By Marilyn Weiss
In the evolving landscape of market research, methods that leverage technology are continually being developed to gain deeper insights into consumer behavior. Mobile Missions are a straightforward approach that has proven successful for SIVO clients. This approach allows researchers to tap into consumers' real-life experiences in a natural and engaging way, collecting meaningful data in the form of open-ended responses, photos and video footage.
Understanding Mobile Missions
Mobile Mission research is an immersive approach that leverages mobile technology to engage participants on their own schedule and in their natural environments. This involves prompting consumers to complete a series of activities and questions via their mobile devices, capturing their experiences, thoughts, and behaviors in real-time.
Benefits of Mobile Missions
Mobile Missions offer several advantages over traditional research techniques:
Real-Time Interaction: Participants receive prompts and tasks on their mobile devices, allowing them to respond in real-time as they shop, prepare, or use products.
Natural Environment: The method captures consumer behavior in real-life settings, such as their homes or local stores, ensuring more genuine participation and deeper insights.
Engagement and Comfort: Participants can complete tasks at their own pace, allowing them time to reflect and encouraging more thoughtful and honest responses.
Remote Observation: Researchers can observe and interact with participants remotely, making it easier to conduct research in environments where in-person observation might be challenging or restricted.
Applications for Mobile Missions
Mobile Missions are versatile and can be utilized to achieve various research objectives. Five common applications that we see at SIVO include:
1. Shopper Insights
2. Customer Journey Mapping
3. Brand and Promotion Engagement
4. Behavioral Insights
5. Competitive Analysis
By utilizing Mobile Missions across these diverse areas, companies can gain a holistic understanding of their consumers and their products, leading to more informed decisions and tailored strategies that resonate with their target audience.
Executional Details
The execution of Mobile Missions typically involves the following specifications:
Your Partner for Progressive Solutions and Actionable Insights
At SIVO, Inc., we are on a constant quest to identify innovative solutions that lead to meaningful insights for our clients. We have had great success in utilizing Mobile Mission technology to capture consumer perceptions and behaviors in a natural and engaging manner to achieve your learning objectives.
Contact us via our website form or email us at Contact@SIVOInsights.com to schedule a discovery call to discuss your business and market research needs.
By Kerry Juhl
Brand positioning is a critical component of a successful marketing strategy. It defines how a brand is perceived in the minds of its consumer target, differentiating it from key competitors. A well-crafted positioning statement serves as the foundation for all marketing efforts and ensures consistent messaging across all channels.
The SIVO team has spent many years helping brand teams develop and evaluate brand positionings across a variety of industries. While every positioning project is somewhat unique, we have supported our clients with proven frameworks and research approaches, leading to the development of successful brand positionings.
The Positioning Statement
A positioning statement is a concise description of how a brand wants to “show up” in the world, highlighting the primary (and ideally, unique) benefit it provides, along with the rationale for how it can deliver the benefit. The statement typically includes the following format and elements:
For (consumer target), Brand is the only product type that provides (key benefit), because Brand has (feature/reason to believe), (feature/reason to believe) and (feature/reason to believe).
For example, Volvo’s positioning statement looks something like this:
For safety-conscious families, Volvo premium automobiles offer the safest cars on the road because they have advanced safety features, industry-leading crash test ratings, and innovative safety technologies.
The Brand Benefit Ladder
At the heart of developing a strong brand positioning is a solid understanding of the Brand Benefit Ladder, a strategic tool used early in the positioning development process. It helps brand teams articulate the value proposition by identifying benefits at four levels:
1) What it is
2) What it does
3) How it makes you feel
4) How it can transform your life
This framework ensures a clear articulation of the brand’s offerings and the emotional and transformational benefits they provide. Depending on the brand’s maturity and the competitive landscape, positioning can be based on functional benefits (what it is/what it does) or a more emotional/transformational benefits (how it makes me you feel/changes your life).
Positioning Types
There are a variety of positioning types that fit across the Brand Benefit Ladder:
Product Features:
Attribute-Based Positioning centers on specific features that distinguish the product.
Example: For homeowners, Dyson vacuum cleaners are superior carpet cleaners because they offer superior suction, advanced filtration, and allergen removal.
Value-Based Positioning is linked specifically to the price value of the product.
Example: For price-sensitive shoppers, Walmart offers everyday low prices by leveraging its extensive supply chain and scale to provide unbeatable savings on a vast assortment of goods, ensuring customers can save money and live better.
