Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Nishat Mehta, President of IRI, a leading provider of big data, predictive analytics, and forward-looking insights that help CPG, OTC healthcare, retailers, and media companies grow their businesses. They discuss some of Nishat’s Aha! moments, whether the carrot or the stick approach to management is more effective, and why consumer behavior has been more geared towards variety in recent years. They also delve into the difficulty of trying to attain brand loyalty in recent years and why the context surrounding consumer data is more important than the data on its own.

Nishat is the President of IRI and recently became the President of Global Solutions at Circana. He was the SVP of Brand Media and Customer Communications at 84.51˚ and a Forbes council member. Nishat got his Bachelor’s degree in Applied Mathematics and his Master’s in Computer Science at the prestigious Harvard University! 

This is one episode you don’t want to miss!

KEY TAKEAWAYS

👉Nishat’s background originally began in mathematics and computer science, but he admits that he doesn’t use any of it in his current work. However, he says learning about debugging components and thinking about how they come back together is a skill that applies to everything in life, whether working a job as a general manager or planning a wedding. It’s helped him learn to apply various skills in his career.

👉We all know the idea of the “carrot and stick” approach of reward and punishment, and Nishat says that he’s had experiences with managers and mentors in his career where both have worked for him. He says, however, that people are far more motivated by the “carrot” (reward) method. Trying to lead through fear of punishment will not yield positive results, only rushed and half-baked ones.

👉When it comes to consumer behavior, Nishat believes that we need to personalize their experience; after all, no two people are the same, so assuming that the entire world’s population is consumers is just a sweeping generalization based on an outdated idea of demographics. Even before COVID, people were doing things only made popular because of the pandemic: using hand sanitizer every day, mixing their own drinks, and working from home. They weren’t a majority, but they were people that were ignored in favor of demographics.

👉We always talk about how the pandemic changed consumer insights and behaviors, but we often get too bogged down in the details, failing to offer a concise explanation for it. But Nishat explains it as this: “For a host of reasons, we had to become more welcoming of variety, and we’ve seen that as both a positive and a challenge to the industry”.

👉It is no longer acceptable to jump onto a big consumer trend and put all your resources into it because trends, by their very definition, will fade and go away, and people will move on to the next thing. There will be consumers that stay with that trend, but if brands put all their eggs into one particular basket, then they will miss out on everything else. 

👉Consumers will always be looking for variety, and every consumer is different. In some categories, consumers are all about efficiency, in others, they might be about experience. It’s about their values, thoughts and, what means something to them. It’s about keeping a pulse on what’s going on with the consumer's mindset and how it’s changing over time.

👉More data isn’t going to give us more clarity, at least not on its own. It’s the context surrounding the data that will help us understand how consumers think; everything is always about context. After all, what makes consumers who they are aren’t their demographics, but rather the values that drive their decisions. 

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6 
Episode Resources

• Nishat Mehta’s LinkedIn
• Nishat Mehta’s Twitter
• IRI
• 84.51
• Circana

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Leslie Talbot, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Corporate Visions. They delve into whether writers and marketers feel imprisoned by SEO, rendering them unable to tell a story, how you can beat your imposter syndrome, and why storytelling is such a scientific, vital part of working with customers.

Leslie is the Senior Vice President of Marketing at Corporate Visions, the leading provider of science-backed sales and marketing training and consulting services. Prior to this, she was the Founder and Principal of G2G Sales Communications, the Director of Content Services at Pragmatech Software (now Qvidian), and a Partner/Senior Writer at Inkable! She’s also written an article titled “Marketing is Moving Further Down the Sales Funnel” - an excellent read!

KEY TAKEAWAYS

👉 We talk a lot about Aha! moments here and the external factors of what led to them, but Leslie argues that it’s the way you respond to situations that create the Aha! moments. You have to ask yourself if where you are right now is where you want to be. She says that once she realized she could make money from writing, an Aha! moment went off in her head: she could combine her love and passion for writing with her sales knowledge to start a whole new career!

