Applying Anthropology

Why P&G's Global "Persuasion" Strategy is Flawed

2011-06-14T20:10:00.000-07:00

Sure, they’re Procter and Gamble the global packaged goods manufacturer. Yes they are in over 180 countries with some of the most recognized brands globally. But does this make them invincible? Not quite. In fact, like most businesses big and small, they are facing pressure in key regions from their biggest competitors, Unilever and Kimberly-Clark.

In light of this, they’ve openly turned to internal growth as their strategy. By growing share in their current markets they think they can win the race. This part of their strategy may be right on – it’s how they are executing it that could totally miss the mark

In a recent Businessweek article Bob McDonald, the current CEO of P&G outlined his strategy. Alarmingly, he talks about “persuading” customers in various markets to use their products. I think this quote sums it up nicely:

“That means persuading men in India to shave with disposable razors, convincing African women of the benefits of Western feminine hygiene products, and selling more teeth whiteners to Americans.”

Without even going into the ethics of this strategy which could be its own blog post, I’d like to discuss why this strategy will fail in the long run.

One word: culture. The products in our lives are cultural manifestations. They are artifacts that play specific roles in our norms, traditions, rituals, customs, rites, etc., etc., etc. As such, they are imbedded into our lives for specific reasons.

Now, this doesn’t mean that new products cannot be introduced into our lives, or old products re-introduced in new ways. Persuasion however, is not the way to go about it.

This is not dissimilar to the age-old marketing rule that states that acquisition is always more expensive than retention. Persuasion is more expensive than cultural adaptation. In the end persuasion is like pushing a boulder up a hill. It’s hard, it’s strenuous and the likelihood of it’s success is limited.

Instead, by taking the emic approach (design anthropology, user experience…) and creating new products or adapting existing products to seamlessly fit within cultures, they will find quicker and more sustainable adoption. Culture cannot be forced, nor can artifacts be forced into cultures. But brands and products can find long-term and happy homes through altruistic understanding of how they fit into the bigger picture. And this I believe is much more in line with Procter & Gamble’s stated purpose:

“We will provide branded products and services of superior quality and value that improve the lives of the world’s consumers, now and for generations to come. As a result, consumers will reward us with leadership sales, profit and value creation, allowing our people, our shareholders and the communities in which we live and work to prosper.”

Want to Understand Human Experience, Take the 3rd Rock from the Sun Approach

2011-05-12T09:47:00.000-07:00

I’m sure I’m not the first to make this comparison, but I probably am the first to refer to it in about a decade…I was watching the very first episode of 3rd Rock from the Sun. You remember, the show with John Lithgow, Kristen Johnston, and a young Joseph Gordon-Levitt where a family of aliens from another planet come to earth to study humans. They take the form of humans and place themselves in a family situation with jobs, school, etc. The sitcom is driven by their discovery of how humans live – traditions, rituals, child rearing, education, humor – all of the things that compose our culture.

It dawned on me, that while their approach is comedic, it is an excellent anthropological approach for understanding the human experience. As anthropologists, researchers, and marketers, there are a few things we can learn from these goofy aliens:

Assume you don’t understand – Go in with an alien perspective and keep that perspective as long as you can. Take the approach that you are experiencing whatever it is for the first time. What are you curious about? What seems to stand out? Ask questions and dissect the pieces until you truly have an insider’s perspective.

Insert yourself – The way you will learn about the experiences of others is to experience it yourself, but keep that alien perspective while you are doing it. In anthropology we call this participant observation. Be part of as much as you can. If it means awkwardly inviting yourself to weddings, or over to someone’s house, you should do it (within reason of course). Which leads to my next suggestion.

Have no shame – There’s no place for shame in this exercise. There really are no stupid questions or requests. It might be humorous to those around you, but they will ultimately understand that your inquiries are part of a quest to truly understand their experience.

Partner with guides – Find someone who is an insider and make them your friend. When you earn their trust, they will share more with you and act as a gate keeper, getting you information or into places that you otherwise wouldn’t be permitted.

