Cultivating Relationships vs. Selling Research Projects with Eileen Campbell

[00:00:00] Eileen Campbell: If you’ve got perfect data that supports a conclusion, yet there are political forces at play, you need to understand that because you’ve gotta help. Overcome those forces, not just say well, but the data set. 

[00:00:14] MRII Announcer: Welcome to MRII’s Insights and Innovators podcast, where we talk to top market research professionals to get their inside stories about innovative and enduring best practices.

[00:00:25] MRII Announcer: Now here’s your host for today’s episode. 

[00:00:27] Jon Last: Welcome to today’s episode, Reinventing Insights from Projects to Decision Partners. Our guest is Eileen Campbell of Womintuition. I’m your host, John Last, president of Sports and Leisure Research Group, and former President of Market Research Institute International.

[00:00:42] Jon Last: Today we’ll be exploring one of the most important inflection points that the insights industry has ever faced. Our guest, Eileen Campbell, has seen this business from every angle as both the former global CEO of Millward Brown, now a part of Kantar and one of the world’s largest research agencies and is a chief marketing officer.[00:01:00] 

[00:01:00] Jon Last: Now is founder of Womintuition where she advises leaders on how to eval, elevate the impact of insights. Eileen has a powerful perspective that we wanna explore with her and the insights industry over the last 50 years has really been selling projects, and this premise now is that that era is over today.

[00:01:17] Jon Last: Eileen believes that companies that will thrive are the ones that help organizations make better decisions faster and with more confidence rather than offering project related relationships. Eileen, welcome to Insights and Innovators. It’s great to have you on board. 

[00:01:31] Eileen Campbell: Thanks, John. Pleasure to be with you.

[00:01:33] Jon Last: So I wanna dive right in and begin with that bold assertion that we, we began with, and that is that the era of selling projects is over. What do you mean by that? And tell me why this is the shift that we’re seeing away from project selling. So important for people listening to today’s episode. 

[00:01:51] Eileen Campbell: So, so just to be clear, I don’t think the, the era of projects is completely over.

[00:01:56] Eileen Campbell: Obviously there’s always going to be the need for somebody to do [00:02:00] a project here, a project there, but I think what’s happening is the market’s really bifurcating. So, you know, we’re gonna have, uh, lots and lots and lots of platform based ways to do projects, frankly, many of which don’t require much intervention from, from.

[00:02:16] Eileen Campbell: Researchers. So that’s one end of the spectrum. The other end of the spectrum are clients who want to have ongoing committed relationships that integrate data from multiple sources and help them build real decision systems, which, you know, as you know, kind of one-off projects, uh, sometimes are, are used for very discreet decisions, but not for kind of bigger systematic approaches to moving your business ahead.

[00:02:46] Jon Last: I think it’s kind of like we had talked about just the evolving strategic role and, and there’s been so much discussion about researchers becoming more consultative. Is is that kind of where you’re going? It’s more than just a messaging exercise, isn’t it? [00:03:00] It’s, it’s more of a, an operating model. 

[00:03:02] Eileen Campbell: Yeah, I think it’s, I mean, I think it’s gonna involve us doing so many things differently, not the least of which is, you know, sort of our times of material kind of, kind of pricing model in the past.

[00:03:13] Eileen Campbell: But, you know, it’s interesting, I think. I think some people in the industry get really worked up about, uh, consultants as competitors, management consultants, as competitors. You know, the truth is we don’t do what they do and they don’t do what we do. Um, that doesn’t mean we can’t be more consultative.

[00:03:31] Eileen Campbell: That doesn’t mean we can’t use the insights to, to provide sort of more. Um, impetus for action. Um, I think that’s definitely where we need to go. That said, you know, I don’t, I don’t think management consultants are the enemy, and I don’t think, uh, we should be terribly intimidated that they’re gonna take our business away.

[00:03:52] Jon Last: Yeah, it’s, it, it is a bit of a, of a shift, I think from how a lot of folks had viewed insights in the past. Mm-hmm. And this whole premise [00:04:00] of being strategic partners. I mean, it, it had been semantics I think, in the past, but, but it’s, it’s, it’s different today. And, and I’m curious from your vantage point, why do you think, uh, so few firms have really actually transformed the way they operate to, to become more in that regard?