Functional Benefits:
Benefit-based Positioning highlights the key functional benefits or solutions provided by the product.
Example: For fitness enthusiasts struggling to exercise regularly, Peloton is the exercise bike that keeps you motivated to exercise because it delivers an immersive and interactive experience, world-class instructors, and a supportive fitness community.
Problem-Solution Positioning focuses on the problems that the product solves for customers.
Example: For individuals suffering from dandruff, Head & Shoulders provides effective and long-lasting relief from dandruff flakes and itchiness because it has a clinically proven formula that eliminates dandruff, nourishes, and protects the scalp.
Emotional Benefits:
Lifestyle Positioning aligns the product with a particular emotion or feeling.
Example: For athletes and active individuals, Nike enhances athletic performance and empowers athletes to reach their full potential through its innovative, cutting-edge sportswear products.
Cultural Symbolism Positioning uses cultural symbols and references to position the brand within a cultural context.
Example: For motorcycle enthusiasts seeking an authentic and exhilarating riding experience, Harley-Davidson is the iconic motorcycle brand that delivers powerful, custom-made bikes with a rich American heritage and embodying the spirit of freedom, rebellion and individuality.
Purpose-Driven Benefits:
Innovation-led Positioning sets the brand up as a leader in innovation and cutting-edge technology.
Example: For environmentally conscious consumers and tech enthusiasts, Tesla is the leading electric vehicle and clean energy company that offers a sustainable environmental solution via their innovative high-performance electric cars and cutting-edge technology.
Purpose-led Positioning centers on what the brand is doing for the world rather than the product itself.
Example: For socially conscious consumers, TOMS is the footwear brand that provides stylish and comfortable shoes while also making a positive impact on communities around the world though its One-for-One model, where each purchase directly contributes to improving lives in underdeveloped countries.
Purpose-Driven Benefits:
Innovation-led Positioning sets the brand up as a leader in innovation and cutting-edge technology.
Example: For environmentally conscious consumers and tech enthusiasts, Tesla is the leading electric vehicle and clean energy company that offers a sustainable environmental solution via their innovative high-performance electric cars and cutting-edge technology.
Purpose-led Positioning centers on what the brand is doing for the world rather than the product itself.
Example: For socially conscious consumers, TOMS is the footwear brand that provides stylish and comfortable shoes while also making a positive impact on communities around the world though its One-for-One model, where each purchase directly contributes to improving lives in underdeveloped countries.
Regardless of the type of positioning and where it fits on the benefit ladder, all positioning statements need to be clear, credible, and differentiated from the competition. It can then be used to inspire marketing executions across channels, to create consistent communications and connections to the consumer target.
Researching Your Brand Positioning
Developing effective brand positioning requires rigorous research, with the ideal approach being a combination of qualitative and quantitative research.
1. Qualitative Exploration: This phase uses one-on-one in-depth interviews with current and potential consumers to explore brand perceptions and refine positioning language. It helps the client team explore and understand the nuanced emotional and rational drivers behind brand choice and allows the team to modify and improve the positioning statements in real-time, based on consumer input.
2. Quantitative Survey: Once the positioning statements are refined, quantitative research helps identify the most motivating positioning from a handful of alternatives. Surveys and real-world experiments (e.g., testing via digital ads) can be used to test different positioning statements among a larger sample, assessing the impact on brand perception and purchase interest.
By using a combination of qualitative exploration and quantitative validation, brand teams can ensure their positioning is not only compelling but also grounded in consumer reality.
Your Source for Expert Consumer Insights
At SIVO, Inc., we are dedicated to helping our clients develop brand positionings that are clear, unique, credible, and most importantly, relevant to your consumer target. We are trusted advisors in supporting your positioning development and will design custom learning plans that generate the insights needed to carve out a unique space in the market and connect with your consumers. This holistic approach will set the foundation for enduring brand success.
Contact us via our website form or email us at Contact@SIVOInsights.com today to schedule a discovery call!
As customer needs evolve and competition intensifies, traditional segmentation frameworks often fall short. Many segmentation models are based on demographics and psychographics, and often define customers based on traits such as their age, gender, attitudes and values. They tell you who your consumer is – but not why they make the choices they do.
To fuel meaningful, strategic growth, businesses need more than demographic snapshots. They need contextual insight. This is where frameworks like Demand Space thinking comes in.