👉 If you’re not careful, your imposter syndrome will be your downfall; you need to trust yourself and your work. When people are telling you that you’re good at something, listen to them and, more importantly, trust what they’re saying is true. Leslie believed that her dreams of writing were a childish pipedream and that she should’ve been focusing on business and sales, but the world and the people around her just kept pushing her to do more!

👉 Leslie says that, at Corporate Visions, there is a massive focus on storytelling because it’s our stories that drive the world; our brains operate through stories. If you don’t understand something, your brain will think up a story to fill in the blanks. If you can tell a story to your customers and make them the hero of their own stories, then you’ll have sold them on your product or service. 

👉 Business people tend to shy away from telling stories, instead choosing to lead with facts and figures. But all business decisions actually come from emotional places. It comes from thinking about what drives a customer to make a certain point, and looking into insights into how they think along with their values. Build your story around where the customer is, rather than just throwing data at them.

👉 The wisdom of conventional marketers isn’t necessarily wrong, but it is limited. There is such a focus on automation and digital marketing recently, but the reason most marketers get into marketing is that they don’t like math and science, and yet those two things are thrown onto them and it can become overwhelming and disheartening. Sometimes the story can get lost because of ‘SEO’. A lot of marketers feel imprisoned by that.

If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Podcasts. Instructions on how to do this are here.

Listen Now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Stephen Griffiths, Director of Consumer Insights at Level2 and Co-founder at Insights Career Network, joins Darshan Mehta. They talk about why companies need customer insight research, the essence of working with cross-functional teams to iterate and measure, and how qualitative and quantitative research gives insights to make informed decisions. 

Stephen is the Director of Consumer Insights at Level2 and the Co-founder of Insights Career Network. He has a deep passion for understanding how consumers behave. His job also entails crafting products and services for companies that solve consumer problems. In his 11+ years in the field, Stephen’s career led him to work with some of the top brands, including General Mills, P&G, Unitedhealth Group, etc. At Level2, he leads the Voice of the Customer (VoC) and consumer research efforts.  

KEY TAKEAWAYS

👉 There are three ways to uncover valuable insights for your company; fast iteration in the real world, external inspiration, and crafting a body of knowledge.

👉 Insights contribute to the growth of a business by showing how business or customer processes work.

👉 When researching data points, distinguish between noise and real insight.

👉 Two ways to differentiate noise and insights are to gather data points by observing trends from open-ended comments and similar products in the market data.

👉 When conducting market research, companies should approach with an analytical mindset and aim to segment the market to create different messages for the diverse and unique personas in the market.

👉Insights are broader than market research. It could be anything from understanding a business opportunity and helping it grow to dig deep beyond facts and observations. 

👉Although gathering as much data as possible is essential, you should sort the body of knowledge to extract only quality data and discard the noise.

👉 When gathering data, seek to strike a balance between qualitative and quantitative data

👉 You can get insight into your business by observing a market category unrelated to yours. 

👉 Businesses need consumer insight to understand underlying needs.

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6

Youtube - https://youtu.be/ccY8cA4_ReA

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Lynn Adelmund, Senior VP of Market Research at Trifecta Research, a leading research and advisory firm serving Fortune 1000 companies and agencies. They discuss some of Lynn’s Aha! moments; how technology has impacted the world of consumer insights; how insight professionals can get too caught up in semantics; and why insights are all about building a connection with customers. They also chat about the overabundance of data, making it more difficult to read and sort through it all!

Lynn is the Senior VP of Market Research at Trifecta Research, but she was previously a Business Insights Manager at Kreg Tool Company, and was also the VP and Chief Insights Officer at GlynnDevins. In fact, for nineteen years she was an Analyst, Manager, and Director of Research over at Informa, proving that she’s more than experienced in all things insights. 

What Lynn doesn’t know about insights simply isn’t worth knowing!