Have fun – Don’t take it too seriously. Human inquiry is a fun endeavor. Look at every new research opportunity as one to learn new things and have fun. Sure the joke might be on you, but in the end, nailing the human experience will be no joke. It will drive results for your customers and ultimately your business.

Back to the Future: What Paper Surveys Can Teach Us About Online Survey Design

2011-05-04T11:39:00.000-07:00

Today, for the first time in my professional career, I had to design a paper survey. This was an interesting experience, because I’m used to using software like Survey Monkey or Zoomerang where I just choose the type of question and then create the text components. Sure I probably could have created the survey in one of these programs and then printed it out, but I decided to do it the old fashioned way.

What I took away from this experience was that this was a great exercise in survey design. Ultimately, while online surveys allow us many freedoms and are in theory easier to compose, we should stick to the principles of paper surveys, even when doing them online.

Here are the challenges/principles that I faced:

1. Brevity – There’s only a limited number of questions you can fit on an 8x11 sheet of paper, even back and front. This meant that I had to really hone in on what it was I was trying to get at, and I could not boil the ocean. And even online, who wants to spend 20 minutes filling out a survey?

2. Usability – How can I make this survey an easy and positive experience for respondents? What font size and spacing are most appealing? How should I lay out that likert scale?

3. Design – How do I make sure that the survey is visually designed in a way that represents my client’s brand and looks professional enough to deliver to their clients.

4. Prototype – How does all of this come together in the end? Once I finished mocking up my survey in word, I wanted to see how it would translate to paper. I found myself printing the survey with multiple font sizes, and I caught errors in grammar and spelling. It is always a best practice to test your surveys online or off on yourself and probably a few others.

Can you think of more? I’d love to hear them!

The Usability of Ravioli

2011-04-29T19:56:00.000-07:00

Tonight, my almost thirty, married self learned how to cook packaged ravioli properly for the first time. This is a staple that fed me through grad school, that I’ve had the skills to make for probably twenty plus years, and yet it’s taken this long for me to make it properly

Why?

Well you just boil water, throw it in and cook right? Apparently not.

When I read the directions on my Rising Moon Organics Wild Chanterelle Mushroom Ravioli (which is delicious by the way) I learned that to get the true ravioli experience, it’s a bit more careful than boil and eat.

Apparently you should never throw ravioli into a rolling boil, but instead should turn the heat down after the water comes to a boil, and at that point put the ravioli in. Then instead of draining it in a strainer, you should scoop them out with a strained spoon. It’s those few details that create a truly delicious ravioli experience.

It was at this moment, that I had a customer experience epitome. You can lead a ravioli to water, but that doesn’t mean it will be cooked properly. We need to understand how customers experience our company or product in situ to truly know whether or not they are experiencing it as intended.

Too many companies out there assume they know how people engage. I’m sure other ravioli packages have the proper instructions, but what difference does it make if their customers don’t read it? Had I not stopped to read the directions, I never would have made this realization.

So thank you Rising Moon Organics for not assuming I knew how to make the most of your product.

Part 3 - Inspiration: What primary, qualitative research provides, that no other means can

2011-04-27T17:11:00.000-07:00

Another reason that I love primary qualitative research is the output. Ethnography in its best form is multi-media and multi-dimensional. It’s a combination of text, video, voice, and photographs. Most importantly, a key tenet of ethnography is storytelling.

Unfortunately, I can’t tell you the number of research deliverables or presentations I’ve seen that clearly have no shelf life beyond that single moment in time. They are boring, wordy, and full of numbers. Ad Age recently wrote about how this is hurting the industry here. So tell me, why spend thousands of dollars on research that is a one-hit wonder?

We all know the power of good storytelling. Ethnography and other in-context methods can produce some really amazing stories told through narrative and video. When compiled properly they are not only insightful, but they are inspirational and they live well beyond the research deliverable and final presentation.