[00:04:16] Eileen Campbell: It’s, it’s, it’s interesting. I think it’s a really provocative question when you think about it. Why haven’t we moved more in that direction over all these years? And I think if you reflect on people you’ve known in the industry, what you’ll find is that there’ve always been some individuals, they were deeply consultative.

[00:04:34] Eileen Campbell: They had really well meshed relationships with their clients. They understood their client’s business as much as anybody. Inside the client company did. And so, so I think it’s always existed. I think in some cases it’s what we valued as an industry. You know, we valued methodological rigor, which of course is important, um, but is not necessarily, um, relationship building.[00:05:00] 

[00:05:00] Eileen Campbell: We’ve valued getting the most out of data from a marketing science perspective. Um. Very important, not necessarily relationship and consultative, um, in, in what it delivers to clients. So I think, I think it’s always existed. Uh, what I think will be interesting though is to see how agencies, companies say this is gonna be a focal point of how we manage our business going forward.

[00:05:28] Jon Last: Mm-hmm. So, so it’s interesting, I know in, in our prior conversations, we both kind of intuited this. Probably a longer time ago, but yet now it’s kind of beginning to evolve and make its way into the structure of, of, of insights organizations You certainly worked with and led some of the biggest ones in the world.

[00:05:46] Jon Last: So when we’re talking about this whole decision partner operating model, what does it really look like in terms of structuring an organization to deliver on, on decision acceleration? What, what has to change? 

[00:05:58] Eileen Campbell: Um, [00:06:00] one, I think both on the client side and on the agency side, we need to take a very hard look at where silos exist in our organization and tip ’em over.

[00:06:10] Eileen Campbell: Um, because the truth is, um, getting broader insights from all the things we do is a pretty horizontal exercise. 

[00:06:20] MRII Announcer: Mm-hmm. 

[00:06:20] Eileen Campbell: You have to understand, you know. How a client came up with a new idea and what about that new idea was intriguing to consumers that you can build on in communicating it, um, how you, how you integrate with the trade.

[00:06:36] Eileen Campbell: What you saw in prior research, how you pivot and adjust if things aren’t going as one expected in market. So there’s something, there’s something about what I will call horizontal Martin. Sorel used to call it horizontality, which I thought was a ridiculous word, but the idea that looking across the client’s, um, enterprise and um, thinking.

[00:06:59] Eileen Campbell: With [00:07:00] that lens, I think is, is super important. So I think we need to look at where we have silos in our own, our own organizations. That doesn’t mean there aren’t still roles for people who have very deep, very specific expertise. So, you know, the orchestra needs the first chair violin, but it also needs a conductor, right?

[00:07:20] Eileen Campbell: So, so some of it is us, us stepping into our role as conductors, more. 

[00:07:27] Jon Last: Does it change you think the way agencies will hire or structure the way that they serve as clients? 

[00:07:35] Eileen Campbell: You know, I think it should do. I think it will. I don’t know. I mean, we, you know, how often have you talked to people where they’ve hired a resume, not a person, right?

[00:07:44] Eileen Campbell: Right. Well, they’ve done this and they were there and, and as opposed to, you know, I’m, I’m a big advocate for, I think one of the most important skills in our industry is curiosity. Um, and, and really trying to [00:08:00] understand not just the, um, sort of the technical aspects, but the, the internal complexities that our clients are having to deal with, right?

[00:08:09] Eileen Campbell: Um, you know, if you’ve got perfect data that supports a conclusion, yet there are political forces at play, you need to understand that because you’ve gotta help overcome those forces. Not just say, well, but the data set. You know that that’s like, we’re operating in a perfectly rational world, which of course we’re not.

[00:08:30] Eileen Campbell: So I think, I think hiring for curiosity, hiring for creativity, um, you know, those sorts of skills, you know, which sounds kind of counterintuitive in, in a world of ai, but I do think those uniquely human skills are gonna get more important. 

[00:08:46] Jon Last: Yeah, no, I’m glad you mentioned that. I, it, it’s, it, I always talked about it as kind of being a pragmatism.