KEY TAKEAWAYS

👉Lynn recalls early on in her career when she was asked to create an analysis for the first time. She pulled out what she thought was a great analytics technique and wrote a great report. However, once it reached the president's desk, he saw that there was a typo and stopped reading immediately. From this, she learned that insights are only as good as the way you communicate them!

👉Any insight professional loves when you figure out what’s driving a consumer. Lynn says that consumers love technology as long as it’s supporting something they love in their life; if someone loves their iPhone, it’ll be because there is something they love on it; someone might love Facebook, not just because it’s Facebook, but because it allows them to connect with their grandchildren. Everything consumers do, they do for the sake of a connection.

👉Insights and research pros can sometimes get a little caught up in the semantics, but Lynn believes that true insight is new knowledge that allows us to better connect with customers and stakeholders. They help us serve customers and allow us to understand them more clearly. 

👉The world of insights has evolved and grown a significant amount in the last few years, and a lot of that growth is due to new technologies and tools. There used to be a time when, in order to get some of the best insights, you had to go door-to-door, but now we have tools that can analyze data and examine customer behaviors and habits, making for more detailed insights. 

👉Despite the fact that new technologies and tools have allowed us to access more data, it is equally just as hard to keep up with that data due to its sheer volume of it. In fact, Lynn mentions that, in certain niche audiences, they’ve gone back to doing telephone interviews rather than gathering data in the new, modern way - it’s almost as if they’ve time-traveled!

👉In order to retrieve good qualitative data, you need to make sure you have decent stakeholder involvement and that you know what you’re doing! Not only that, but you need to ensure you leave your biases behind. Make sure you go into it with an open mind and be ready to listen; don’t go in thinking you already know a topic and that they’re going to confirm what you already know!

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6 
Episode Resources

• Lynn Adelmund LinkedIn
• Trifecta Research 
• Kreg Tool Company 
• GlynnDevins 
• Informa

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Nishat Mehta, President of IRI, a leading provider of big data, predictive analytics, and forward-looking insights that help CPG, OTC healthcare, retailers, and media companies grow their businesses. They discuss some of Nishat’s Aha! moments, whether the carrot or the stick approach to management is more effective, and why consumer behavior has been more geared towards variety in recent years. They also delve into the difficulty of trying to attain brand loyalty in recent years and why the context surrounding consumer data is more important than the data on its own.

Nishat is the President of IRI and recently became the President of Global Solutions at Circana. He was the SVP of Brand Media and Customer Communications at 84.51˚ and a Forbes council member. Nishat got his Bachelor’s degree in Applied Mathematics and his Master’s in Computer Science at the prestigious Harvard University! 

This is one episode you don’t want to miss!

KEY TAKEAWAYS

👉Nishat’s background originally began in mathematics and computer science, but he admits that he doesn’t use any of it in his current work. However, he says learning about debugging components and thinking about how they come back together is a skill that applies to everything in life, whether working a job as a general manager or planning a wedding. It’s helped him learn to apply various skills in his career.

👉We all know the idea of the “carrot and stick” approach of reward and punishment, and Nishat says that he’s had experiences with managers and mentors in his career where both have worked for him. He says, however, that people are far more motivated by the “carrot” (reward) method. Trying to lead through fear of punishment will not yield positive results, only rushed and half-baked ones.

👉When it comes to consumer behavior, Nishat believes that we need to personalize their experience; after all, no two people are the same, so assuming that the entire world’s population is consumers is just a sweeping generalization based on an outdated idea of demographics. Even before COVID, people were doing things only made popular because of the pandemic: using hand sanitizer every day, mixing their own drinks, and working from home. They weren’t a majority, but they were people that were ignored in favor of demographics.

👉We always talk about how the pandemic changed consumer insights and behaviors, but we often get too bogged down in the details, failing to offer a concise explanation for it. But Nishat explains it as this: “For a host of reasons, we had to become more welcoming of variety, and we’ve seen that as both a positive and a challenge to the industry”.