It’s amazing how we or our clients can tell a story about one of our customers, but when you hear it from the horses mouth in a video or audio clip, it has exponential power. Time and again I’ve seen stories like these retold again and again, up through the ranks even to the C-Suite of Fortune 500 companies. This is a power that I have yet to see from quantitative research - but I'm sure some people get inspired by numbers :)

Part 2 - Context: What primary, qualitative research provides, that no other means can

2011-03-14T14:31:00.000-07:00

This is where lab settings and quantitative methods fail. Sure there are focus groups, and other qualitative and quantitative methods that can be interesting in a lab setting, but they are only telling part of the story, and the accuracy of that story can be questionable (I’m not going to debate focus groups in this post). What is missing is context, which illustrates what people do, not just what they say they do as well as all of the things that go on around what they are doing. This knowledge can lead to insights and innovations that could only be gained by in-context observations.

In-context research reveals many more options than the ones that you bring to a focus group, or that your participants can think up or rationalize on the spot. It shows us things that maybe aren’t recognized as important, but really are.

Who cares what your product is supposed to do. If you don’t understand how it actually fits into people’s real lives then you will never be able to truly design a good product or experience and then market it properly.

By understanding the context that surrounds products and services, we are able to suggest innovations, improvements and communications that truly resonate with people. The upfront costs of this are definitely more expensive, but the ROI on this investment will definitely have positive ROI if done right.

Part 1 - Inherent Understanding: What primary, qualitative research provides, that no other means can

2011-03-04T09:34:00.000-08:00

When we talk about ethnography, we often talk about what it is going to do for design or marketing communication. What is often unrecognized, (always reality once you’ve done it) is that it is a powerful means of discovery and business immersion for us, the agency, on behalf of our clients - of course in addition to the plethora of design and communication insights that will be garnered.

Yes, as anthropologists, consultants and marketers, it is our job to immerse ourselves in our client’s business. However, there is only so much that can be gained from stakeholder interviews and existing research immersion. I’d suggest that this can get us 80% there. But, it’s that other 20% that can really make business-changing differences.

By actually meeting with current and future customers/users, we get an understanding that gets us closer to an etic (insider) understanding, which can only lend to us being more successful on behalf of our clients. The process of designing, conducting, analyzing, and synthesizing custom research provides a level of insights and empathy that cannot be gained through other means.

Furthermore, there is a clear difference in the caliber of insights, innovation, and design that is produced from people who truly understand the business, the marketplace AND consumers, when compared to those who don’t.

While a 12-week, global ethnographic study need not be necessary, some form of primary, immersive customer research is always worth fighting the good fight for.

New Series: What primary, qualitative research provides, that nothing else can

2011-03-02T15:43:00.000-08:00

In my next attempt at a blog series, I'd like to discuss and solicit conversation about the unique benefits of primary, qualitative (hopefully ethnographic!) research.

It is something that as anthropologists and researchers in business we are constantly struggling to argue and articulate. This becomes particularly interesting for marketers "In the Age of Analytics." If we have data, why do we need more?

I've created an initial list of topics that I hope to cover. This is clearly just a start, and I hope that as a community, we can come up with a comprehensive list and seal-tight articulation. As such, please feel free to agree, disagree, edit and add.

For Starters:

Business Immersion
Context
"Why?!"

Anthropology, The Oscars and the Creation of Personas

2011-02-28T10:02:00.000-08:00

Like much of the country, I watched the Oscars this weekend. As I witnessed various Hollywood talent receive their awards, I started to reflect on what makes a good actor or actress. How do they transform from character to character, and how does this differ from who they are in real life?

As I got to thinking about this, I realized that the key to good acting is ethnography at it’s finest. It’s studying and understanding a character so deeply that you can embody them (the inside-out perspective, if you will). While anthropology doesn’t go as far as to try to play the people we study, in my particular line of anthropology I’d argue that we actually have a harder job in the creation of tools like personas.

Let’s start by looking at the Wikipedia definition for personas. It states, “A personality, in the word's everyday usage, is a social role or a character played by an actor.” If we took out the phrase, “played by an actor,” would that be very different from the definition of personas in marketing?