[00:08:50] Jon Last: Uh, you know, I think about it particularly in the verticals that we specialize in and, you know, there’s such large personalities in sports. Yeah. And [00:09:00] you need to be mindful of that, or can be taken for sure. There isn’t shot. It’s just, you know, it’s, you don’t have that deeper understanding of, 

[00:09:07] Eileen Campbell: for sure.

[00:09:08] Jon Last: Organization’s capabilities and gaps are, you’re not gonna necessarily deliver on, on that partnership promise. 

[00:09:14] Eileen Campbell: Totally. 

[00:09:15] Jon Last: So, you know, getting into some of the, the, the, the nuts and bolts of it. I, I think one of the, the more provocative ideas I’ve read from you is, is that clients aren’t necessarily saying, can you collect this data faster and cheaper?

[00:09:29] Jon Last: But they’re asking, why do I even need you at all when I can query my own data take? And you, and, and you kind of referenced that in the first of the, the different points of inflection is that what clients are really, when they ask for that, what’s really the right answer to that? 

[00:09:43] Eileen Campbell: You know, it’s interesting, right?

[00:09:44] Eileen Campbell: I think, you know, you, you’ve seen, and if you’ve followed the grit report or any of the, you know, sources of data in our industry, there’s certainly been a rise in clients, um, doing DIY or assisted serve kind of research. Do I think they’re doing that? ’cause they really want [00:10:00] to, not particularly. I think that there is too much stuff that we weren’t adding enough value as agencies.

[00:10:08] Eileen Campbell: So, you know, why am I paying somebody to push buttons for me? I can push the buttons myself, 

[00:10:14] MRII Announcer: right? 

[00:10:14] Eileen Campbell: I still think most clients, given the choice would prefer to have a really deeply engaged partner who adds value, and again, brings some of that horizontal view and also brings context that a client who’s focused on a specific brand or specific industry may not have.

[00:10:33] Eileen Campbell: You know, you’ve, you’ve been on the agency side, you’ve been on the client side. Um, you work across many different sports and you can say, well, actually, you know what? We’ve seen this thing in golf, and I know it sounds crazy, but it might have applications in, you know, team lacrosse, some new sport that people may not know much about.

[00:10:55] Eileen Campbell: So that idea of providing context is I think [00:11:00] something that, that. Clients will say, well, I could do it myself, but um, will I have the same broad perspective that somebody on the agency side has. So I think, I think we’ve really gotta illustrate where we add value or it, you know, it is pretty darn easy 

[00:11:18] Jon Last: Yeah.

[00:11:19] Eileen Campbell: To do stuff yourself. 

[00:11:20] Jon Last: I, I, I totally agree. I mean, it’s funny, I think back, you know, when I was on the client side, you know, I did vertically integrate our capabilities and then here I am, 18 years later, still going on the agency side. A lot of that really is that objective context. I mean, being able to, right.

[00:11:36] Jon Last: To really kind of understand where there are those comparables that maybe you’re blinded by being in your own silo. I, I, I often cite, you know, it’s funny, I, I took a, a quick sojourn out of golf into the cruise line industry and they were very similar at the time. They were both overbuilt, you know, this is back in the late, they were both fragmented in terms of totally distribution, very niche, and, and there was a lot to learn from that.

[00:11:59] Jon Last: And, and it kind of [00:12:00] goes to what you were saying, you know, when you talked about. You know, we, we have this, uh, to, to paraphrase the former president irrational exuberance about ai. And, you know, you’ve argued as of I that what humans bring in terms of pattern recognitions and challenging internal biases.

[00:12:17] Jon Last: These are, these are things that can accelerate decisions that are quite different from what AI might provide. Looking at kind of the past. How do you see ultimately, you know, coming, playing out in the, in the future years? I mean, what’s, what’s that combination? I, I, I’ve got some thoughts, but I’d love to grab yours.

[00:12:34] Jon Last: Yeah, 

[00:12:34] Eileen Campbell: yeah, 

[00:12:35] Jon Last: we can talk 

[00:12:35] Eileen Campbell: about that. I think there’s an enormous role for both, right? I mean, if you think about the way we used to do research, you do a project, you answer a very specific question, and then you might as well have just thrown it away, right? Okay. It’s problem solved. That goes in the, you know, the heap of past research.

