Collaborative Research

Sometimes, combining forces is the best approach to research. Team work has many advantages for an organization, including better flow of ideas and increased resources.

For instance, partnering with Mindshare and ESPN, Unilever was interested to explore consumer behavior and media interaction in the future. The companies used Scenario Planning, a corporate strategic planning activity (borrowed from military strategy) which attempts to predict what things will be like in the future.

The research project, called Media 2015, used third-party research and primary-sourced interviews with 14 media industry experts to attempt to understand how media in the year 2015 will look. These individuals (listed in the full report) are leaders in their respective fields, including digital marketing, mobility, consumer trend spotting, and media regulation.

The three company team identified trends they believe are certainties for the future of media – such as increased bandwidth, the digital generation getting older, and devices getting fasted – and others trends that are unpredictable – such as the overall shape of social networking, how much people and regulators will care about privacy, and the level of customization expected.

The research identified four possible future scenario's for consumer media. The predict that, “the four scenarios are not exclusive of one another, but together form pieces of a possible future of media, evolving differently for varied sectors, audience groups and geographies.”

In the first, consumer behavior will be highly fragmented – consumers will access information across a wide range of sources. The second, Portal Me, features consumers with narrowed and focused attention. Media will be constant, but customers will receive information that is customized to them based on stated and learned preferences. The third, Media Buffet, features consumers who pick and choose their media content using multiple devices. Brand marketers will need to deliver information through multiple channels. The fourth, Traditional New Media, is the most passive, where consumer attention is limited. The scenario is characterized by entertainment and less by connectivity.

Research projects such as Media 2015 allow companies to make strategic plans and decisions about their efforts to respond to changing business landscapes. Research projects and information projects like this one are invaluable tools for public relations and marketing practitioners.