Artificial intelligence
Jun
How Great Research Helps Tech Companies
jerry9789 0 comments artificial intelligence, Brand Surveys and Testing, Brandview World, Burning Questions
How Well do you Understand Your Customers’ Needs?
As a Tech Company, how well do you know your customers? In most cases, identifying who has an affinity for your brand and focusing on the needs of that customer type can spell success for your products, especially the launch of your new offerings.
Sure, you might think you can have AI go over your customer database and hope it’s able to recognize customers and prospects most likely to purchase your product. However, AI shortcuts are unable to approach the intuitive and interpretive power of human thinking, let alone the kind performing at a high and excellent level.
The Story of HP Test & Measurement
The case of Hewlett Packard’s “Mentor” campaign is instructive. HP commissioned our researchers to spend quality time with worldwide HP engineers as well as engineers from other companies, learning about their daily lives – how they think, feel, and behave. The researchers stretched the intuitive, interpretive, and synthesis-building capacities of their right brains to arrive at a subtle insight that AI would have great difficulty seeing: that HP engineers showed greater qualities of “mentorship” than other engineers.
The result was a highly successful, award-winning global campaign. Conversion rates soared as HP logged higher equipment sales in virtually every world region. The campaign also produced significant financial gains for HP and won an ADDY Award for creativity.
The Squaresoft Video Games Story
We also conducted primary market research for Squaresoft Video Games to determine affinities for their products. They had been sending out about 200,000 mail pieces per month to key metros across the US. By giving us extracts of their file of purchases of similar games, we appended characteristics and modeled affinities for prospective buyers.
We called those most likely to respond “Videobrats.” The model reduced the number of markets to 4 key metros which had the highest concentration of “Videobrats,” concentrating their marketing on high-affinity households in these markets.
Our researchers spent a great deal of time with Videobrats in these markets, exploring their daily lives, discovering how they think, how they interact with others, and how they spend time with entertainment and gaming software. This hard work produced a key set of insights that could be perceived only through the intuitive and interpretive power of the human mind. It’s not something AI could touch.
The result was a campaign of extraordinary power and great marketplace success. Squaresoft reported dramatically increased sales of the two game titles in the specific geographies in question, ranging from 20% to 200%. Not only that, the “Videobrats” campaign won the KPMG Award of Merit for ROI performance and the Ernst & Young Most Effective Marketing Campaign Award.
The Lessons for Marketing in the Tech Sector
Many people conducting marketing campaigns in the tech sector believe you just need to tell people on the web what you have (e.g., software, hardware, systems), and the magic of internet targeting will take care of the rest. They’re wrong. It’s as important in tech as in any other category to tell people why they should want the software, hardware, or systems from your brand instead of another brand. That requires you to express something about what psychologically or emotionally binds your customers to your brand.
Discovering the root of these deeper connections requires more complex layers of understanding and perception than AI can provide at present. Hard-working humans driving their minds to higher levels of interpretation and synthesis can do it.
When market research is used not just as a means to an end but as a way to gain a deeper understanding, Tech Companies are able to produce outstanding results because they are able to come up with inspired and creative solutions addressing the needs of those who value their brand the most. AI is unable to unlock these sophisticated types of solutions because it’s unable to relate on an intuitive and interpretive level the same way excellent human thinking does.
If you’d like to see this kind of magic brought to life for your brand, please reach out to us here.
May
How Great Research Helps Financial Services Companies
jerry9789 0 comments artificial intelligence, Brand Surveys and Testing, Brandview World, Burning Questions
From maintaining loyalty and fostering customer relationships to focusing marketing messages on the most profit-optimal consumer, great research is helping Financial Services companies identify not only their best customers and prospects but also their needs and why they prefer their brand over others. This is done through a high-quality segmentation study and persona development, which break a company’s market into different groups so that different strategies for marketing to these groups can be leveraged. The main reason a company wants to complete market segmentation research is so they can gain actionable insights, like how to sell more of their product or services.
