Insight Meets Sustainability - Steve Phillips

My guest this week is Steve Phillips, CEO of Zappi and chair of the Mayor's Sustainability Council.He has been at the forefront of transforming the insights industry. Under his leadership, Zappi has pioneered AI-driven tools that help creators worldwide test, validate, and scale ideas—long before AI became mainstream. That doesn’t mean he’s old, by the way. Today, he’s doubling down on new models that unlock deeper value from research data.He’s also the coauthor of The Consumer Insights Revolution: Transforming Market Research for Competitive Advantage, written with Ryan Barry, former president of Zappi, and PepsiCo leaders Stefan Gans and Kate Sharp. The book provides organizations with a blueprint for becoming truly customer-centric by anticipating shifts in behavior before they happen.Beyond innovation, Steve is passionate about building a sustainable future for the insights industry—ensuring it grows in ways that serve both businesses and the planet. What a novel idea.His global perspective, shaped by working across four continents, combined with his award-winning work in behavioral economics, has earned him recognition from the European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research, the Market Research Society, the Advertising Research Foundation, and many more.Simply put, Steve is an innovator, author, and sustainability champion who is redefining what insights can—and should—be.