Demand Space frameworks shift the focus from static consumer traits to the moments that drive decisions. Instead of defining your audience only by traits such as age, gender, or income, this approach considers:
It’s not about who your consumer is on paper – it’s about what’s happening around them, and inside them, when they make choices.
Consumers don’t always behave the same way, even when they share similar traits on paper. A single person has different needs and behaviors throughout the day, week, or year, and traditional segmentation often misses these moments that drive real-world decisions. Demand Spaces, on the other hand, are based on the moments where context, emotion, and need converge.
When implemented thoughtfully, Demand Spaces help businesses:
Demand Spaces help businesses find the moments when consumers are underserved by existing options. These blind spots often become the clearest opportunities for growth. By identifying emotional or contextual gaps in the consumer experience, teams can design solutions that respond to real pain points and not using assumptions.
They also help businesses go beyond what consumers say they want and uncover what they actually need in specific situations. This helps teams design offerings that better reflect real-world behaviors. It’s a way to spark smarter ideas, grounded in daily routines, shifting priorities, and overlooked occasions that traditional research often misses.
Demand Space tools help position brands based on context and need, not just category. This reduces overlap and creates clearer brand roles. That means brands can carve out distinct emotional territory, ensuring each one plays a defined role in the consumer’s life, not just on a shelf.
By focusing efforts on the most critical consumer moments – when the stakes, emotions, or needs are highest – teams can prioritize smarter. It enables brands to align resources with the occasions that drive the most value, loyalty, or conversion – improving both focus and ROI.
They also help in assigning each brand, product, or service distinct moments. This ensures they serve different needs or occasions rather than competing for the same ones. By separating who serves what – and when – demand spaces bring clarity to brand architecture and reduce inefficiencies across portfolios.
Demand Spaces help businesses unlock growth by bringing clarity to what consumers need, when they need it, and why. Instead of chasing broad segments or spreading resources thin, brands can focus on the moments that truly drive behavior – revealing new opportunities, reducing internal friction, and building solutions that resonate in the real world.
Let’s say your target is a 35-year-old parent who regularly shops for snacks. Depending on the situation, they might want:
Each moment carries different emotional and functional needs – and may lead them to choose entirely different brands or products. This is the nuance Demand Spaces capture.
In a challenging market, brands can’t afford to rely on guesswork. Demand Spaces provide both smarter lenses for targeting and innovation, a more human understanding of consumer behavior, and a faster path to discovering what will actually drive choice – and growth.
To identify and activate demand spaces, brands need to move beyond static surveys. Instead, they should use context-rich research tools like:
These are some of the methods that help businesses capture real consumer behavior, in real environments. At SIVO, we combine deep qualitative expertise with flexible research models to help you map the demand spaces that matter most to your business. Whether you're reassessing brand positioning, exploring whitespace for innovation, or trying to understand behavior shifts in today’s market – we help you with the right tools and insights for your business.
Want to talk about how Demand Space research can unlock strategic clarity for your team?
We’d love to help!
Every year, businesses face the same challenge: key research projects grind to a halt when insights professionals go on vacation. Deadlines can slip, stakeholder requests pile up, and business decisions get delayed, all because critical expertise isn’t available when it’s needed most.
For many teams, the choice is either overloading remaining staff (leading to problems like burnout) or putting projects on hold (risking lost momentum and missed opportunities). But there’s a better way.
Leading brands solve this problem by leveraging On Demand Market Research Talent—highly skilled, fractional insights professionals who step in seamlessly, ensuring that research initiatives keep moving, even when core team members are out. Whether planned months in advance or needed at the last minute, these experts keep insights flowing year-round without the cost or commitment of full-time hiring.
In this article, we’ll explore:
If your research team has ever struggled to keep up during vacation seasons, this is for you. Let’s dive in.
Insights teams (or their superiors) often assume they can absorb the impact of vacation gaps—but the reality is more disruptive than expected. When key insights professionals are out of office, projects stall, timelines get pushed, and business decisions are delayed. The ripple effect extends beyond just a temporary pause—it can create significant financial, operational, and strategic costs.
Insights don’t operate in isolation. When research is postponed due to staffing shortages, marketing campaigns, product launches, and strategic initiatives suffer. A postponed concept test could mean missing the ideal market entry window, and a delayed brand study could leave unanswered questions right when leadership needs clarity.
