The Consumer Insights Handbook : Using Audience Research to Make Smart Decisions

Researching audiences is a dynamic and intellectually challenging process that celebrates innovative approaches to consumer desires, needs, and behaviors. Whether you are working on a brand, product, or a strategic campaign, successfully reaching your target audience and meeting your objectives requires good research.

A practical and accessible approach for how to plan for and complete a consumer insights research project from the initial request for proposal (RFP) to the final presentation of findings, this second edition handbook features new real-world examples and techniques and a new chapter on the uses of the latest research technologies and AI. Danielle Sarver Coombs flips the typical model presented in research methods textbooks to emphasize that data should be used to understand people as thoughtful, deliberative audiences. As such, consumer insights research should be done with the goal of better understanding target audiences in a meaningful way. With this orientation in mind, these insight-driven research projects allow decision makers to tap into consumers’ wants, needs, and desires through messaging and products designed to resonate. Guided by the author’s own experience in the field as well as guidance from current practitioners on the client, boutique, and agency sides, this book offers an accessible, thorough, and compelling perspective on how to plan for and complete consumer insights research projects from the initial RFP to the final presentation of findings. Each chapter includes a guide for how to conduct in-class research, quotes and recommendations from experts in the field, and case studies and real-world examples.