The months leading up to strategic business planning – often Q3 for most organizations – are a critical time to align your consumer insights and market research efforts. This is pre-planning season: the runway before Q4, when final decisions around investment, growth initiatives, product pipelines, and customer strategies are made. During this stage, thoughtful research planning can profoundly impact whether insights end up framing big decisions or simply reporting on them after the fact.

Strong pre-planning research allows companies to proactively understand areas like shifting customer behaviors, untapped market opportunities, competitive changes, and evolving brand perceptions. When insights are gathered early and intentionally, they can guide the very foundation of strategic choices – not just validate them later.

Research that leads, not follows

Without a clear plan in place, insights often default to being reactive. But leading organizations treat pre-planning season as the moment to ask meaningful, forward-looking questions:

• How are customer expectations evolving in our category – and how might that influence our product roadmap?
• What unmet needs are emerging that we can own strategically next year?
• What messages should our marketing prioritize, now and in the long term?

By aligning research objectives to these future-facing questions, insights teams ensure their efforts serve a broader purpose – helping leadership see around corners before decisions are made.

Turning data into actionable strategy

Pre-planning research that’s linked to strategic planning also improves how data is used across the business. Rather than isolated reports, teams build unified insights strategies that fuel collaboration between marketing, product, finance, and R&D. The result? Consumer feedback becomes a shared lens for decision-making – not just something owned by the insights team.

Challenges organizations often face in pre-planning research:

• Insights briefs without a clear tie to Q4 or annual planning priorities
• Data collected too close to planning deadlines to influence strategy
• Lack of senior ownership connecting research to business outcomes

This is why pre-planning research, when done with the right leadership and timing, is more than just useful – it’s transformative. It moves the insights team from supporting cast to strategic partner.

At SIVO, we’ve seen that organizations who start early and align insights to their planning timelines not only make better use of their research investments – they build smarter, more adaptive business strategies year over year.

When senior-level guidance is missing from the research function during pre-planning, it's easy for insights to remain disconnected from the broader business agenda. Teams might run surveys or gather consumer data, but these activities often stay stuck in the tactical zone – helping only in the short term, and rarely shaping strategic decisions in Q4 and beyond. This is one of the most common pitfalls of pre-planning research when it's not led with intention.

So, what happens when market research lacks leadership during pre-planning? Several things:

1. Research becomes reactive, not strategic

Without a senior insights leader driving the connection to business goals, the default becomes quick-turn requests that feel urgent but aren’t always aligned with the larger strategy. Your team collects data, but it rarely feeds the questions that matter most to enterprise growth or annual planning.

2. Teams work in silos

Research gets developed in isolation, with marketing, product, or sales stakeholders chiming in too late – if at all. Instead of building a cross-functional research plan, organizations lose touch with what insights are truly needed across departments. The result: missed opportunities, duplication of efforts, or redundant data.

3. Insights are under-leveraged

A lack of leadership means no one is owning the strategic narratives behind the data. The findings might get shared – even in a well-designed deck – but without context, they don’t influence senior decision-making. This is when executives begin to see market research as “just reporting” – instead of a tool for innovation, differentiation and direction.

Why leadership changes everything

Strategic insights planning begins with someone who has both the research expertise and business acumen to translate data into action. These individuals – often experienced consumer insights professionals – connect the dots between what customers want and where the organization is headed. They're critical in turning ideas into insights, and insights into impact.

When in-house leaders are unavailable or spread too thin, bringing in external support can be a powerful solution. This is where fractional experts, like SIVO's On Demand Talent, make a meaningful difference during pre-planning. With experience across industries and insight disciplines, these interim research directors step in quickly and lead your team through the early stages of research planning.

Compared to hiring a full-time lead – which can take months – On Demand Talent gives companies access to top-tier professionals with the ability to start within days or weeks. They're not junior staff or freelancers just filling a gap; they're experienced insights leaders who bring strategic thinking to your existing team without the long-term commitment.

What On Demand Talent can help you avoid:

• Wasted research investments on disconnected or duplicated efforts
• Insights that don't scale up to support annual planning goals
• Internal confusion about what the research is supposed to inform

Ultimately, it’s not the volume of consumer data that drives value – it’s the leadership in place to use it well. And during pre-planning, that leadership makes all the difference in whether research results stay tactical or serve a strategic role in Q4 and beyond.

During pre-planning season, when insights teams begin preparing research to inform annual strategy, leadership matters more than ever. Without clear guidance, research can easily default to reactive data pulls or short-term concepts. Interim research leaders – such as an interim research director – can bring the strategic direction and business alignment needed to elevate pre-planning research into a critical tool for decision-making.

These seasoned professionals help bridge the gap between insights execution and strategic business goals. Whether embedded temporarily or on a fractional basis, they provide clarity, focus, and integration that’s often missing when teams operate autonomously.

