Clients often begin the Product Advancement process by assessing the marketplace with a Custom Market Landscape Analysis. A few of the techniques used to surface insights for further exploration include brand migration framing, segment and brand perceptual mapping, purchase propensity modeling.

Phoenix’s qualitative research professionals have developed a number of unique exploratory research techniques which have been proven to deliver more “Aha” moments and concepts than traditional research methods.

MindMap
Phoenix’s proprietary Mindmap process goes beyond the “rational” conversations and interactions produced by traditional qualitative research to uncover deep-seated consumer needs and aspirations. Mindmap’s multi-discipline approach draws upon cognitive psychology and linguistics to identify the emotional and psychological dimensions of purchase motivation and brand loyalty. A video montage is produced which features the key themes surfaced.

Ethnography
Observing consumers in their natural environments—where they live, rest, conduct business, eat, relax and shop—provides a “360-degree view” of how context and environment shape perceptions and decisions.

 
Qualitative Research
Phoenix employs a variety of additional, innovative exploratory research techniques to surface new insights for product and program development, including Street Monologues, Anthropologic Interviews, Mystery Shopping and Expert Interviews. These methods have been proven to deliver unique perspectives on consumers’ psychological, motivational and experiential needs and gaps.

Ideation Sessions
The Phoenix team works with clients to convert the themes uncovered in the exploratory research into product platforms and concepts for further testing with consumers. Phoenix’s extensive marketing experience and “right brain” skills separate us from the typical research firm. Our team actually writes the concepts and/or illustrates the prototypes as the starting point for discussion and brainstorming. The “concept expression” exercise is used to ensure that all participants in the ideation session thoroughly understand the core idea.

Client ideation sessions are conducted by Phoenix moderators who have been licensed and trained in the Osborne-Parnes “Creative Problem Solving” (CPS) brainstorming technique which employs both divergent and convergent thinking.

Concepts generated in the client ideation sessions are thoroughly explored through consumer focus groups to refine such elements as product, features and benefits, pricing, promotion/positioning, channel and service strategies prior to quantitative testing.

Numerous ideas or concepts are generated through the discovery process that need to be narrowed down to those with the highest potential to generate business using quantitative research. Leading concepts can be identified within a matter of days using the Concept Screener Lab. Through online or live audience research and a proprietary multi-dimensional mapping technique, concepts can be quickly scored, clustered and ranked to show which concepts should move into the next stage of development and testing. When appropriate, accompanying qualitative sessions provide context and rich insights for guidance on the best way to position concepts for the next round of evaluation.

In some cases, the screened concepts may now need to be “built” by adding a series of features, pricing levels and/or design elements to the core proposition. The Concept Builder Lab allows respondents to create their ideal product quickly and easily using a “drag and drop” technique online.

In other cases, the screened concepts might already have potential sets of features, pricing and benefits associated with them. The Concept Optimizer Lab uses advanced adaptive choice-based techniques to allow consumers to trade off various components in order to develop their ideal product configuration.

In still other cases, the concept/product configurations might already be established, in which case the Concept Tester Lab will quantify the size of the market opportunity and revenue potential for each concept.

Information from the Concept Builder Lab, Concept Optimizer Lab and Concept Tester Lab is modeled to identify the key purchase drivers and purchase combination sets. These drivers provide input to the Concept Simulator Lab which allows clients to run various revenue and profit scenarios and prepare the business case for each product and/or marketing decision.

Once the business case has been validated, the next step is to evaluate the best way to position the concept and to choose a name which will have strong appeal and provide a good fit. The Concept Positioning and Naming Lab simultaneously tests a variety of positioning concepts and name concepts/marks using the same approach as the Concept Screener Lab and/or Concept Tester Lab described above.

Phoenix provides clients with a variety of options for tracking a new product’s acceptance and adoption in the marketplace.

If a syndicated AdPi® and BrandPi® Audit is already running in a client’s category, subscribers can cost-effectively track the consideration and/or purchases of their new product as soon as it enters the marketplace. Specific geographic “pilot markets” can also be isolated and compared to “control markets.” The Audit will also quantify the direct impact and ROMI of the new product’s advertising on building brand awareness, image and consideration.

If an Audit is not available in a client’s category, a Custom AA&U Study will be designed to measure the new product’s awareness and acceptance trends over time, or, if desired, to provide comparisons between pilot and control markets.

• Website Screener Lab—A variety of initial website design and positioning concepts are exposed and evaluated quantitatively to determine which one(s) has the highest potential to be developed further.
  
  
• Website Experience Lab—Employs usability and “talk-through” testing on early prototypes to provide guidance on site content and design’s affect on marketing effectiveness.
  
  
• Website Landing Page Lab—Once finished screen shot prototypes of key landing pages have been developed, consumers provide detailed verbatim on specific likes and dislikes regarding page features such as links, menu choices, likely click-on choices, interest to dig deeper, etc.

When the new website is launched, a quantitative assessment of the site against norms for the category is conducted.

  
Web Value Index
The Web Value Index study determines if the visit to a client’s site was worth the visitor’s time and effort compared to the sites of competitors. The study specifically diagnoses how content, design, navigation and ease of use can enhance value for the visitors, as measured by “conversion” metrics. Diagnostics provide specific direction for improvement. This study has proven to increase revenue from 10% to 50%.

Website Trust Index
Trust is a key driver of prospect attraction and customer commitment in the digital world. This study highlights specific actions required in content, design and function to engender trust.