The marketing specific definition states, “Personas are fictional characters created to represent the different user types within a targeted demographic, attitude and/or behavior set that might use a site, brand or product in a similar way.” What I’m interpreting is that the only difference is in the execution – actors “play” the character, while marketers deliver them on paper.

Ultimately when developing the marketing version of personas, both of those definitions apply. In developing personas, they should be real, believable, and hopefully Oscar worthy. They need to include such attention to detail that they can be used as a strategy and design tool. In some ways, I’d argue that those developing personas have to go one step beyond acting because their “characters” must transfer to the other players in the production seamlessly so that anyone member of the troupe can play that role.

Good personas are the result of a three step process: research to gain an ethnographic understanding of target audiences, the embodiment of those archetypes through analysis and synthesis of that research, and the creation of a performance of those characters that can stand up to the toughest critics.

So is anthropology that different from acting? Maybe there’s a career change in my future…Or maybe Los Angeles is getting to my head.

Earning Client Buy-In on Ethnography

2010-03-15T16:03:00.000-07:00

This isn’t the first time that I’ve discussed the difficulty of selling ethnography within the private sector. For business standards, ethnography has a lot working against it – it’s time intensive, it’s cost intensive, it doesn’t yield hard numbers that executives lean on, and it receives a lot of scrutiny for small sample sizes.

Some clients will never get over these so-called “drawbacks”, but if there’s even a twinge of interest, there’s a way to increase your success rate while maintaining the integrity of ethnography: Involve your client in the research-planning phase.

This starts with an initial meeting with the client to determine exactly what they want to learn. If what they are wanting lends to ethnographic research, then write down quotes from the conversation that illustrate the need.

The next step is to plan a working session with your client, where you will map out the research plan together. I’m not going to get into the logistics of how this is done (ask me independently if you are interested) – but ultimately what you are seeking to do is make the client feel like they own the ethnography. They help plan it, they come to understand the value of it, and they are much more likely to take it back to their leadership and push harder for approval than they would with a proposal they weren’t involved in developing.

Is Undercover Boss Guerilla Ethnography?

2010-03-03T09:17:00.000-08:00

There’s a new show on CBS called Undercover Boss where C-suite executives from companies like 7-Eleven, Waste Management, and White Castle go undercover within their own companies. Over the course of a week they try a series of jobs on the front line of their organizations and learn invaluable lessons about their companies.

While their methods and practices certainly don’t comply with the ethical guidelines of the AAA (American Anthropology Association), what they are revealing is that ethnography can be a valuable tool for turning the lens on our own organizations.

It is participant-observation that gives them an honest and uncensored view of their company from the perspectives of the work force. In each episode, the executives learn things they never would have thought to consider, how their policies are impacting the front line, and the realities of their employees’ professional and personal lives.

What we can all take away from this is that the view from the corner office is extremely myopic. Executives don’t have to go undercover to see what’s happening within their companies. Instead, they should be spending time on a consistent basis understanding the day-to-day happenings at all levels. Over time, they will find that their perspectives widen and when they make decisions in the boardroom, they will increasingly positively impact efficiency, effectiveness, and moral.

Reciprocity – Fact or Fiction in Marketing?

2009-08-17T18:05:00.000-07:00

A key element of ethnography is reciprocity – giving back to those you study. It can come in many forms during fieldwork, from physical gifts or service, to a written history of a group’s culture. But how does this concept translate to marketing?

Last week on Twitter I posed the question of whether or not reciprocity is possible in marketing and advertising. Many people said no, but those who said yes had two perspectives. One that reciprocity is possible, but it is very controlled and manufactured. The second group argued that social media and the internet are forcing marketers to be reciprocal if they want to survive.

I’m going to have to agree with the latter position. Sure, not all brands are giving back as much as they’re asking for – but that’s not a sustainable model. The internet has democratized marketing and advertising. People now have the power to learn the truth about brands and have an infinite forum for expressing their opinions both good and bad. As a result, brands have had to give up control and try harder to form a symbiotic relationship with people.

