Today’s Chanakya is part of RNB Research, a New Delhi-based market intelligence company providing research solutions and intelligence services for Asian and African companies.

In today's cross-channel world, consumers interact with brands across a multitude of devices, channels and sessions. As brands and communications channels have multiplied, the complexity of satisfaction assessments and loyalty has grown exponentially. With greater choice in almost every category has come a sense that poor product performance need not be tolerated. However, if choice feels excessive, consumers may simply buy what they know instead of wading into the pros and cons of a new decision.
Consumer information is the engine of customer satisfaction. We need to have metrics to appropriately monitor key elements of interaction. Branding today is a much different practice than it was even 10 years ago. Data-rich marketers and constantly connected consumers are rewriting the rules of long-held branding practices. Great brands have always been defined by great products, and great marketers will always do everything at their disposal to create meaningful, positive experiences with consumers.

The Smartphone Generation:
The changes that we see today are wholly different, and are being driven by consumers. Smartphones are becoming—or already have become, depending on the demographic—the primary device for leisure-time connectedness. Their seductive personalization capabilities and non-stop notifications beg for our attention. Penetration is increasing day by day with cheaper smartphones available in the market and internet data providing companies coming up with cheaper data plans. And most importantly penetration is across social classes and gender. You may also find your domestic help on a cheaper Chinese smart phone!!
Brands have to understand that smartphones are changing the way a consumer thinks. Marketers call it a “Mobile mind shift” in which the consumer thinks he can get what he wants immediately.

Social Media Intelligence – Start the right conversations:
Today, the social media strategy—and the wealth of data and customer insights that result—must be the cornerstone of any successful company’s go-to-market strategy. It must be pervasive throughout the entire buying cycle. Customers are no longer limiting interactions with a brand or company solely through the traditional forms of media. The “one-size-fits-all” approach is gone.
Social media intelligence takes a deeper dive into the conversations that exist online, going beyond ‘likes’ and ‘retweets’ for a real glimpse into how consumers perceive a company or brand. Organizations that take this kind of social knowledge and run with it are at a huge advantage over those that don’t. Social intelligence can help marketers with Consumer identification, Consumer segmentation, Consumer satisfaction, Consumer retention, Competitive intelligence, Influencer’s identification and Trend analysis.
Brand managers should begin thinking of social media as a massive data repository, a digitized focus group with millions of unpaid participants. This repository consists of huge amounts of unstructured data, which hold valuable insights about customer shopping habits, lifestyle interests, product use cases, even aspirations. Today, we can parse this data for research on countless subjects and use this data for/to Aggregate View of Trends and Conversations, Cross-Promotion & Product Strategy and Pre-emptive Positioning Strategy.