Translating Business Questions into Research Objectives

One of the primary strengths of interim insights leaders is their ability to translate high-level business questions into actionable research objectives. This ensures the research that’s initiated during pre-planning directly supports the questions leadership will ask in Q4 planning sessions – such as where to invest, how to grow, or what risks to manage.

Instead of isolated projects, an interim leader can prioritize and shape studies that proactively inform growth strategies, consumer preferences, and competitive positioning.

Breaking Down Silos in Time for Planning

Many insights teams operate in silos, especially when leadership roles are vacant or spread thin. Interim talent helps unify cross-functional teams – from marketing to product to finance – by aligning on core questions that matter for business planning. This collaborative approach not only strengthens the relevance of research but ensures faster traction and internal buy-in.

Benefits of Having Interim Leadership in Pre-Planning

• Business-aligned insights: Research projects are shaped with strategic decisions in mind
• Faster momentum: Experts can hit the ground running without onboarding delays
• Stronger cross-functional connection: Interim professionals build bridges across stakeholder teams
• Improved resource prioritization: Time and budget are directed toward the most impactful questions

Ultimately, interim research leaders don’t just help create better reporting – they help teams ask better questions. And that’s what sets the stage for strategic planning that’s rooted in real, useful insight.

When it comes to bridging gaps in consumer insights leadership, two common solutions emerge: hiring a consultant or deploying On Demand Talent. While both can provide value, they differ in how deeply they integrate with your team and how effectively they align pre-planning research to larger business objectives.

SIVO’s On Demand Talent is not built like traditional consultants. Instead of offering advice from a distance, these seasoned professionals work alongside your internal team, embedding themselves into your workflows, systems, and culture. This day-to-day presence is a key factor in producing research that’s grounded in strategy – not just delivered as an external recommendation.

What Traditional Consultants Offer (and Where That Falls Short)

Consultants often enter with specific frameworks or deliverables. This can be helpful for broad assessments but may not drive alignment under tight timelines or make actionable connections across internal functions. And because consultants often operate outside the core team, their recommendations sometimes lack ownership or continuity through planning cycles.

Why On Demand Talent Leads to Stronger Research Alignment

On Demand Talent integrates directly into your team, giving you immediate access to experienced professionals who:

• Understand your business context: They take the time to learn your priorities, customers, and categories – fast
• Plug into existing processes: No need to reorient systems or workflows – they adapt to yours
• Work cross-functionally: Instead of delivering isolated outputs, they partner across departments
• Focus entirely on your tasks: Unlike consultants juggling clients, they dedicate focus to your organization

For example, let’s say an insights team at a growing food brand is down one senior leader heading into pre-planning. Rather than hire a consultant for a one-time study, they bring on an On Demand Talent professional for three months. That expert not only designs the studies with strategic framing, but also joins business planning meetings to help translate findings into action. (Note: this is a fictional example for illustration)

In short, if you need leadership that can both think strategically and execute inside your organization, On Demand Talent offers a more embedded, flexible solution than traditional consulting or freelance support alone.

Pre-planning season moves quickly – and so should your support. Whether your team is managing a leadership gap, needs extra hands to meet executive demands, or wants to level up the strategy behind upcoming research, timing is critical. That’s where fast, flexible insights support makes all the difference.

Adapt Quickly to Business Needs

Your business can’t wait months for a full-time hire or take the risk of an underqualified contractor. With SIVO’s On Demand Talent, organizations can be matched with expert-level talent in days or weeks – not months. These professionals offer support for both short-term research planning and long-range strategy execution, making them a powerful tool as you prepare insights for Q4 strategic planning.

Our consumer insights experts come from diverse industries, including retail, CPG, healthcare, tech, and financial services. They’re vetted, experienced, and ready to contribute immediately.

Customize Support Based on Your Needs

One of the advantages of using On Demand Talent is its flexibility. You can bring in expertise for a specific project – like designing a foundational study – or for an interim period – such as covering an open head of insights role. Many teams choose to augment their current staff during busy seasons without the long-term commitment of full hiring.

It’s also a cost-effective way to scale. While consultants or agencies may charge significant fees for strategic work, On Demand Talent offers embedded senior support focused precisely on your business planning priorities.

Common Use Cases for On Demand Talent Before Planning Season

• Backfilling a senior insights director during transition periods
• Infusing strategic direction into current tactical research projects
• Driving stakeholder alignment ahead of annual planning sessions
• Providing bandwidth to meet executive demands for decision-ready data

Whether you’re looking to spark new thinking, tighten alignment, or simply ensure your insights team doesn’t fall behind, the flexibility of On Demand Talent can support precisely where and when it matters.