Take for example, Banner Bank for whom Cascade Strategies developed a brand model which identified “Strivers” as the primary segment they should focus on. The bank initiated special promotions and appeals featuring the products of greatest interest to Strivers. A Striver-specific ROI program was developed to measure the degree of program success. Modeled indices were used to set Striver product targets by branch. After 2 years of activity, Banner Bank exceeded all key Striver product targets system-wide.
Read about our approach to high-quality brand development research here.
Another example is the case of Capital One where they needed help trying to identify the “persona” or psychographic type most interested in adopting a certain mobile app for personal investing. We conducted in-person depth interviews with “mobile-minded consumers.” We also conducted an unpacking session with Capital One staff where individual staff members were given assignments to review videos and be prepared to discuss key traits and behaviors of respondents, such as outlooks, investing styles, goals, worries, needs, plans, and so forth.
We identified that the “Empath” is the most interested in adopting a certain mobile app for personal investing. The “Empath” persona is fairly immersed in pragmatic thinking and probably best understands the possibilities for “thinking” or guidance apps, allowing Capital One to focus their brand campaign effort on the needs of this psychographic type. The net result was a highly successful new product introduction.
Read about our approach to segmentation studies and the development of brand personas here.
Copyright Cottonbro Studio
“But wait, can’t AI do this?” you may ask. While there is a faddish and hype-driven tendency to turn quickly to AI for short-cuts in market research, AI cannot yet fully replicate the deep interpretive and intuitive skills of the human brain, especially the right brain (the nonrational side). Moreover, effective AI deployment requires human supervision and involvement as final arbiter of how the outcomes will be leveraged.
As you can see, market research results as good as the examples above come from human-centered thinking, the kind that allows brands to break past ordinary bounds and achieve true excellence. It’s this kind of extraordinary thinking that Cascade Strategies has consistently provided a long list of US and international clients for 33 years.
Feel free to reach out to us to discuss your needs at https://cascadestrategies.com/contact-us/
May
Five Ways AI Can Help Telecom Companies Improve Their Marketing
jerry9789 0 comments artificial intelligence, Burning Questions
By moving away from business-driven marketing towards customer-centric, data-driven, and highly customized efforts, companies like telecom operators can thrive in these rapidly changing times. Here are five examples of how telecom companies can benefit from utilizing Artificial Intelligence in their marketing:
1. Increase in Product Marketing
With the millions of customer data they’ve collected, telcos can leverage AI to create targeted marketing campaigns via text, email, online ads, etc. This helps them gain a more real-time picture of their users’ experiences, thanks to sharper insights, suggestions, and trend recognition. Critical marketing knowledge and understanding of their user base are also enhanced by incorporating machine learning apps and algorithms into their product.
2. Improved Campaign Performance
Personalization as a strategy has proven through time its helpfulness in boosting several types of marketing campaigns. Integrating AI into the mix can rapidly grow its scale and capacity.
Ad targeting becomes more efficient with AI identifying the most appropriate customers for specific ads based on secured information on buying history and user preferences.
And by also automating user journeys, marketers are able to decrease the time and costs of sales targets and conversions.
3. Addressing Customer Service Issues Better
AI allows telcos to respond quickly to customer experience concerns by gathering data and identifying where the user journey fails, fostering customer satisfaction. Various AI-powered software analyzing customer feedback also improves customer support efforts by finding more appropriate, more empathetic solutions.
Front-end customer service employees can also get holistically educated about various issues and scenarios through AI training. Here the AI takes on the role of a customer. AI training also helps businesses cut back on major labor and time costs.
4. Improved Digital Marketing and Customer Engagement
Cloud-based products offer well-integrated data insights and marketing intelligence, machine learning and analytic technologies with recommendations, multi-dimensional visualizations of complex data, and free-form user analysis.
Such products solve problems by allowing users to easily integrate disparate data sources, breaking down traditional silos and enabling insight-driven decision-making.
5. Notifications Sent at More Appropriate Times
AI is also being used to boost push campaign engagement by determining the best time of day to send notifications to consumers, preferably the time they are most open to brand interactions.
With the enormous data and complexities handled in industries, telcos must use AI in staying ahead of competitors. It’s just simpler to address problems and automate solutions, run daily operations more efficiently, and provide better customer service and satisfaction. In the long run, telcos continuing their development along this path are more likely to emerge as undisputed winners.
