What Do They Really Want?

If only our customers could invent products and services, bemoan Mark Cowan and Nigel Clarke, who maintain that using customer insight is the key to unlocking growth.
What is it that makes a new product or service really successful? We’re talking about success that exceeds profit expectations, enhances the brand value and is evangelised by consumers.
Take a moment and think of a product or service that you swear by – one that you cannot do without and would unhesitatingly recommend to others. Maybe your choice is one of the oft-quoted examples like the Apple Ipod.
Perhaps it was something more personal to you like a Starbucks latte, a BMW 3 series, a Pret a Manger no bread sandwich, or even an Innocent Smoothie. Whatever you thought of would be something that fits your needs perfectly and gives you that feeling of owning or using something that’s just for you. Without exception, the successful products and services that impact our daily lives do so largely because they address an unmet or latent need that we as consumers are often not able to articulate. Identifying the unmet need and the context of the customer environment is the ideal starting point to develop new ideas.
The process for identifying consumer insight is not an exact or hidden science. The Fast Moving Consumer Goods world couldn’t function without it and there are some big players in FMCG who really embrace the consumer led approach.
Look at Reckitt Benckiser or Proctor & Gamble and you will see that the key to their creative process is a consumer insight focus. Whilst there are some glimmers of this same process in the financial world with the likes of First Direct, Beat that Quote and even Reuters, most are nowhere near the level of brands in FMCG.
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