As an anthropologist in marketing, I find comfort in this transformation of the field knowing that the research I do aims to understand how we can build relationships – not to learn about people so that we can exploit them. If we (marketers and anthropologists) do it right, we can reverse the bad reputation that marketing has earn the loyalty and evangelism of people because reciprocity is a given, not a pleasant “surprise and delight”.

What do you think – is it a dream or a foreseeable reality?

Us vs. The Other

2009-08-02T06:52:00.000-07:00

In Anthropology we spend endless hours discussing “Us vs. The Other”. It’s social, political, educational - you name it. The anthropologist vs. those she studies. The school administrator vs. the children he teaches. There’s a constant struggle as we walk the line that divides us from them.

In marketing, the debate goes unspoken, but it exists at the core of what we do. Recently AdWeek reported on a study that found that Ad people had different perspectives on what makes an ad effective than the general public. No, really?

Walk around any ad agency and you will hear constant banter about our consumers or customers, not people – or in many cases us, our significant others, children or friends.

In my last posting I discussed authenticity and the role it plays in both marketing and anthropology – if we apply that to the “us vs. the other” debate, then authenticity means breaking down the walls between marketing-types and customers. Just as Julia Child broke down the walls between French cuisine and the American people, marketers should simply be striving toward erasing “The Other.”

In the new marketing democracy where people choose when, where and how they interact with brands, in order to truly find success we must stop thinking of them as consumers or customers and begin approaching them as people. It is from that perspective that we will be able to create the most effective relationships between brands and people, because we will be designing and creating for the actual needs and desires of people, not what we as marketers assume they need and want.

What Marketers and Anthropologists Alike Can Learn from Julia Child: Authenticity

2009-07-21T06:27:00.000-07:00

Vanity Fair recently published an article on Julia Child five years after her death and approaching the eve of the new movie “Julie and Julia.” Now I must admit that while I know the name and to some extent the character, Julia is a little bit before my time. As I read this article, I realized what a feat Julia accomplished having successfully translated French cooking into an American masterpiece.

Born to a wealthy American family, Julia ended up in France through life choices and happenstance. It was there that she discovered her love for French cuisine and wanted to share that love with the United States. To do this, she not only had to literally translate the recipes to use American ingredients and measurements, but also had to construct the guide in a way that worked in an American kitchen. Julia nailed something that both anthropologists and marketers strive to achieve – authenticity.

Julia was a true Anthropologist. While she didn’t have the degree, she did exactly what anthropologists do. It was her love for French cooking that drove her to study the cuisine to a near native level. She worked tirelessly to construct an inside-out view of the food and culture that is such an integral part of France, using participant observations and many of the other tenets of ethnography. Then she had to work backwards to deconstruct all of the elements she had learned and use her native understanding of her audience to authentically translate this in a way that was culturally relevant in the United States. Through this process she wrote her ethnography in the form of a cookbook.

The authenticity of this ethnography was proven through the marketing success the book achieved. Selling over 600,000 copies by 1969 (a huge accomplishment for the 1960s) Julia achieved something that many had failed at before. The point here is that authenticity goes a long way when you are trying to sell something. Whether it is cookbooks, bottles of wine, or children’s toys this remains the same: we should all strive to be anthropologists in our own right. Having an authentic offering positioned in a meaningful way for your audience is the foundation for success for anthropologists, marketers and world-class chefs alike.

New Series Coming Soon

2009-07-15T14:31:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking a lot lately about where I want to take this blog.

The first thing I need to do is to increase the frequency with which I blog. In order to that, I want to create a series of topics that will keep me writing for a while.

The first series I'd like to introduce is: Applying Classic Anthropology Debates to Marketing.

In this series I plan on exploring things like authenticity, Us vs. The Other, reciprocity and "studying in". All of these debates that happen consistently within the academic anthropology realm, have very real applications to the marketing world, and I'd like to discuss how they can be applied to make marketing more meaningful, real, and in turn, effective.

Please join me in debate, suggest topics, and enjoy!

Why there’s still benefit in doing things the "Old Fashioned" way

2009-07-13T13:17:00.000-07:00

I’ve talked a lot before about how one of the major deltas between the business and anthropology worlds is the speed at which ethnography can be conducted. There’s great benefit in ethnographic research, however to do it right takes a lot of time, which in the business world usually makes it too costly from time and financial perspectives.

