Our most asked
questions
- Trends and innovation
- Idea/concept development and refinement
- Consumer/category/market understanding
- Marketing mix optimization
Please read on to hear more about each of these areas.
We believe that we must innovate for the future – not for today. We know that the best innovations anticipate where consumers and markets are going and why. And we define innovation broadly – it’s not just product/service innovation; it’s also communication innovation, retail innovation, etc.
JRI believes strongly in establishing meaningful platforms to guide the innovation process. These platforms serve as pillars for exploration and ideation. They’re often based on a combination of relevant broad consumer trends, market dynamics, insights from adjacent and not-so-adjacent categories, social media influencers, consumer need states, consumer pain points, and other considerations.
JRI has developed and refined a toolbox of techniques and approaches for conducting idea generation sessions that are focused on eliciting less-obvious, future-forward ideas from clients, influencers, consumers, and often ourselves. And we’ve even developed a future-oriented testing protocol to screen these ideas.
We believe that delighting consumers in a differentiated way and creating and maintaining concept/ product “harmony” throughout the innovation process is paramount. We’re also guided by the reality that, in this world of clutter and short attention spans, ideas need to be articulated in a succinct, engaging way.
We are experienced writers with a long record of successes – and that’s half the battle. JRI also frequently relies on our social media influencer community for honest, constructive feedback and recommendations. Why influencers? Because we know that what the influencers deem as “sharable” with their followers is a great indicator of relevance, differentiation, and clarity.
And we have developed a proprietary testing protocol for concepts that leverages all of the above points.
JRI has a portfolio of approaches that help a diverse group of clients develop a better feel for consumers and markets. Often, these are organized into multi-faceted, ongoing programs. Elements may include:
- Trend framework development and tracking – We identify a set of broad consumer/market trends that are relevant to the client’s business, with an emphasis on how these trends are evolving and uncovering the resulting opportunities. JRI’s proprietary annual “What’s Hot/What’s Not” study helps identify and evaluate the manifestations of these trends as they unfold. And our custom Trendscape reports feature deep dives into these trends.
- Consumer squads – JRI designs programs that allow clients from multifunctional groups to experience consumers in an up close and personal way. One approach is through the use of consumer panels, including generational groups such as Gen Zers. This allows clients to personally interact with consumers in a guided, meaningful way. And we always orient our clients so that they can have effective, stress-free consumer interactions.
- Innovation Fairs – We frequently organize events (IRL or virtual) at which our clients get to experience, hands on, a broad array of products and services that are relevant to the issue at hand – for example exploring what’s new in health and wellness across categories. These events are often followed by ideation sessions to turn observations into opportunities.
- Trend Treks – JRI curates a set of interesting, engaging locations for clients to visit, usually over the course of a day, with JRI as your tour guide. The emphasis in on exploring companies/individuals who have created unique ways of leveraging consumer/market trends across a number of categories/markets, many of which may be quite removed from the client’s categories. Because often the best new ideas come from the outside!
We’re experienced, intuitive moderators who have a reputation for conducting effective, engaging qualitative research – online or in person. We love projective techniques – when they add substantially to our understanding.
And we also have rich quantitative research experience, which enables our clients to ask us to help them design, manage, and analyze quantitative studies in partnership with a quantitative research firm (one of our strategic partners or our client’s choice). This promotes continuity and efficiency.