[00:12:53] Eileen Campbell: You know, now we’ve got the ability to create these incredible data lakes and we have the AI tools to overlay [00:13:00] them and say, you know, tell me everything we as a company know about. I don’t know, uh, women’s shaving habits, you know, um, and all of that incorporative learning. That may have gotten lost in the past.

[00:13:15] Eileen Campbell: You know, AI is gonna do an extraordinary job of helping us understand and mine that kind of data and draw inferences and, you know, I’m really excited about the potential in medical research that, you know, a lot of stuff that ended up on the scrap pile. Actually may have real merit. So, so I think there’s all kinds of, you know, really positive things coming out of what AI can do, but it is sort of a rear view mirror, right?

[00:13:42] Eileen Campbell: It is collecting all the world’s learning or all of our own learning and drawing inferences from that. Um, and while that gives you some indication of what you might expect in the future, um, it certainly can’t [00:14:00] simulate. The, all the weird humanity, um, how quickly we, as human beings change how something will trigger our, our, our thinking in a different way.

[00:14:12] Eileen Campbell: So, you know, to me it’s the combination. I also think that, you know, AI is an enormous opportunity for researchers because the truth is, even the hyperscalers, the Googles, the metas, um. They still need, what will differentiate them from everybody who’s, you know, ingesting all the data out there. And sometimes that’s gonna be the human insight.

[00:14:35] Jon Last: Yeah. 

[00:14:36] Eileen Campbell: Um, it’s not gonna be swallowing more data, it’s going to be asking some questions that maybe nobody else thought to ask. 

[00:14:43] Jon Last: And I think it’s recognizing that as we continue to evolve as a society and within the categories that we work, you know, you’re absolutely right. You kind of looking back certainly sets the context.

[00:14:54] Jon Last: The stage kind of can be somewhat predictive, but it’s not. Really what research can [00:15:00] ultimately do in, in projecting out a specific circumstance. It’s, it’s, it’s almost like that old line, you know, about tracking studies. Right. You know, they can be very static and boring until they’re not. 

[00:15:10] Eileen Campbell: Exactly. It’s you, you know, God knows how many times I, you know, at Millward Brown, how many times you defended that.

[00:15:17] Eileen Campbell: You know, you’re, you’re not gonna appreciate your tracker until some trigger event. You go, how did we not see that coming? Well, you canceled your tracker, you know? 

[00:15:29] Jon Last: Yeah. We’ve lived that world too, so. So let’s talk a little bit about the implications for the industry. I mean, if the next era of insights is really about better helping organizations to make decisions and not just delivering research or data, how does that change, I know you’ve referenced some of this before, but what are some of the new capabilities that firms need to build today that may not be as prevalent as they need to be?

[00:15:53] Eileen Campbell: Well, I think we need to get our own tech house in order. Right? Um, you know, the truth is in many, many agencies that I [00:16:00] see, uh, they don’t know what they know, right? Um, and again, it goes back to that sort of silo. We’ve gotta get people overthinking, oh, I need to protect this somehow. My job security depends on, I’m the only person who knows.

[00:16:15] Eileen Campbell: Um, and so I think, I think, you know. I would say we, the, the insights industry was an early user of technology, a solid user of technology, certainly an early user of predictive analytics and, you know, some of the underlying tech that drives ai, like, um, you know, machine learning and language models and neural networks and all those things we were experimenting with in the nineties.

[00:16:42] Eileen Campbell: Um, but we probably have not done as good a job as we could. To say how do we leverage technology to make what we deliver to our clients better? Um, you know, I still see an awful lot of cases where [00:17:00] someone talks about their quote unquote database and it’s an Excel spreadsheet. Um, and so, you know, we, we kind of need to get our own act together on, on some of this stuff.

[00:17:12] Eileen Campbell: Another thing that I think we’ve gotta think about, John, and I think this is a tricky one. I don’t, I certainly don’t have the answers, but is how we price and how we engage clients on the issue of the value we deliver. So, you know, we’ve, we’ve trained procurement teams to take three proposals, line them up, try and decompose them in the most granular fashion, um, and.