There are many anthropologists out there who are attempting to solve for maintaining the integrity of ethnographic research, while speeding the process to fit within real-world business situations.

Today I’m sitting here, for the first time since graduate school coding field notes. As I’m doing it, I realize the value in the very process of ethnography. First of all, I can’t just summarize the research – I have to actually read through all the notes that were gathered on this project. Then I have to start looking for patterns in the data by creating codes that correlate with the content. Then finally I have to re-read the notes and apply the codes.

By the time I actually get to quantifying the patterns in the data set, I’ve read the notes that were collected at least three times. I am so familiar with them, that the patterns are jumping off the page at me.

This not only makes writing the report a breeze, it also makes for a very rich document. Had I not gone through this process, I might have just pulled out points that stuck out at the time of conducting the research. Instead, more nuanced findings are identified and reported.

We’ll see how the client reacts to the report, but I’m hoping to employ this process more often in my day-to-day work.

Data Visualization and Anthropology

2009-05-20T06:38:00.000-07:00

Data Visualization (DV) is all the buzz in marketing. While everyone is rushing around trying to figure out how they can apply it to their business, I wanted to take a moment to discuss how the discipline of anthropology might benefit from DV.

Traditionally, anthropology is not a quantitative science. All Anthropologists are trained in some form of quantitative methods, and analysis – but our essence is in things observational or qualitative. However, that does not mean that we can’t use data visualization to help organize our data into quickly digestible elements for our client presentations, or in our own analysis to help us identify patterns in our field notes.

Here are a few of my thoughts on how we might use DV. I would love your input on additional applications.

Identifying Patterns in the Data: When using an ethnographic coding software such as Atlas.ti there’s a function where you can export a word count into an excel sheet and how many times they are mentioned in the notes. You can feed this list into one of many word cloud generators on Wordle (http://cli.gs/N31M5H) and it will show you which words “pop”. This can help you easily identify patterns in your field notes or transcripts.

Quantifying Findings: One of the biggest challenges for an anthropologist is the need to balance qualitative with quantitative. More often than not, clients want a quantitative element to their research projects, or at minimum want “proof” of our findings. Data visualization tools can help us put a “wow” factor in our presentations. IBM’s Many Eyes http://cli.gs/Gm8VZDis an open-source site where people make thousands of visualizations. The site allows you to enter your own data into the system and customize the various charts and graphs.

Find and Visualize Online Artifacts: Anthropologists (at least from what I’ve seen academically) are just starting to become attuned to plethora of data and artifacts that are publicly available online. Photo and video sites such as Flickr and YouTube are chock full of artifacts that we can draw upon to further contextualize our work. Tools such as Tag Galaxy (http://cli.gs/yYa5Tq) allow you to type in a keyword and see related tags and the photos that are associated with them.

There’s no doubt many more applications for data visualization to anthropology. The point here is that applied anthropologists have to make their findings accessible to their clients and the people they study. Data visualization is a great toolbox/practice that will support the discipline in presenting findings in a way that is mutually comprehendible and visually pleasing – especially in business. I see the field of data visualization as a way to continue to bridge the gap between the academy and the field, as anthropologists continue to work to find the right formula for conducting valid ethnography within the time and money constraints of the business world.

The Challenges of Corporate Anthropology

2009-04-22T08:41:00.000-07:00

Harvard Business Tip of the Day: "Use Anthropology to Get to Know Your Customers"

It's always a bit amusing to me when anthropology and ethnography are presented as a novel and straightforward way to learn more about consumers. The blog posting (http://tinyurl.com/c5hf3f) goes on to say that P&G and Google are using anthropology to learn more about new customers and new markets.

Shouldn't we be using anthropology for ALL customers and ALL markets? The basic premise is understanding the world from your customer's point of view, which informs everything from strategy to product development - something that is useful for every project we work on.