👉It is no longer acceptable to jump onto a big consumer trend and put all your resources into it because trends, by their very definition, will fade and go away, and people will move on to the next thing. There will be consumers that stay with that trend, but if brands put all their eggs into one particular basket, then they will miss out on everything else. 

👉Consumers will always be looking for variety, and every consumer is different. In some categories, consumers are all about efficiency, in others, they might be about experience. It’s about their values, thoughts and, what means something to them. It’s about keeping a pulse on what’s going on with the consumer's mindset and how it’s changing over time.

👉More data isn’t going to give us more clarity, at least not on its own. It’s the context surrounding the data that will help us understand how consumers think; everything is always about context. After all, what makes consumers who they are aren’t their demographics, but rather the values that drive their decisions. 

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6 
Episode Resources

• Nishat Mehta’s LinkedIn
• Nishat Mehta’s Twitter
• IRI
• 84.51
• Circana

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Daniel Enson, VP of Research Solutions at Toluna Corporate. They discuss Daniel’s aha! journey; how data can be turned into an interesting, coherent story; the huge impact that agile research has had on the world; and the key to what a successful research team looks like. They also delve into the number one mistake that researchers always make!

With over fifteen years of experience to draw on, he’s the man to go to for all phases of research, including study design, sample planning, advanced data analysis, and actionable storytelling. He’s the VP of Research Solutions at Toluna Corporate, an organization delivering real-time consumer insights at the speed of the on-demand economy, and has been there for over nine years, starting out as a Research Director.

One of his previous colleagues described him as “an effective and talented boss and teammate. Regardless of what else is going on, he's always there to support and mentor those that work with him and for him”.

Tune in to this week’s episode of Getting to Aha! to find out more!

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

👉One of the key aspects of market research and consumer insights is being able to think on your feet and question your own assumptions. Just because your campaign or marketing idea didn’t do super well at the beginning, it doesn’t mean it’s a failure or that it’s bad; it may just require a little tweaking.

👉Daniel’s favorite part of research is storytelling; it means you can present something to clients in a way that all the data makes sense. To do this, you need to make a good, well-thought-out questionnaire and choose the right methodology. It’s all about weaving the data into a coherent, interesting story. It’s no easy task, but when it all comes together, it can feel extremely satisfying.

👉With the help of agile research (a research method where feedback is collected quickly and continuously), researching data has been made much easier. But, as Daniel points out, it wasn’t always this way. When he started out in the industry fifteen years ago, there weren’t any companies out there using the agile methodology; the research took much longer and wasn’t necessarily always accurate. Viewing the data in real-time is far more helpful, also meaning it’s more valid and legitimate.

👉Before you shift towards agile research, there are two things you should keep in mind: know who your target audience is, and don’t try to fit every single thing into one template. Without these two pillars, your campaign will surely collapse. It’s incredibly important to make sure you’re keeping track of everything in a clean and accessible way.

👉Oftentimes, there are far too many questions in a survey or questionnaire, which can result in way much data, which isn’t useful at all! Daniel says that something you can do to stop this from happening is to make a quick sample poll just to figure out what the people want. This way, your questions will be more streamlined and straightforward, filtering out the futile ones.

👉For a successful research team, diversity is key. You need to make sure you have people from traditional market research jobs, science, psychology, writing, and analytics, as well as people with different strengths and interests who want to learn more about research. But most importantly, they need to be able to work as part of a team.

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6 
Episode Resources

• Daniel Enson on LinkedIn
• Toluna Corporate 
• RTi Research
• Fulcrum Analytics 

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Joseph Michelli, Chief Executive Officer of The Michelli Experience. They discuss Joseph’s aha! journey; why you should tap into your natural curiosity; how business leaders coped with the pandemic; and why you should always listen to your employees. They also delved into the importance of humanizing your customers, as well as what it truly means to be a brand!