The default response to vacation gaps? Overloading remaining team members. This short-term fix often leads to long-term burnout, reducing productivity and increasing the likelihood of rushed, lower-quality insights. High-performing researchers need time to recharge, but when teams are stretched too thin, performance—and retention—suffers.
Even with strong documentation, there’s always implicit knowledge that only team members carry—research nuances, stakeholder preferences, and the context behind past decisions. When an insights pro steps away, this expertise temporarily disappears, forcing teams to either pause projects or make assumptions that may not align with prior research.
Insights teams thrive on being trusted advisors to the business, but when gaps in coverage lead to stalled projects or incomplete data, stakeholder confidence erodes. If leadership views the insights function as unreliable, they may turn to gut instinct over data-driven decision-making—undermining the very role of the Consumer Insights function.
The bottom line? Vacation gaps in insights teams aren’t just an inconvenience—they create costly disruptions that affect business performance. But there’s a way to avoid these risks while still ensuring that research professionals get the breaks they need.
Vacation gaps are inevitable—but research delays don’t have to be.
Vacation gaps are inevitable—but research delays don’t have to be. The key to maintaining momentum without burnout is having a strategy in place before gaps happen. Whether you’re proactively planning or scrambling for last-minute coverage, here’s how leading companies keep research running smoothly, even when key team members are away.
When key team members are out, the biggest risk is insights bottlenecks—studies stall, stakeholder questions pile up, and research deliverables get delayed. SIVO’s On-Demand Talent steps in seamlessly, ensuring business-critical work continues without disruption.
Certain projects can’t afford to pause just because someone is on vacation. Product launches, consumer deep dives, and ad testing require continuity and expert oversight.
Sometimes, vacation coverage isn’t planned—it’s needed last-minute. Whether it’s a sudden leave of absence or a forgotten PTO overlap, scrambling to fill gaps can lead to expensive delays.
Whether planned or unexpected, vacation gaps don’t have to slow down insights. With an On-Demand Talent strategy in place, businesses stay ahead of potential disruptions—avoiding last-minute scrambles and keeping research moving seamlessly year-round.
Leading companies plan ahead—or react quickly—with On-Demand Talent, ensuring no critical work falls through the cracks that can impact the organization. Here’s how organizations leverage fractional insights pros to bridge gaps and keep research running smoothly:
Scenario 1: A national CPG company has ongoing brand equity tracking and ad testing, but their Senior Consumer Insights Manager was heading out for a month-long vacation.
Without coverage, research timelines would have slipped, and stakeholder meetings would have lacked fresh insights. Instead, the company brought in an On-Demand Consumer Insights Strategist to manage the process, ensuring:
This proactive approach prevented research bottlenecks and decision-making gaps, keeping the business moving.
Scenario 2: A global food & beverage company had a new product launch scheduled—but their Head of Consumer Insights and two key team members had overlapping PTO.
With final-stage concept testing still underway and last-minute adjustments needed for packaging and claims, the company faced a potential launch delay. Instead of postponing, they brought in a fractional Insights Lead to:
ODT gave them specialized expertise exactly when they needed it, ensuring no compromises in research quality or speed.
Scenario 3: A leading technology brand was in the middle of a competitive landscape study when an unexpected leave of absence left their insights team short-staffed.
Rather than overloading remaining team members or pressing pause on critical work, they:
With rapid-response talent placement, the company avoided research disruptions and kept its competitive intelligence up to date.
Scenario 4: A major retailer had a busy summer innovation pipeline, but multiple insights pros were out on PTO at the same time.
Rather than pausing consumer co-creation sessions and delaying concept testing, they used On-Demand Talent to:
With fractional insights experts seamlessly filling gaps, the company stayed on schedule without sacrificing research quality.
Whether you plan ahead or need urgent support, On-Demand Talent ensures your research stays on track—so your team can take time off without work grinding to a halt.
By leveraging fractional insights professionals, companies can prevent last-minute scrambles, reduce the risk of missed deadlines, and maintain research momentum year-round.
So, how do you avoid research slowdowns when your team is out? And if you’re already facing an urgent coverage issue, what’s the best way to bridge the gap without scrambling?Let’s break it down.
Businesses plan for financial forecasts, marketing campaigns, and supply chain logistics months in advance. Yet, many insights teams still treat PTO gaps as an inevitable issue. The key is building vacation coverage into your annual research strategy so that insights continue flowing, no matter the time of year. Some things you can do:
Planning ahead prevents vacation gaps from becoming business roadblocks. But what if PTO conflicts weren’t anticipated—and now key insights work is at risk of falling behind?