The conversation starter provided by Harvard asks where else people have seen anthropology applied successfully and where it has fallen short. I’d like to argue that where anthropology falls short is where it is not applied appropriately. It is not as though “applying anthropology” is an easy thing to do. There are practitioners out there with advanced degrees and years of experience who are still trying to figure it out, so I dislike anthropology being presented as something that corporations can just pick up and turn on, subsequently producing great insights.

In the business world we are faced with tight deadlines and budgets. Ethnography is not something that you can do overnight and get right. The challenge for anthropologists and other market researchers is to find ways of satisfying both sides of the puzzle.

The conversation in my mind should be more about how we conduct ethnography within the constraints of the corporate world. What methods have worked for people, and what have fallen short?

Local Marketing in a Global World

2009-04-21T07:04:00.000-07:00

Global marketing is a tricky feat. For years we’ve been trying to figure out “glocalization” or the concept of global marketing on a local level. While there are hundreds of case studies where local translations have gone wrong and missed the point culturally, we’re now seeing the reverse issue where local campaigns are receiving global backlash.

Last week there was outrage against Burger King’s Texican Whopper, "the taste of Texas with a little spicy Mexican." The commercial featured a tall cowboy with a short and round Mexican wrestler clad in an outfit resembling the Mexican flag. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwpNQWrD8PY&feature=player_embedded)

While this commercial might have been successful on the local level (I’m not sure locally what the impact was), what marketers did not expect was that the commercial would be heard about in Latin America. Almost immediately there was an uproar from Mexico and other Latin American countries. The Mexican ambassador to Spain, Jorge Zemeno, immediately publicly denounced the commercial.

What marketers and anthropologists alike are learning from case studies such as this, is that as consumers become more interconnected through social media and global brands, the reach of our work grows larger and larger. So how do we balance both sides of the global/local equation making sure that our campaigns are locally relevant but globally sensitive?

Crispen Porter in Europe created this commercial. I’d bet that had they consulted with their U.S. or Latin American counter parts, they probably would have been forewarned on the cultural sensitivities they might upset with this content. It’s a clear sign that Crispen Porter, a leader in ad creativity, is not a single global brand, but rather a collection of regional brands sharing the same name.

Sure, having anthropologists or other cross-cultural experts working with your teams is helpful, but co-operation is the name of the game in this global world. As global marketing brands, we must unify the delta between our regional affiliates. While this gets complicated in terms of P&Ls and they way each country’s office is run, brands that don’t form strong partnerships between their global offices are going to face blunders like this.

In the very least, when creating campaigns with references to other cultures, contact someone with some local expertise or run the concept by your colleagues in that country – hopefully they can tell you if you are going to hit a soft spot or not.

A New Cultural Paradigm

2009-02-13T10:03:00.000-08:00

As we head into 2009, we are inundated with talk about the recession, the credit crunch, the housing crisis, the stimulus package, and on, and on, and on...There’s no doubt that the marketplace and many individuals find themselves in a frenzy.

If we step back however, and analyze the situation from a cultural and anthropological perspective it’s quite interesting to see what is going on. We are witnessing a number of micro-cultural shifts that together are forming a new cultural paradigm on a macro level.

We are experiencing a shift in our culture of consumption. Our social currency, rituals, and beliefs are changing right before our eyes. And while we can’t at this point name it, if I had to bet on it, I would say that the cultural and behavioral changes that are occurring in response to this economic crisis are going to permanently change the way that we as people consume for generations to come.

Gone are the days of mass conspicuous consumption and unquestioned trust in corporations. What people are experiencing today from the job market to the supermarket is going to have lasting cultural and psychological effects. We have already seen that consumers are being much more careful about their purchases. Furthermore they are fully skeptical of corporate executives. Brands and companies must more than ever prove their value through quality, transparency and generosity – because the culture of consumption has changed indefinitely.

As our clients continue to come to us for answers and advice on how they can make it through these times, remember that it’s not just about surviving today. Price cuts and discounts are a temporary tactic that will only undermine their brands once things get better. We have to remind ourselves and our clients that once the economy recovers from this mess, people are not going back to their old ways. Now is the time to solidify our spot as players in this new cultural paradigm.

