Strategic Insights – We’ve Got Ideas

Many marketers and advertisers instinctively write off academic research for business purposes as they consider it useless and irrelevant for their purposes. This type of research, they say, is simply “academic.” But does academic research really have no place in our real world business lives? Can it not provide a valuable perspective on some issues we grapple with in advertising and marketing?

I think it is entirely too simplistic just to write off academic research completely. Granted, much of it is theory based and therefore not particularly applicable to marketers’ needs for quick reads on consumer attitudes and behaviors. Of course, little of it deals with specific product areas. Certainly, sample size and composition of those samples are also a concern. And a lot of academic research is published a year or two after the research was originally conducted.

However, if one is careful and knows where to look, some academic research can be of value. As long as one realizes that most of the research is quite broad in its perspective and typically attempting to reinforce or build on a theory, valuable nuggets can be located.

For example, we found some useful data on consumers’ use of coupons that assisted us in the development of a coupon strategy for a specific client. We also found articles explaining how consumers are engaging with content found in interactive advertising. This learning helped us develop the agency’s overall strategy for advertising on new media. Obviously, this whole “new media” area is timely and vital for marketers to understand as we lunge further into an Internet-based communicaiton world.

The key to locating good learning in academic research is being familiar with the key journals and the types of articles found in these journals….or at least finding someone who is familiar with them. And of course, one has to be able to cut through all the academic jargon that infests these articles, making it practically impossible for any normal human being to read.

Remember, nuggets of wisdom are there and often worth the effort and time involved in looking for them.