Mar
What if every US citizen had a dollar for every good decision made by the president and lost a dollar for every bad decision? How much would Americans have in their “Decision Account” now? What about a half-good decision? Would Americans’ Decision Account be credited for 50 cents? Clearly, the whole matter hinges on what is defined as a good or bad decision.
Mar
Responsible AI – What Causes Bias in Training Data?
jerry9789 0 comments artificial intelligence, Burning Questions
Over the past few decades, the use of AI in business has grown tremendously. By 2030, AI may generate up to $15.7 trillion in revenue to the global economy.
From process automation to sales forecast, the potential applications for AI in business are nearly limitless. But, you’ve still got to wonder, what happens when we place so much power on fairly new technology? Will it be fair or biased? Will it try to take over the world in the future? We don’t give the fear mongers much weight about AI taking over the world, but unchecked bias in AI data or models can lead to unintended negative consequences that do real harm.
Mar
4 Ways Data Can Help Create Sustainable Revenue Growth
There is no question that year after year, the cost of revenue (COR) generation continues to climb. Look at publicly traded companies in nearly any sector and read the reported costs associated with sales and marketing. In almost every case, the costs of acquiring revenues continue to outpace the gross revenues generated. It costs more to make the same money. In today’s world of shifting digital and economic landscapes, tapping into data in real time and extruding insights gives executives a critical tool to stay ahead of the curve. Near real-time decision making is a necessity – not a luxury.
Feb
What is Digital Transformation?
Digital transformation is the process of implementing workflows and technologies that leverage data into your business operations.
From using AI for marketing purposes to replacing paper invoices with billing apps, companies all over the world are changing their business processes, customer relations techniques, and marketing tactics.
While it may be obvious that digital transformation is unavoidable, some businesses are slow to implement it. This approach puts them behind the competition. To gain a competitive advantage in the 21st century, it’s imperative to embrace the numerous digital opportunities and integrate them with existing work processes.
Feb
Marketing AI Curious? Here’s 7 Key Questions to Ask
jerry9789 0 comments artificial intelligence, Burning Questions
Artificial Intelligence(AI) has recently been integrated into marketing and is still in its early stages. It makes automated decisions based on available data and audience observations or economic trends that impact marketing. By doing so, it enables marketers to gain more insight and understanding of their target audiences.
However, a business must comprehend how AI Marketing works and its effects before adopting it. Here are seven questions every company interested in AI Marketing should ask themselves.
Feb
“Data Scientist in Residence”, “Chief Data Officer”, “Big data engineer”…the data science buzzword du jour is “Data Scientist.” These data scientists are part data analyst, part statistician and part software developer. With data quickly becoming a top strategic business priority for many companies, the need for data scientists will only increase – especially as we move toward an ever more data-driven world.
If data represents a strategic asset for your company, then you should be wondering if a data science team is needed and is it better to buy or rent the talent? Data analysis can be done by anyone with analytical skills, right? Well, the functions of a data scientist on a data science team are broader than initially meets the eye….and they typically need to work closely with data analysts and subject matter experts.
Data Scientists are in demand, and the salaries for US-based professionals can easily reach six-figure levels (about $120K + benefits according to Indeed). The number of data science jobs is expected to grow by 24% over the next five years. But do you really need a team of data scientists?
Jan
Do You Need To Hire A Data Scientist?
jerry9789 0 comments artificial intelligence, Burning Questions
Is It Time To Hire A Data Scientist?
Data and analytics have taken the business world by storm – finally! It’s been a long time coming though many may say they’ve always used data to support decision making. While true for some, the rise of Data Science from the back office to the boardroom conversations as the most in-demand position is relatively new. From finance and manufacturing to marketing and operations, data science has extended its hand to have application in almost all business aspects.
But what makes this role in such high demand? If you’re contemplating whether or not to build an in-house team, we’ll shed some light on the role Data Scientists play and considerations you’ll want to understand before making a decision.
info@cascadestrategies.com
2032 Newport Way NW,
Issaquah, WA 98027
(425) 677-7430