Joseph is an internationally sought-after speaker, psychologist, author, and organizational consultant. He passes on his knowledge in ways that encourage workplaces to be joyful and productive, focusing on the customer experience. He has been the CEO of The Michelli Experience - a full-service, human experience delivery company that helps leaders attract and engage customers - for over twenty-five years; is an Opinion Columnist at CEOWORLD magazine; and has also won the Asian Brand Excellence Award.

Whatever Joseph doesn’t know about customer experience, it isn’t worth knowing…

Tune in to this week’s episode of Getting to Aha! to find out more!

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

👉Joseph began his career in radio after winning a competition to visit a radio station when he was thirteen. By the time he finished college, however, he had realized that his career would be in something quite different, which is what led him down the path of customer experience. But he’s always stayed in touch with the man who gave him that job and considers the lessons he’d learned from him to be one of his Aha! moments.

👉Part of being successful means you need to tap into your natural curiosity. Whilst it is true that as we go our way in life, we lose some of our drive and curiosity, but we must always try to keep on challenging ourselves and be willing to go to the next level. Never be afraid to learn new things, it’ll benefit you dramatically in the long run!

👉 During the pandemic, one thing became exceedingly clear to Joseph: leaders didn’t know what they were doing. It was a very difficult and unpredictable time for everyone, and even they admitted that they were clueless on how to respond - as a result, it was Joseph’s job to help them retain customers. He asked them what they were relying on and what tactics they had in place, and found himself giving advice to more and more people, which is how he came up with his next book.

👉A philosopher once said, “the first duty of love is to listen,” but Joseph has altered that to “the first duty of leadership is to listen,” and then added, “the second duty of leadership is to listen more”. The most important part of being a business leader is to listen to the people around you and to figure out how to lead them in the best way possible. 

👉In the early days of the pandemic, Joseph tells a story about when they’d call customers simply  to thank them for visiting. Naturally, customers were very skeptical at first, but it turned out to be a very authentic, genuine way to make customers feel appreciated. Since then, they’ve put more time and energy into appreciating their customers, not just monetarily, but humanistically.

👉Brands tend to confuse the need to be interesting as a goal, when really, they need to be interested. If a company is interested in its customers, then the customers will eventually become interested in them. All relationships, even in the B2C world, are a two-way street - there has to be some give and take rather than just take.

👉 To Joseph, “customer satisfaction” means meeting expectations, but “customer delight” means exceeding those expectations. The latter is far more emotional, and you can feel it in your chest when a company goes above and beyond for you. 

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6 
Episode Resources

• Joseph’s LinkedIn
• The Michelli Experience
• CEOWORLD magazine 
• Stronger Through Adversity: World-Class Leaders Share Pandemic-Tested Lessons on Thriving During the Toughest Challenges

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Danielle Blugrind, Senior Consumer Manager at Roku. They discuss Danielle’s aha! journey; why you shouldn’t try to reinvent the wheel with your product; how insights can help you see into the future and figure out who your customers are; the importance of keeping your product simple and clean; and why your curiosity and passion are the keys to success.

With over twenty years of experience in market research on both the client and vendor side, Danielle describes herself as an “insights devotee”. She is currently the Senior Consumer Manager at Roku, a world-famous brand of hardware digital media players which offer access to online streaming platforms. Previously, she was the Director of Consumer Insights and Brand Strategy at Taco Bell.

Tune in to this week’s episode of Getting to Aha! to find out more!

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

👉Ultimately, market research is all about human behavior, because at the end of the day, all consumers and customers are human beings just like the rest of us. Danielle explains that it was her passion for this aspect of the job that drew her towards it and, as a result, led her to become an “insights devotee”

👉To be an expert in the field of consumer insights, one must really care about what they do and have a natural curiosity about how people think and behave. Danielle has that very curiosity, and although such a feeling may have killed the cat, it only elevated her to exponential levels.

