On June 7, 2023, attention economy experts came together in NYC to share case studies and participate in engaging discussions on the attention measurement landscape. Plus, attendees heard a recap of the issues debated at AUDIENCExSCIENCE and an update on Phase I of the ARF Attention Validation Initiative, an empirically based evaluation of the rapidly developing market for attention measurement and prediction.
This ARF Pharma Council event followed up on the Council’s podcast episode on “Inclusive Futures of Humancare,” focusing on the importance of inclusiveness in pharma research and marketing with respect to both demographic characteristics and health conditions. Four speakers delivered brief presentations, followed by a discussion moderated by Pharma Council Co-Chair Marjorie Reedy of Merck.
In 2022 the ARF Cultural Effectiveness Council conducted 18 in-depth interviews (IDIs) with senior research executives via Teams and Zoom to understand how the ‘Future of Qual’ would evolve with rapidly changing qualitative methods and the urgency across industries to understand cultural shifts. Council members Chloe Stromberg of LinkedIn and Anne Kaplan of Paramount, who worked on this project, presented what the Council learned from these interviews. Their presentation was followed by a panel discussion with a mix of Council members (Tony D’Andrea of General Mills and Tristan Marra of GLAAD) and culture-savvy researchers outside the Council (Danie Hemsley of Cassandra and Kendra Clarke, former Senior Director, Head of Experience Research and Design, Core Technologies at Twitter), led by Council Co-Chair Janelle James of Ipsos. The presentation and discussion focused on how qualitative research is evolving, how it can overcome its challenges —particularly those related to diversity and cultural understanding—and best practices for conducting qual research, moving forward.
Howard Shimmel of Janus Strategy & Insights, LLC. guided this expert panel through the critical questions surrounding the importance of calibration panels to the measurement industry. Howard asked why calibration panels are needed, what they bring to measurement, and what is sacrificed if the industry does not support them moving forward.
In a follow-up discussion for the “Understanding Audiences” track, Havas Media’s Peter Sedlarcik delves deeper into the ways the panelists are measuring for their clients, from the challenges of creating custom platforms and how technology’s rapid advances are affecting how they reconcile data, to balancing rigorous methodology with dynamic measurement approaches.
Vidyotham Reddi shared insights from Mars’ approach to A/B testing as their gold standard of learning. Framing it within the timely “virus” context, Vidyotham reinforced A/B testing’s dependability, versatility, and precision for marketing and understanding consumer behavior as part of Mars’ overall strategy.
LoopMe’s Carlos Cruz and IRI’s Joe Conte review a case study for Pepsi’s Mt Dew using IRI’s real-time deterministic sales data and LoopMe’s in-flight optimization. Highlighting the precision of IRI’s retailer loyalty card data from 117M households (HH), Joe provided background on and execution of the campaign that increased dollars per HH sales lift by 40%. Aligning the right ads at the right time by leveraging IRI’s actual purchase data, Carlos outlined the attributes that drove brand lift and Pepsi’s sales goals to attract new buyers.
The presentation shared YouGov’s research behind building a cross-device, multi-source, and verified behavioral data exchange tool. The research tackled the following problems:
This presentation describes a project to enhance analytics on print and digital audiences in France. The main sources of data for print and digital audiences in France are:
Microsoft’s goal was to create a solution to bring independent data sources together. Their database contains 2+ years of data on millions of Microsoft’s identified customers, usage across 10+ core consumer products, and revenue (both direct and indirect, across these products). This database is also GDPR compliant. Protecting this data is a priority.
Raj Mann reviewed the evolution of Microsoft’s infrastructure. In the past, research was slower due the need for a lot of data manipulation and quality control challenges. The investments have increased extensibility of data and removed obstacles that prevented data access for researchers and improves collaboration. Microsoft’s infrastructure investments resulted in a 70% reduction in time for data analysis on the 600 studies Microsoft conducts annually.