My (client’s) customer research was a disaster . . .

. . . what happened?

They did survey work, asked lots of open ended questions, did focus groups in several regions, did intercepts at conferences, and with all those insights, their outreach adjustments didn’t change the results anywhere near as much as they were expecting.

They tweaked . . .

They adjusted . . .

They re-wrote . . .

They refocused resources . . .

They added incentives . . .

They addressed pain points . . .

But still couldn’t move the needle.

Then they called us . . . and we took a closer look, because on the surface, it looked like they were doing everything “right”.

Turns out the enemy was time . . . times had changed since these respondents had become customers, many of them had been customers for years. Their perceptions were of the early version of the company and it’s products. But they’d evolved, so those same benefits and highlights didn’t appeal to modern prospects. The world had changed around them, offering consumers many choices that more closely fit their needs, so the firm was only appealing to a niche of consumers who fit the original profile, with those specific, older needs.

We did a split test, between existing customers and some prospects that fit a more modern profile, to confirm this, and sure enough, prospects didn’t respond to the same messages that existing customers did. Then we did another split test, one with prospects that fit the existing ICP, and one with prospects that fit a more updated profile reflective of the new offerings. Again, the old profile prospects responded better to the offers than the new one did, by a huge margin.

We recommended that the client make some simple adjustments in message and in media selection to reflect what the newer prospect profile might prefer, and Bingo! Response rates, sales, revenue, customer acquisition numbers all shifted dramatically upward over about 90 days.

Most of the time it’s not what questions you ask, but how you ask them, that yields the really effective insights. In this case, it had more to do with who you asked. And that requires skill, experience, and time in the saddle, things only an experienced professional can offer you.

A fracational CMO might be the seasoned professional you need. If you’re new to customer research, or just curious about how it can help you drastically improve your marketing activation, messaging, media buys and conversion rate, message me, and we can have an honest conversation, and start coming up with ways to help you reach your growth goals.