A Refreshing Look at Ethnography in the Corporate World - A Post-Mortem on the Forrester Consumer Forum

2008-11-14T13:02:00.000-08:00

Two weeks ago I attended Forrester’s Consumer Forum in Dallas Texas. For those of you not familiar with Forrester, it is a research company that produces analyst reports on business, especially in the realm of technology. Every year they hold a Consumer Forum where marketers, researchers, and business folks from both the client and agency sides gather to learn about consumers. This year the topic was “Keeping Ahead of Tomorrow’s Consumer.”

At the conference we heard from leaders at American Airlines, Blockbuster and Citi, as well as leading analysts from Forrester itself. I was fortunate enough to sit down with Josh Burnoff, a Forrester Analyst and co-author of Groundswell (a fabulous book on social technologies that you should pick up if you haven’t already). While hearing from all of these high profile business people was fabulous, the highlight of the conference for me was a session on Qualitative and Quantitative methods.

This session had two speakers on research. One was from a market research company and the other from Wells Fargo. The latter is the one I want to mention today.

As a practicing anthropologist in the field of marketing, I often hear and read about ethnographic research. However, as most anthropologists will attest, this is quasi-ethnography at best. Most of this type of research in business encompasses some limited methodologies of ethnography, but misses the main point of understanding people in their native setting in an attempt to understand them from the inside out. When I heard that this speaker was going to be talking about ethnography, I was curious, but of course skeptical.

To my surprise and delight, she presenting a refreshing perspective on ethnographic research. Each year, Wells Fargo conducts one ethnographic study. Understanding that true ethnographic research is both resource and time intensive, they don’t try to cut corners and thus only conduct one such study a year.

While I’m happy to give you details about the study itself and the results presented - the point here is that companies that are doing true ethnographic research are seeing significant return on their investment. It’s certainly tempting to cost-cut and speed to market with traditional marketing research such as surveys and focus groups, but those only present what people say, not what they do. As any anthropologist and many market researchers will tell you, what people say and what people do are very different. Ethnographic research takes both of these views in context to gain a deeper understanding than most methods.

As an anthropologist in business I am constantly looking for innovative ways to conduct ethnography. Wells Fargo has given me hope that ethnography is not just a myth in the corporate world. I believe that social technologies provide a means to do this in a way that satisfies the time and cost restrictions that exist in an applied context. I look forward to discovering and discussing the progression of ethnographic research over the next few years.

The Ethics of Blog Monitoring

2008-10-31T09:04:00.000-07:00

In the corporate world blog monitoring is becoming a more and more popular means of conducting primary research. Unlike focus groups or one-on-one interviews, the blogosphere is seen as an uninhibited universe where consumers discuss anything and everything without the influence of researchers or other respondents. And it makes total sense – consumers are literally living out part of their lives online. We certainly cannot ignore what they are doing there. Furthermore, it is proven that what people say about products, service and brands has significant impact on buyer behavior. How many times have you researched a product online before buying it?

Having done blog monitoring first hand, I know that the insights that emerge are rich and valuable. But as an anthropologist, ethics have been engrained into my brain. I can’t think of a single graduate course I took that didn’t spend a significant portion of the time discussing the ethics of conducting anthropological research. I committed to being candid about who I am and why I’m conducting research. Also, I promised to reciprocate for the things that I learned. And finally, I pledged to make my findings open to the public for the greater good of the communities I study. But there are some major conflicts here. How does this translate to the online space, where the identity of myself and those I study are often anonymous? This is further complicated by the fact that as the employee of a corporation, my findings are more often than not proprietary.

I’ll admit, that while I made these promises and I’ve certainly pondered the ethics of this type of research I don’t have all the answers. I’d like to think that the work I do studying the blogosphere in the end is for the greater good, rather than an attempt to sell people more things and services they don’t need. Often my findings identify need gaps and concerns that consumers have, allowing my clients to address them. But what would consumers say if they knew that their blog was being monitored. Would they change what they wrote?

I wonder who’s looking at my blog right now…?