Archive for the ‘Julia Cupman’ Category

How Fast Can We Go?

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Faster, better, cheaper. It is the mantra of today’s business. In her latest contribution to Thursday Night Insight, Julia Cupman asks: Is there anybody out there who doesn’t want it faster, better and cheaper?

The problem is that there is a tension between these improvements. Is it possible to have something better as well as cheaper and faster? It seems that we can. Food is in our supermarkets faster and cheaper than ever before and in the main it is fresh and tasty. Clothes, cars and computers are all faster, better and cheaper. And once consumers become accustomed to these improvements, they want more.

Faster is, of course, an important offering to many customers in business. They want speedy delivery, they want the instant resolution of problems, they want 24 hour support etc. These used to be the means by which a company could differentiate itself, but as one company offers it and others follow suit, in no time at all they become the norm.

I am now working out of B2B International’s New York office and it has hit me how important the faster, better, cheaper mantra is in the States. American businesses work at an impressive speed. Their days start early and are highly structured. BlackBerries are ubiquitous and it is not unusual to receive instantaneous replies to e-mails sent as early as 7am or as late as 11pm – at the weekend as well as on weekdays.

Technology does not only act as a conduit to improved productivity however. Many companies believe that technology can replace employees and cut costs, plus generate more revenue through increased, automated efficiency. This is evident with the growing number of self-service check-outs, online transactions and automated phone systems. In wanting faster, better, cheaper, we are guilty of favouring technology over human interaction. In many years to come, will there reach a stage when we have no human contact throughout the day, when everything will be managed and automated from our homes?

I wonder how much faster business can become. We were all impressed at how computers and mobile phones enabled us to be more productive, and most of us never expected to be able to speed up even more with technologies allowing immediate access to e-mails and the internet too. So what is around the corner to feed our insatiable desire to go faster? And more to the point, do we actually want to go faster, given the saying that “speed kills” and the possible implications this may have on business?

Indeed speed may be attractive, but if businesses focus too much on becoming faster, this may be to the detriment of quality and service. For instance, Starbucks attempted to speed up customer service by introducing a high-tech hand-held ordering system to reduce congestion at the counter. Using a techno gadget, staff would take orders from customers and wirelessly beam each customer’s order through to the espresso bar. Although the high-tech ordering system improved the speed of service, customers did not appreciate the mechanised ordering process, claiming it was impersonal and blackened the overall experience.

As so many of us strive to serve our customers according to the bigger, faster, better paradigm, it would nevertheless seem that there is some truth in the adage ”the best things in life come to those who wait”.

Posted in Market Research USA, Julia Cupman, Thursday Night Insight, Customer Satisfaction |
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American expansion for B2B

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B2B International’s USA office opens in White Plains, New York in June 2008.

This office will allow us to better meet the needs of our many North American clients, as well as providing us with an on-the-ground data collection presence in the United States for all of our clients worldwide. From New York we we will offer our full range of qualitative and quantitative market research services, across the following sectors: chemicals and petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, engineering and manufacturing, construction, education, finance, IT, paper & print, telecoms and transport.

Julia Cupman, who has been named Business Development Manager of the US company, explains:

For further details about our services in the United States, please email newyork@b2binternational.com or call +44(0)161 440 6000 and ask for Julia Cupman or Matthew Harrison.

Posted in Market Research USA, Julia Cupman, Matt Harrison, International Market Research, Market Research |
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Tell customers what they want to know!

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In her first Thursday Night Insight contribution, Senior Researcher Julia Cupman discusses meeting customers’ needs, and finds that while this seems like a simple task, achieving this goal is actually fraught with difficulty.

In my spare time I play in a string quartet, and the players and I have come to learn over the years that the public most likes the music that it knows – that is, music that the vast majority of people recognise, as opposed to high-brow classical pieces which are only known to the select few. I believe there is an element of truth to this in marketing too, and I will use an example from a project I conducted recently on seafood to illustrate my point.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, 70% of the world’s fish stocks are now fully fished, over-fished or depleted. In the North Sea, for example, many once common species such as cod, skate and plaice are now overfished and, in the case of cod, stocks are on the verge of commercial collapse, whilst common skate is believed to be virtually extinct.

“Consumer awareness”, “ethical consumerism” and “The Green Revolution” are terms that are ever more frequently bandied about as consumers are encouraged to play a role in saving fish stocks. Industry is playing its part by communicating messages regarding sustainable seafood to customers and consumers. The tuna fish cakes I found in my fridge earlier, for example, had “sustainably sourced” written clearly on the front of the packaging.

Cod is one of the most popular fish eaten in Europe, but it is under pressure of being overfished. In 2006, Birds Eye caught around 17,000 tonnes of cod – around a quarter of the North Sea cod population. However, the company announced last year that it would launch new fish fingers made of Alaskan Pollock from a sustainable fishery in order to help cut its cod catch by 4,000 tonnes a year. Birds Eye tried to promote its new Pollock fish fingers to consumers from the sustainable fish angle, but failed. It then changed its message, dropping the sustainability aspect to focus on Omega 3 instead – a wise move given that fish is perceived as a healthy option by the vast majority of consumers that buy it.

It became clear to Birds Eye that consumers were not in the know or were not concerned enough about sustainability for this message to influence their purchasing. Birds Eye instead realised that it had to tell consumers what they wanted to know – that fish is good for them.

This may appear simplistic, yet it is surprising just how many companies (not just Birds Eye) are unable to take the customers’ perspective. This points to the fact that identifying customers’ needs may actually be a far more difficult endeavour than first seems.

And it is also why disciplined, in-depth research is so invaluable when launching a new product, since this kind of intelligence is invariably the difference between success and failure.

Posted in Julia Cupman, Thursday Night Insight, New Product Development |
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