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Connecting data for a future of holistic insights
20 May 2021

 

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Article provided by Cint, Principal Sponsor of the MRS Awards

Cint is proud to be a multi-year sponsor of the MRS Awards – a program that is critical in shining a spotlight on insights companies that are moving our industry forward, even in the face of immeasurable challenges. We’ve seen organisations pivot to meet new demands, innovate to tackle complicated problems, and stay unflaggingly positive – providing vital data to the business world to ensure success during upheaval.

One byproduct of current events is the sheer amount of data now at our disposal for decision making. Consumers have turned online for daily activities, creating massive amounts of digital behavioural data to accompany existing data streams such as transactional data, CRM, consumption, survey data and much more – all living in silos. At Cint, we’ve been thinking a lot about the need to see how all this data is interrelated to get a more complete consumer view.


Challenges surrounding connecting data


One key hurdle includes the death of the cookie, a tool for identifying individuals to help personalise outreach, which Google plans to phase out by 2022. The move to eliminate the cookie is largely based on overall consumer demand for greater privacy, coupled with mounting legislation for protecting personal information. While these new regulations do not specifically target market research, our industry has been directly affected. Organisations must comply with rules and consumer consent issues, which are becoming more granular and difficult to navigate as restrictions rise. In addition, media fragmentation has caused consumer behavioural data to be spread amongst a wide variety of devices and services, as digitalisation increases.  

Looking ahead to a connected future

Market research can help us understand the “why” behind the growing pool of digital behavioural data. Yet, connecting data at the level needed today is about understanding a particular person who has done something at a specific moment in time, for a specific reason.

Organisations must find approaches that allow them to uncover how data is interrelated in order to find patterns, come up with conclusions and help guide decision-making. This requires some key ingredients such as a wide group of people from which to draw (or to whom we can match data) so we can find specific individuals (scale); explicit permission from respondents (consent); and be able to actually find and interact with these people in a wide, deep sea of respondents, in real-time and with accuracy (automation).

There are several approaches emerging that address these issues, as companies innovate to try to stay a step ahead of a changing landscape and continue to drive decision-making that is grounded in solid, connected insights. The good news is that the insights space is in a good position, with access to first-party data and a working value exchange with consumers, to start to connect the dots in this new environment. Cint is proud to have a number of solutions that address new issues surrounding connecting data efficiently and effectively, allowing holistic consumer views. 

If nothing else, the past few months have proved that we never know what’s around the corner. Connected data, and greater consumer understanding, can help give us the solid foundation needed to continue looking ahead with optimism and creatively solving any challenges that come our way.

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