👉 When thinking up new, innovative ideas for your business, there is absolutely no point in trying to reinvent the wheel. Danielle tells a story about when they were trying to develop ideas for a new Taco Bell promotion and realized that the obvious answer wasn’t to recreate a bunch of flavors, but rather to collaborate with Doritos - an idea which in hindsight seems glaringly obvious. 

👉It’s important to try and figure out who exactly your customers are through insights. For example, in the world of streaming, it’s about looking at not just the customers' demographics but also at the geographical aspect. Different parts of the world have different rules and regulations regarding streaming, so figuring out who the customers are and what position they’re in can help a tremendous amount.

👉Always ask yourself: how do people feel when they see your ads? There is a multitude of ways to figure out the answer to this question. You can look at the data and examine what results they’re getting; you can look at what people are actually saying about your ads, or you could try your best to look at them objectively and listen to your gut.

👉 It’s all about the why. Why are consumers paying attention to and interacting with you? Why are customers interested in what you do? Take a look at the data and really listen to what your customers have to say!

👉 Roku is known for how easy its platform is to use and has become one of the most popular streaming methods to this day. It is made specifically for people who don’t want a complicated system. In order to get customers on board with your product, always keep it simple on the surface! Simplicity eases customers into it.

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6 
Episode Resources
Danielle’s LinkedInRokuTaco BellDrucker School of Management 

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Annette Franz, Founder & CEO of CX Journey. They discuss Annette’s aha! journey; how customer experience came to be so vitally important in business; when the customer journey truly begins; and the difference between being customer-focused and customer-centric. They also dive headfirst into the annoying habit that businesses have of ignoring customer feedback, as well as why leadership needs to change.

In addition to being the Founder and CEO of CX Journey, Annette Franz is also a keynote speaker, coach, consultant, and thought leader, and was named one of “The 100 Most Influential Tech Women on Twitter” by Business Insider. With thirty years in the CX profession under her belt, her book, Customer Understanding: Three Ways to Put the “Customer” in Customer Experience (and at the Heart of Your Business), is a testament to how much knowledge and advice she has to offer. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

👉 Customer Experience wasn’t always a widely talked about subject within businesses. Back in the early 2000s, there wasn’t much of an understanding about what customer experience truly was. Over time, however, metrics and data became a more prominent aspect of marketing; they were read and interpreted in different ways, and businesses were finally beginning to understand that customer loyalty and satisfaction were two separate things. It wasn’t until 2010 that CX became more widely talked about.

👉 The customer experience really begins at the moment of need, when the customer has a problem that needs solving. The minute that moment comes into fruition, it’s up to businesses and CX professionals to act fast and come up with ways to solve the problem. It’s all part of the customer life cycle.

👉 Don’t just be customer focused, be customer-centric! But what’s the difference between the two? Well, the former is more tactical and focuses on the short-term approaches of what to do when a customer is in front of you. The latter, however, is far more strategic, meaning it takes into account long-term strategies for retaining customers and making sure they come back.

👉 Annette recalls a client who had a really unhealthy approach to customer relationships before the introduction of CX; they would think that customers were trying to take advantage of them, leading to a lot of resentful feelings towards them, breeding toxicity. It wasn’t until there was an analysis of the business’ core values that the idea of ‘customer trust’ came to be. Through this, they were able to decide what behaviors were acceptable or not.

👉 Whilst customer experience is so important, we need to also remember how the employee’s experience factors in, after all, the two are inherently linked. You can’t have a good relationship with your customers if your employees aren’t happy - it’s about striking that balance.

👉 Businesses have the annoying habit of getting feedback from customers and then not doing anything with it. It’s very important to keep up-to-date on what your customers want, otherwise, they will leave you for a competitor who actually does listen. By taking their feedback into account, you are actively telling your customers that you hear them and that you are working to make their experience better.

👉 It starts at the top: you have to change the mindset of business leaders before being able to make a real difference for your customers. There is the assumption that leaders are completely separated from the customer experience, that there is a wall between them - in order for change, this needs to not be the case.