[00:17:40] Eileen Campbell: Almost line by line. Say, well, you know, you cost more on this, and they cost less on that. And, um, with no kind of sense of, but what value does it provide? So, you know, if we stop somebody from launching a product, that is [00:18:00] inevitably going to fail. That’s work. Millions and millions and millions of dollars.

[00:18:06] Eileen Campbell: You know, even the production cost, it’s Super Bowl season. The production cost of creating a Super Bowl ad is what it used to cost to create a feature film. Um, and if we can help people make sure the ideas are right before they go into that level of production, you know, that’s, that’s an enormously valuable, um, decision tool that we’ve, we’ve given them.

[00:18:30] Eileen Campbell: So I think we’ve gotta get better. As an industry at understanding where we provide value and how we provide value, and trying to think about monetizing, you know, the risk reduction, the opportunity identification that we provide. And again, I don’t have a lot of answers on this. I have a lot of questions.

[00:18:50] Eileen Campbell: Um, right. And I think it’s gonna take, you know, many smart people getting in a room and thinking through, you know, how do we break the [00:19:00] back of this? Time and materials. Three bid, you know, kind of crazy world that we’ve created for ourselves. 

[00:19:09] Jon Last: No, it’s, it’s true. I mean, it’s, it’s funny you think about the frustration of that, whereas when you can eradicate that constriction, it becomes more of a conversation as opposed to just, you know, a square, an exactly square peg into a square.

[00:19:23] Jon Last: Right. I, you know, I’ve heard you talk about three capabilities, uh, decision acceleration, cross-category, pattern recognition, and challenging internal biases. What do you think clients are most hungry for today? And, and, and which ones are agencies best and least equipped to handle? 

[00:19:41] Eileen Campbell: I would say we are our best equipped, uh, the kind of agencies that I’ve dealt with, which are, you know, generally kind of large specialists.

[00:19:51] Eileen Campbell: I mean large, um, generalist kinds of agencies I think are kind of the cross pattern recognition. Um, you know, one of the things that, this is sort of a [00:20:00] personal thing for me, but part of why I always loved the agency world was if you’re, if you’re someone who thrives on diversity and you like working on a lot of different things, um, you know, the agency places is, there’s no better place to be, right?

[00:20:15] Eileen Campbell: It’s, it’s, you are never, you have no excuse to ever be bored. On the agency side, but it also allows you to see things that you go, you know, that’s really interesting. I was just talking to a client in Category X and I think there’s something really quite meaningful there for a client in category Y. Um, you know, so I’ll give you an example.

[00:20:40] Eileen Campbell: I was on the board of a company called Monotype that, that they were in the business of bonds, you know. What’s the font? I’m, I’m looking at your logo on your, on your screen there. Whatever font it is. 

[00:20:52] Jon Last: Right. 

[00:20:52] Eileen Campbell: It never would’ve occurred to me till I was, was on their board how important what they do is to the automotive [00:21:00] industry because all the displays in your car, you know, it’s incredibly important what they look like, what the fonts are like, how they contribute to safety.

[00:21:10] Eileen Campbell: So there’s, there’s something about that. Law of unintended consequences when you see something in one place and you go, oh, aha, that could be really interesting over here. So I think that’s something we’re, we’re best equipped to do. 

[00:21:27] Jon Last: Yeah, it’s, it, it’s, it’s, I can think of, you know, obviously the whole brand construction and branding components of this and how that translates into so much of.

[00:21:37] Jon Last: Everything that someone’s trying to do in, in a lot of different verticals. You’ve, you’ve seen it from both sides. I’ve seen it from both sides too. It’s kind of amazing to, to, to kind of, and, and I know we, it’s not really where I wanna go today, but 

[00:21:51] Eileen Campbell: Yeah. 

[00:21:52] Jon Last: Yeah. Those vantage points are just so helpful, I think, regardless of where you’re, you’re playing now, you’re coaching leaders and [00:22:00] you know, when you, when you think about running a major insights organization today, and you think about the broadness of transformation, where do you start?

[00:22:12] Eileen Campbell: You know, I, I think we might have chatted about this before. One of the first places I think we have to start both on the agency and inside the client side, is to do some serious kind of self-reflection on what I will call, for lack of a better term, the inferiority complex that seems pervasive in our industry.

