We are single-minded about the need to get business to truly listen to customers.

We believe that marketing people should come out from behind the mirror and talk to customers regularly, face to face. We have seen for ourselves the difference it makes. And so have our clients.

Here you can read more about our views and, more importantly, the experience of our customers.

Customers are not data

market research in the age of customer-centricity

In today’s customer-driven markets, research should be a truly transformational discipline.  The role of customer insight must be to enable companies to effect a culture change in customer engagement.

 

Everyone agrees that businesses must be ‘customer-centric’ and have ‘a single view of the customer’.  The challenge is how, in an increasingly multichannel world, you really can put the customer at the heart of your business. For many, it requires a considerable change in corporate culture and mindset, from the boardroom to the shop floor. And this explains why many organisations struggle to build a customer-centric business. Customers are still kept at arm’s length.

Market research has never really been about continuously talking and listening to customers; it has been about finding out what customers think, as objectively as possible, and transmitting these discrete findings to the organisation.

Today, the real purpose of research should be to stimulate and inform the conversations that all organisations need to connect and sustain a close relationship with customers. Because you don’t just want to know what customers think, you want to know what you should do. And that means understanding people as much as data.

Traditional market research methods and models do not encourage customer engagement. The one way mirror is a true metaphor: the client/researcher observes customers, commenting on what they say but never getting close to them. To build customer-centricity, we need to start treating customers as people, not sources of data. A customer-focused business will be characterised by more open listening, more thinking about customers all the time, by everyone.

The customer-centric business will also use what it already knows about customers. ‘Do some market research’ is often the reactive, simplistic response to a marketing problem. Organisations today are rich in customer data but too much knowledge still sits in silos across the company. Discovering what you already know about customers and sharing this information is the first step to building a more customer-centric business. It is also cost effective.

Successful market research in the age of customer centricity will divert from the established models.  Key characteristics will include:

  • Finding out what the organisation already knows before commissioning any extra research. You may already have the answers.
  • A research brief developed jointly by client and research team, which relates to clear commercial objectives and allows for flexibility as the project develops.
  • Out of the ordinary research techniques to bring client and customers face to face, enabling real conversations to take place.
  • Strategic partnerships between clients and customer insight providers, to create long term value and maximise budgets.
  • An understanding and acceptance that customer insight is part of everyone’s job, and not the sole responsibility of someone on the marketing team.
  • The output is insight and data woven together from a variety of sources to create actionable business strategy, rather than a narrow report, based only on research findings.

The explosion in multichannel retailing means there is more customer contact and data than ever before. Successful companies will use this information to create a culture where insightful conversations with customers are a daily occurrence, and inform decision making at every level.

Jonathan Salisbury, Managing Director, 100%Cotton

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We worked in partnership with Annabel Karmel and a major global entertainment brand to develop a new family of healthy-eating products for toddlers which made their Mums even happier than the nappy-wearing consumers.
“100%Cotton have been extremely refreshing to work with. They are proactive in their approach and deliver real clarity in their results. In short, they add value.” Roger McLaughlan, Asda Living Managing Director
"100%cotton have played a major part in our securing new contracts worth over £10m in the last year. Their consumer insight has helped us achieve partnership status with two major supermarkets." Steven Phelps, Former Sales & Marketing Director, Gala Coffee Ltd
"Having worked with 100%Cottton across a variety of consumer research projects, what sets them from the norm is a passion and desire to transform insights into a deliverable, tangible conclusion".   Dave Clack, Zetar plc Business Development Director and Kinnerton Confectionery Sales Director
“100% Cotton are a breath of fresh air, they offer a client-focused approach  centred on getting really good research and then get that research understood and applied in the (client) business; they don’t let you keep the power point presentation  in the drawer!" Chris Cole, Make It Cheaper MD
“Our strategic partnership with 100%Cotton marks a new way of working; we intend to bring about a cultural change so that all our people – not just those in the Marketing Team – actively seek market insight to help them better understand and engage with our customers.” Sarah Taylor, (formerly) Screwfix Brand Marketing Manager
“The whole idea of Trade Point is that it is designed from the customer’s perspective. 100%Cotton has helped us achieve this by getting us out from behind the one-way mirror and putting us in the same room as customers.” Ian Herrett, B&Q Business Development Director
"100%cotton always bring incredibly pertinent and level-headed thinking to our business. Their approach is thoughtful, but they don't duck difficult issues." Hamish Renton, Former Managing Director, Riviera Desserts, a division of Uniq plc
"Having worked with 100%Cottton across a variety of consumer research projects, what sets them from the norm is a passion and desire to transform insights into a deliverable, tangible conclusion".   Dave Clack, Zetar plc Business Development Director and Kinnerton Confectionery Sales Director

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