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6

Episode Resources

Annette’s LinkedIn

CX Journey

• Customer Understanding Three Ways to Put the “Customer” in Customer Experience (and at the Heart of Your Business)

• Built to Win: Designing a Customer-Centric Culture That Drives Value for Your Business

Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form

In this episode of Getting to Aha!, Darshan Mehta is joined by Steve Krull, CEO and Co-Founder of Be Found Online, A strategy-driven, people-focused digital marketing agency connecting brands and humans in innovative ways. They discuss Steve’s philosophy of “unleadership”, why it’s important to let people make mistakes so they can learn from them, and how to decide what to focus on as a business leader. They also discuss how digital marketing has changed since the COVID-19 pandemic and why customer experience should always equal business performance.

Previously, Steve was the VP of Strategy and Sales at Huble Digital and excelled in what he calls “unleadership”. He believes in collaboration and leading by example; remaining vulnerable and open to new ideas, accepting feedback…and doing good things. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

👉Steve defines “unleadership” in business as more of a philosophy than a methodology. It all comes down to being a good person and trusting the people and your team around you, and once you do that, your leadership characteristics will shine through. 

👉People learn from their experiences and their mistakes. As a leader of a team or an organization, you have to let people make mistakes and hit walls, otherwise, they won’t learn what you want them to. Some leaders may see this as a frivolous exercise, but Steve believes it’s necessary. It affords them the opportunity to grow.

👉As a leader, you must decide what to focus on. Steve talks about how communication strategies are something that all leaders should think about. How are you having conversations? How are you presenting facts to people? The way you deliver a message to someone else is so important, and exactly the same can be said for an organization's brand and marketing.

👉Steve’s wife was diagnosed with cancer at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, and he describes her as an inspiration. Although there were some tough times, and it can be easy to bury your head in the sand and avoid everything, it's all about how you get back up and keep moving forward. At some point, you have to face everything rather than run away. The same idea applies to business - if you’re losing customers, face it, figure out the reasoning, and learn.

👉The customer experience should always equal the business’ performance. If you were to go to a restaurant and the food was good, but the service was bad, you might give it another shot just to see, and the same if the roles were swapped. However, if both are bad, then no amount of marketing or advertising will fix that. You have to make sure your customer experience is always the best it can be.

👉As a result of COVID-19, more money and effort have gone into digital marketing. Although it seems like this was the direction it was going in anyway, it was only accelerated by the pandemic; there have been massive changes in analytics and privacy. People expect more from businesses than they did before, resulting in them carrying a heavier weight of responsibility.

Listen now!

bCast - https://bit.ly/3ACsRBz

Apple - https://apple.co/3gsuA31 

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3B0lVy6 

Youtube - https://bit.ly/3KYAHtd 

RSS -  https://bit.ly/3AFrUs6 
Episode Resources

Steve Krull Linkedin

Steve Krull on Instagram

Steve Krull on Twitter

Be Found Online Website
Getting to Aha! with Darshan Mehta is hand crafted by our friends over at: fame.so
Previous guests include: Luca Popovac, Senior Executive, Abhilasha Sinha of Open Secret, Laura Beavin-Yates, Stephen Griffiths of Level 2, Kristin Luck or ScaleHouse, Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business, Nicolas Zeisler of We’re Doing CX Wrong and How To Get It Right, Pricilla McKinney of Little Bird Marketing, Brooke Sellas of B Squared Marketing and Joseph Michelli of The Michelli Experience.

Check out the 3 most downloaded episodes: 

• Changing the Direction of Customer Experience with Luka Popovac, a Senior Customer Experience Executive
• Innovation, Curiosity, and Being Human with Abhilasha Sinha, Chief Growth Officer at Open Secret
• [Greatest Hits ] Emotions & Consumer Behavior with Laura Beavin-Yates
  
  

If you are interested in joining Getting to Aha! as a guest, please complete this form