Stephen Kraus on brands making higher impact by working with higher academia

In this episode of Now That's Significant, a market research podcast, host John Bird welcomes Professor Stephen Kraus from the University of San Francisco to discuss the importance of collaboration between academia and the market research industry. Professor Kraus, an expert in marketing and consumer insights, shares his unconventional journey through the world of market research, highlighting the challenges and opportunities he's observed along the way. Here are five key takeaways from the episode: Collaboration is key: Professor Kraus emphasizes the potential for fruitful partnerships between industry professionals and academics, benefiting both students and companies. Survey quality remains a challenge: Despite advancements in technology, ensuring high-quality survey data is an ongoing struggle for the industry. Education empowers the next generation: Professor Kraus finds fulfillment in educating aspiring market researchers, equipping them with the skills and confidence to navigate a rapidly evolving field. AI is a powerful tool, but human insights are still essential: While AI offers valuable capabilities, human creativity and the ability to synthesize insights remain crucial for success in market research. Gen Z requires a different approach: Engaging younger audiences requires understanding their unique values, preferences, and digital habits, emphasizing relevance and authenticity. Tune in to this episode to learn more about the evolving landscape of market research and the exciting possibilities for collaboration between academia and industry. Don't forget to check out other episodes of Now That's Significant on all major podcast platforms! *** Infotools Harmoni is a fit-for-purpose market research analysis, visualization, and reporting platform that gives the world’s leading brands the tools they need to better understand their consumers, customers, organization, and market. www.infotools.com Established in 1990, we work with some of the world’s top brands around the world, including Coca-Cola, Orange, Samsung, and Mondelēz. Our powerful cloud-based platform, Harmoni, is purpose-built for market research. From data processing to investigation, dashboards to collaboration, Harmoni is a true "data-to-decision-making" solution for in-house corporate insights teams and agencies. While we don't facilitate market research surveys, provide sample, or collect data, we make it easy for market researchers to find and share compelling insights that go over-and-above what stakeholders want, inspiring them to act decisively. One of the most powerful features of Harmoni is Discover, a time-tested, time-saving, and investigative approach to data analysis. Using automated analyses to reveal patterns and trends, Discover minimizes potential research bias by removing the need for requesting and manually analyzing scores of cumbersome crosstabs – often seeing what you can’t. Discover helps you easily find what differentiates groups that matter to you, uncover what makes them unique, and deliver data points that are interesting, relevant, and statistically significant, plus see things others can’t. Add to all this an impending GenAI feature, and you have an extremely powerful, future-proofed tool.