Even with careful planning, unexpected gaps happen. A last-minute PTO request, overlapping team absences, or an urgent business need can leave insights teams short-staffed at critical moments. If you’re already dealing with a research gap, here’s how to minimize disruption fast:
As companies seek more efficiency, many turn to AI-powered research tools to bridge staffing gaps. While AI can be a valuable support system, it has clear limitations that make it an unreliable substitute for expert insights professionals—especially when high-stakes decisions are involved.
For instance, AI is great at surfacing data but doesn’t interpret nuances, human motivations, or cultural relevance—leading to misaligned insights. AI models also (unfortunately) inherit biases from training data, which can skew results if not carefully reviewed and adjusted by human experts. Additionally, executives rely on strategic recommendations, not just raw data—AI lacks the credibility and business acumen needed to drive stakeholder decisions.
If you’re considering using AI to fill vacation coverage gaps for your research team, keep in mind that the more tools you introduce, the more training your team will require. This can actually take more time away from employees rather than increasing productivity—especially for short-term needs like a vacation fill. What seems like an easy solution can quickly turn into a time-consuming distraction, creating more inefficiencies rather than solving the original problem.
When critical insights projects can’t wait, finding temporary research experts quickly is essential. So, where can businesses turn for immediate, high-quality research support?
Many organizations look to freelance platforms and consulting firms, but these often require lengthy onboarding or lack the industry expertise needed for specialized research roles. Others attempt to redistribute workloads internally, which can lead to inefficiencies and overburdened teams.
A more effective approach is tapping into pre-vetted insights professionals (like ODT) who can integrate quickly, understand complex research needs, and keep projects moving without disruption. Whether covering for a planned PTO or responding to an unexpected gap, having a flexible resourcing strategy ensures that insights teams can maintain momentum—without last-minute scrambles or overburdening internal staff.
At SIVO, we provide businesses with flexible, on-demand insights talent to keep research initiatives moving—no matter the challenge. Whether you need short-term vacation coverage, interim leadership, or specialized expertise for a critical project, we place senior-level insights professionals within days.
Don’t let research slow down when key insight team members are out for vacation. Let’s talk:
contact@sivoinsights.com | www.sivoinsights.com/on-demand-talent-management/
We can all probably agree that we are living through one of the most disruptive events of our generation. With our worlds turned upside down, it comes as no surprise that the way people work in America has also vastly changed.
Just as news stories cropped up about 2021 being the year of the Great Resignation, other stories followed asking the question ‘where have all the workers gone?’ I’ve pondered this question as well, seeing the ‘short staffed’ signs everywhere I go and hearing from countless businesses about their struggle to retain talent.
The answer to what is causing the Great Resignation might lie in the reframing of the phenomenon. A smart colleague of mine, Vina Klein, astutely calls it the “Great Values Reset.” I really like that. It gives more insight to what is happening. People seem more attuned to their values when choosing how to live and how to work. At the start of the pandemic, we were sent home and we slowed down, we took stock, and we re-evaluated our lives. That experience impacted our choices in 2021 and beyond.
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Do customers want to ‘hire’ your product?
Now enter the gig economy. The gig economy has always been around, but something interesting happened as a result of Covid-19. Gig workers represented around 35 percent of the U.S. workforce in 2020, up from between 14 and 20 percent in 2014. The number of companies that fully operate on gig work has increased by 85% since 2014. That growth has only accelerated as a result of Covid-19. As workers reset values and put more focus on having some control over their lives, employees are leaving the confines of a 9-5 and corporate bureaucracy. The gig economy is where they land, and SIVO Insights has the perfect launchpad for these workers.
I’m very fortunate to lead SIVO Insights On-Demand Talent. I’m passionate about helping my consumer insights consultants find fulfilling roles that match their skills and talent. I’m also very much “in the zone” when I’m able to help our clients fill a specific need on their team or find the right talent for a project. Matching our clients’ needs with SIVO’s On-Demand Talent experience and skills is the best part of my job.
SIVO Insights On-Demand Talent allows people to choose how they want to work. It provides the flexibility and work-life balance that comes with the gig economy. For companies, On Demand Talent delivers flexibility, too. Whether an organization is struggling to find and retain talent or is not in a position to commit to a full-time hire, tapping into SIVO On Demand Talent is a win-win!
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