THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
The latest industry insights and trends.
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Feature story
Ignite 360 Announces Appointment of Lisa Osborne as New CEO, Succeeding Founder Rob Volpe
Ignite 360, a consumer insights and marketing strategy firm known for its commitment to elevating human understanding to unlock growth for Fortune 500 brands and businesses, announces the appointment of current COO, Lisa Osborne, as the CEO effective Sept. 12 while current CEO and founder, Rob Volpe, is moving into a Chairman position.
Decisions… Decisions… Decisions: Consumer Frustrations in Inflation Laden Grocery Aisles
Mixed messages abound about the state of the economy but one thing is clear, “it’s a wild time” according to consumers. Learn how the Navigating to a New Normal participants and broader US adult population are coping with inflation in Winter 2023.
Two Things Consumers are More Worried About Than You Might Realize
Can you guess which global and societal issues fall just behind food, gas and fuel prices as top consumer worries. One hint: it’s not pollution or climate change.
Storytelling in Uncertain Times: The Questions That Really Matter for Your Business to Succeed
Although the market responded positively to the recent news that the Fed signaled a slowdown on interest rates, by the time you read this, other news may send markets downward. A series of major events have rocked our globe over the past several years—each with devastating human consequences: the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, inflation at a 40-year high. Knowing your customer in times of crisis is critical to safeguarding your business. It provides a roadmap to re-align your strategy to weather the storm. Today, Insights Director John Sularz reveals the essential step you need to take to ensure organizational resiliency during unstable times.
The Best Time to Start Your Data Analysis Report? The Answer May Surprise You.
One of the biggest mistakes in research is beginning the report writing process only after the data comes in. Analysis and story development must be infused at every step of the research and data acquisition process.
COO, Lisa Osborne looks at each research step and what you need to consider to deliver meaningful and actionable analysis.
Quant Data Is Only Half The Story: Write Better Consumer And Market Insights Reports With These Top 3 Tried And True Tools
Do you need help finding the story among fields and fields of transactional data, survey data, or similar information? What motivates, inspires, and prompts certain beliefs, actions, or decisions? The ‘why’ behind it all that informs the most powerful insights and strongest stories? Today, COO Lisa Osborne shares three ideas to successfully integrate elements of qualitative learning into your survey instruments that go beyond the ‘what’ of stated behavior and lead to better consumer and market data insights reports.
The Right Way To Tell A Story With Data: Five Steps That Will Engage And Influence Your Audience Every Time
For researchers, all data is good data, and we love to gather, consider, compare and share it. When it comes to storytelling, however, we must resist the urge to include and show all our data. Today we explain the five steps to effective data storytelling that will engage your audience and influence action.
Stop Confusing Everyone with Your Data and Learn the One Thing You Can Do to Fix It – Starting Now
Did your last research project create more questions than actionable steps? Want to maximize the comprehension and influence of your next project? Today we share the key to unlock the true potential of your research with this one change…
Getting Customers to Spend More
In his book, Dollars and Sense, behavioral economist Dan Ariely talks about the irrational ways we spend money. As marketers, it can be useful to use those same “irrational” mechanisms to get customers to spend more. How do your customers make the decision to spend? Expert researcher and strategist, Jay Zaltzman, explains what you need to know plus 3 critical takeaways to get the most out of your consumer spending research!
10 Reasons You and Your Organization Should be Doing Accessibility Research
According to the CDC, one in 4 U.S. adults – 61 million Americans – have a disability that impacts major life activities. Accessibility research is an important and growing space. Today we break down exactly why understanding accessibility matters for you and your business - and how to make it happen.
How Consumer Insourcing is Impacting You and Your Business (and 3 Steps to Deal with It)
A funny thing happened as life started to open up in summer 2021. People weren’t finding the value and benefit they used to out of their away-from-home experiences. It was more satisfying and rewarding to “insource” and do it themselves. What’s behind this phenomenon and what can your business do about it? Navigating to a New Normal respondents share their experiences.
The Most Exciting, and Terrifying, Time to Be in Consumer Insights
We asked 3 of the brightest client-side insights leaders we know to participate in a roundtable discussion about a range of issues facing the industry today.
Elizabeth Oates, Sr. Director, Consumer Insights at Ulta Beauty, Humayun Rashid, Director, Microsoft 365 Research & Insights, and Marlene Straszewski, former Senior Director, Consumer Insights at General Mills each shared insight and perspective on the evolving role of the consumer, what research methods will be in demand in the future as society opens up again, the power and importance of listening as well as what’s needed from insights agency partners today.
Our #1 system for creating successful stories
You are often swimming in data, reports, and information. You don’t have the time on your weekly priority list to think deeply, you only have time to think about what to get done NOW. But without that Big Idea and story, you won’t know what matters most, what is at stake, and what to do next. You need a system!
Are You Delivering Couch Potato Insights? Activation Workshops Can Help
Whether woven into a project from beginning to end or a stand-alone project, Insights Activations have become a popular tool we utilize to help our clients move their Insights Agendas forward in their organizations. Senior VP, Marie Becker explains how the key to successfully activating on insights (and getting them “off the couch”) hinges largely on our ability to get key stakeholders immersed in the project early on.
Design Forums: The Key to Post-Pandemic Success
Leading change can feel Sisyphean – it’s slow work, with a lot of undeveloped ideas, missing expertise, and lack of consensus. It requires you to have a clear understanding of your audience, the support of key teams, and a BIG creative idea around which to rally. Easy to say on paper, harder to accomplish in real life. Design forums make change a natural process by removing the hurdles.
Juicing Empathy for Better Business Results
How do you turn a squishy skill like empathy into a tool to drive decision making and business results? You juice it, of course!
Consumer Journeys in Flux: The Change You Cannot Wait to Discover Is Happening Right Now
We have entered a “Waiting” period. People waiting to get a vaccine, parents waiting for schools to re-open – and businesses waiting for consumers to embark upon their post-pandemic shopper journeys. But for business, now is not the time to wait. Now is the time to prepare the space for consumers. To inspire you to action – COO Lisa Osborne shares a story of a world-renowned coffee company that went all-in, armed with data and insights to disrupt the stale supermarket coffee aisle – and built a case for innovation.
When Your Ship Doesn’t Come In – 3 Considerations for Post-Pandemic Recovery
Our upside-down pandemic existence has dramatically shifted consumer shopping habits and behaviors – causing shipping nightmares and eroding the health of our finely tuned supply chain forecasts. Whether or not your product is facing a price increase due to shipping or other COGs challenges, your consumer is going to be dealing with price increases on multiple fronts. Here are 3 things your business needs to consider when navigating these new waters.
Chapter 7: 72% of Adults Seek Change Post-pandemic, is Your Business Ready?
An overwhelming number, 72%, of Navigating to a New Normal respondents want some degree of change in their life when the events of 2020 come to a close. In case you missed out on our Chapter 7, 3-part story – here are ALL the insights behind what people value and want to achieve when given a choice – and how your company can prepare for this new future.
Where Do We Go From Here? Re-uniting as Americans.
“What can you do after the election to bring unity and help make the other side successful?” The initial reactions of discomfort and uncertainty from the 16 Navigating to a New Normal participants betrayed a long-standing American Conundrum: we are more comfortable pointing out the problem than being part of the solution. Check out the 5 Key Actions that came out of a conversation around unity.