[00:22:33] Eileen Campbell: And if you think about it, we are involved in the most important. Decisions that companies are making, what am I gonna sell? How am I going to sell it? Uh, if I’m hitting a rough patch, how do I turn the ship around? Those are massively important decisions and they have tremendous commercial impact, [00:23:00] yet we somehow think of ourselves as, you know, if I hear one more person call researchers nerds.

[00:23:08] Eileen Campbell: I will, my head will explode. Um, so I think we need to, to embrace and own, and frankly broadcast a bit more the value we bring, um, to, to organizations. Um, so I think that’s, that’s part of it. So that’s a huge transformation project in how you. How you grow and coach your teams, what skills you hire for. Um, you know, that doesn’t mean there’s never gonna be the place for an introverted researcher.

[00:23:43] Eileen Campbell: Um, but you know, I think what we need to remember is introversion, extroversion are about where you get your energy, not what you’re capable of doing, right? So a smart, introverted researcher also needs to be capable [00:24:00] of selling the value they bring. Right. Either to their client’s organization or to their own organization.

[00:24:06] Eileen Campbell: Um, so I think there’s, I think there’s some of that. I, I do think, you know, we’ve gotta get people comfortable with AI skills. Um, you know, I’m particularly concerned that we have a generation of leaders who vaguely think of it as cheating. Mm-hmm. We have a generation of kids coming into the industry who’ve actually been told it’s cheating.

[00:24:28] Eileen Campbell: In an academic context. Um, and so we, we really need to get over that hurdle. And so I think, uh, you know, the best leaders in the industry right now are really helping people get to grips with how to use ai, how to use it productively, how to use it transparently, and frankly how to use it unapologetically.

[00:24:49] Eileen Campbell: You know, we should be, we should be bragging to clients. We’re using AI to do these things. It makes what we can deliver to you quicker. It makes it more accurate. It allows me to spend [00:25:00] more time thinking about what the implications are. 

[00:25:04] Jon Last: You just hit on the word I was gonna come back with, which is implications.

[00:25:07] Jon Last: I think too often we get stuck in the process and less about thinking about what the utility of it is, and that’s the implications. Totally. Kind of flipping that to the client side. Yeah, we have a lot of aspiring leaders and, and client side leaders that listen to the, to the podcast. Any advice for them as, as they kind of navigate this shift towards becoming decision partners as opposed to just functioning as a project manager?

[00:25:35] Eileen Campbell: I think, um, I think for many of our clients, it would be fantastic to see them embrace a bit more design thinking. Um, you know, one of the things that I, I think we’ve struggled with as an industry is. The caliber and the, um, dynamism of what we deliver is often not up to [00:26:00] snuff. Right? So. Uh, on the client side, I want people to think about how do I make this amazing thing that I just did, these amazing insights that I just, um, have uncovered.

[00:26:12] Eileen Campbell: How do I make those go viral throughout our organization? Like, you know, I’d love to walk in a meeting and say, have you seen this thing that John did? Like, oh my God, you know, let me forward it to you. Um, and I think some of that is creating things that are a bit more snackable. I think it is creating things.

[00:26:30] Eileen Campbell: That make consumers come to life for our colleagues. Um, I’m a big advocate of, to the extent you can integrate video, um, it’s amazing how it will command the attention in a boardroom 

[00:26:44] Jon Last: on the 

[00:26:44] Eileen Campbell: tv. Um, exactly, exactly. And you know, of course, uh, with all due respect to our friends at Microsoft, um, we’ve gotta kill our dependence on PowerPoint.

[00:26:56] Eileen Campbell: And a lot of that comes from clients, right? I’ve seen agencies [00:27:00] that create these fantastic deliverables and only to have a client say, yeah, but could you do, could you just put it in some PowerPoint slides for me? Um, and so, so I think that, um, making sure on the client side that, that your work is visible and compelling and exciting, um, is, is super important.

[00:27:21] Eileen Campbell: And some of that is. Kind of really basic design thinking and storytelling. 

[00:27:28] Jon Last: Yeah. You know, when I was on the client side, I always talked about two things. I talked about the marketing of marketing research within the organization, and then actually attributing this to A-C-E-O-I reported into, he was like, your job is to be famous throughout the organization and your job is also to help make me famous in the industry.

