Background and Client Objectives
A non-surgical cosmetic laser brand came to TrendSource setting out to uncover how to better identify their target markets and better conform marketing campaigns to them. Who was most likely to be interested in purchasing the client's services, what opportunities for market expansion lay in untapped consumer pools, and ultimately what marketing campaigns, messaging, and product offerings could best target these groups?
Working closely with the client at every stage of the engagement, TrendSource set out to develop a methodology that would identify consumer profiles articulating particular segments’ likelihood to be interested in and purchase the clients’ services.
Program Development and Methodology
TrendSource determined Panel Surveys would provide the best combination of depth and flexibility—a quantitative methodology with a sprinkling of qualitative insight.
TrendSource surveyed 500 men and women between 25 and 55 years old who expressed some interest in having such a procedure over the next six months or had recently scheduled or completed one.
In order to construct consumer archetypes, respondents were asked about their daily lives, their corporal self-perceptions, and a wide array of other data, providing a data set of the client's likely customers, which could then be gleaned for insights into their ideal markets and messaging.
Results and Analysis
Using cluster analysis, TrendSource's Advanced Analytics team broke the client's likely customer base into seven distinct segments based on their demographic data and answers to specific questions. These clusters could then be leveraged to understand how to best position the client's products within the market to most effectively appeal to each of these segments.
Each cluster offered unique insights into how individuals first hear of the client's services, where and how they perform research into the services, why they choose the services over other alternatives, other likely cosmetic services they may purchase, and their willingness/likelihood to purchase services at full price. TrendSource further provided insights into how customers perceive their procedure's success, and how they determine if they will purchase another.
TrendSource offered four distinct recommendations to the client related to messaging, marketing platforms and channels. Most notably, the Insights team uncovered a previously unconsidered entry point to the client's services and found an unlikely relationship between customers' day-to-day habits and their likelihood to purchase. This allowed the client to understand their customers not as one undifferentiated mass but as a set of distinct clusters that come with their own pain points, concerns, and paths to purchase and repurchase.
Conclusion
In this case, the geographic diversity targeted by this national provider, coupled with the simplicity and depth of their research question—who are our consumers and how can we best target them?—made a strong case for panel surveys as a primary market research methodology.
The client emerged from the engagement armed with reams of data concerning their likeliest consumers, the messaging type and channel best positioned to reach them, and the ways certain lifestyle choices influence their consumer base.