing action. 40 Once a year, Marketing News lists
hundreds of current marketing and sales software programs that assist in designing marketing re-
search studies, segmenting markets, setting prices and advertising budgets, analyzing media, and
planning sales force activity. 41
Overcoming Barriers to the Use of Marketing Research
In spite of the rapid growth of marketing research, many companies still fail to use it sufficiently or
42
correctly. They may not understand what all marketing research is capable of and not provide the