[00:27:47] Eileen Campbell: Exactly. 

[00:27:48] Jon Last: Great orientation. That was, I, I, I never forgot that even when I moved 

[00:27:51] Eileen Campbell: to be the guy who knows, right? Like, you know, in every organization. It’s like, I don’t know, but I know a guy who knows. I think insights leaders should be the [00:28:00] guy who knows and gets pulled in like, Hey, you know, let’s, let’s get them into this meeting.

[00:28:07] Eileen Campbell: They’ve got some really interesting, in interesting things to share. 

[00:28:11] Jon Last: Any, any cool examples? Like when you sat in the CMO chair, there had to be certain insights that not only influenced, but you know, kind of made the work indispensable. Any any stories that you could share that, that kind of illustrate what we’re talking about?

[00:28:26] Eileen Campbell: You know, it it, it’s interesting because, uh, you’ve, you’ve been quite adjacent to the entertainment industry through your career, John, and, you know, um, with all respect to my friends in the entertainment industry, it is not the most insights driven. Mm-hmm. Of arenas. So frankly, getting anybody to think it wasn’t, you know, I, I had one, um, one colleague who said, oh no, you know, entertainment industry, it’s like the circus, right?

[00:28:52] Eileen Campbell: Either the sawdust is in your blood or it’s not. And you know, I think I said to him something like, well, you [00:29:00] know, I think sawdust in your blood might clog your arteries and that maybe we need. You know, maybe we need some people who don’t have sawdust in their bloods, in their blood to help us out. Um, I think some of the most interesting things I was able to move on, and I think it’s moved a lot further since I left, is to try and help studios understand just how compelling IMAX was to their potential.

[00:29:26] Eileen Campbell: Um. Audiences. Mm-hmm. And so, you know, we went from little tiny lines of copy at the bottom. You know, that said, see it in imax, to now it’s like above the fold, big print filmed for imax in imax. Um, and it’s a massive differentiator. That was a place where research really mattered. Um. We could show like the more you integrated that message, um, the bigger the contribution to the box office was.[00:30:00] 

[00:30:00] Eileen Campbell: Um, and, and you know, having a film in IMAX was often the difference between being the number one and the number two movie at the box office because we commanded such a, such a premium ticket price. Um, and it became sort of an imprimatur of what is the big movie out there this week? So that was a place where, where.

[00:30:21] Eileen Campbell: As a CMO Insights really helped me encourage our studio partners to feature IMAX more prominently in their own communications because frankly, their communications had way more power than mine. Their budgets were, you know, a hundred fold what my budget was. 

[00:30:40] Jon Last: Yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s, again, I think it comes back to seeing the broader picture from a more holistic lens.

[00:30:46] Jon Last: I, I often talk now about how, in some respects. There’s been such a race to broaden the reach of so many entertainment and sports properties that that. Begets a [00:31:00] whole nother set of thinking that that mm-hmm. Insights can deliver this. This has really been a terrific conversation. Uh, you know, we could go on for another 45 minutes.

[00:31:09] Jon Last: I, I know time is precious, both to you and to our listeners, but, um, a few big themes that really stood out for me today. Um, obviously the industry has to stop selling projects. It has to start. Being marketing or strategic partners that enable better decisions. Um, certainly AI is accelerating the shift, but it’s not replacing the people who bring judgment and context and pattern recognition and the courage, um, to, to challenge some long held assumptions and assertions.

[00:31:37] Jon Last: And, and I think the third theme that just stood out for me is just this real transformation means rethinking the capabilities and the role that insights play in, in, in shaping strategy. Mm-hmm. Um. Appreciate so much you sharing this, this candid and forward looking perspective. Um, and thanks to you and all of our listeners for, for joining us.

[00:31:56] Jon Last: Uh, please join us again for another episode of Insights and [00:32:00] Innovators. 

[00:32:00] Eileen Campbell: It’s been a real pleasure. Thanks John. 

[00:32:02] MRII Announcer: Thanks for joining the Insights and Innovators podcast for Market Research Institute International. Click subscribe to never miss an episode and visit us@i.org for more market research.