The consumer’s mind is full of business opportunities yet to be deciphered. Henry Ford once said that, if he had asked people what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse. Steve Jobs was not in favor of asking consumers, because he considered that, in general, “they do not know what they want until you show it to them”. So…

Should we or should we not ask our consumers? Do we have or do not pay attention to what they tell us? In my opinion, it is not about whether they are asked or not, but about what they are asked, how they are asked and, ultimately, what interpretation we give to their answers.

This divergent form of consumer understanding and idea generation is, in some way, an art. Precisely for this reason success is not always guaranteed, it does not always work out well. We must be aware that a wrong conclusion can also lead to bad decisions for the business. Let’s take an example: a well-known food brand observed that consumers of pasta sauce bought it for convenience, but a very high percentage of them cut onions to add it. So, the manufacturer decided to add more onion to the recipe to make it more convenient. What do you think happened? Consumers continued cutting and adding onions in the same proportion as before. Actually, consumers liked to feel creative in the kitchen,

Arriving at powerful conclusions requires some method and discipline, a lot of practice and good habits. There are 7 techniques to achieve it:

• Be curious, have an open mind and feel comfortable speculating in the process of finding the why of things. Try to go beyond the obvious.
• The “Eureka!” Moment usually does not come up in the office. Go out into the real world and observe. The idea can come at any time and from any source of information, even what you already have in your head!
• Put yourself in the shoes of the consumer, but remember to “take away your own ones”, because in another way, the ideas that you have preconceived will not let you see the opportunities.
• Connect points, sources of information, to draw robust conclusions; and if you can, share them with colleagues, reflect and debate.
• Do not try to justify what you are doing in your company or what you would like to do.
• Do not become obsessed in trying to observe something in particular. It is easy for us to miss important things that really matter. It’s human, and as it shows, a button: I invite you to tell me how many passes does the white team give in the next video?
• Finally, practice, practice and practice. Powerful conclusions will come more easily if we maintain this habit and mentality.

Disruptive business opportunities can be generated from the deep understanding of the consumer. This is what we believe in Improven, because we are nonconformist and we like to challenge the Status Quo together with our clients, thus removing the curious and inquisitive child that we were a long time ago. This allows us to understand the needs, motivations and deepest desires of the consumer and place him at the center of decision making. After all, all battles are fought in the mind of the consumer and not in the channel.