Social Media Intelligence Case Study – Consumer Packaged Goods

Situation:

A large consumer packaged goods company wasn’t getting the sales expected on a new product line.  The client is in a highly competitive industry and wanted to understand the consumer attitudes toward the product and identify the reasons for/against purchasing.

Solution:

We used our proprietary social media intelligence methodology and analyzed all public online mentions about the product line.  Four (4) relevant themes were identified within the consumer conversations: brand reputation, cost and value, product quality, and product packaging.  We further analyzed the demographic and geographic information within the discussions to further segment and uncover rich consumer insights.

Results:

Within two (2) days, ListenLogic collected and analyzed 17,000 comments over a 30 day period.  We determined the following:

• Consumer attitudes toward the brand, reputation and value were relatively positive for all age and gender segments, no issues there
• Quality was seen as a slight issue, but not enough to explain the lack of adoption
• For female consumers, specifically 18-34 which was one of the product’s primary targets, packaging was the issue

Through social media analysis, we were able to determine that females, specifically 18-34 located in the Northeastern United States, had real issues with the packaging design and were choosing a competitor’s product.  The packaging size was too big, and during the cold stormy winter in the Northeast women didn’t want to carry the large package out to their cars from the retailer.  The competitor’s packaging was 25% smaller.

Armed with this qualitative and quantitative data, the client made a well-informed decision to quickly alter the packaging size to make it more universally acceptable, as well as create a new campaign targeting female consumers.

For more information and to see how we can help you leverage social media for consumer intelligence, please contact ListenLogic at 1-888-ROI-ON-SM or info@listenlogic.com.

Social Media Intelligence Case Study – Carnival Cruise Lines

Company:

Carnival Cruise Lines

Date:

March 2010

Objective:

To understand travelers’ perceptions of Carnival Cruise Lines as well as reputation issues surrounding the brand. Some specific questions to be answered include:

1. What drives decision making for particular cruise ships?
2. Is the ‘Fun Ship’ reputation turning away travelers?
3. Are ‘noisy kids’ harming the brand?
4. How is Carnival’s cancellation policy viewed?

Answers:

We used our standard methodology of mining social data on message boards, forums, blogs, microblogs, news and social networks sites using RESONATE, our monitoring technology, to extract themes, opinions, influencers, demographics and geographic segments.  Our analysts were then able to interpret the data and provide the following insights:

1. Travelers discuss multiple reasons for switching cruise lines including ship noise, doors slamming, loud public announcements, and the “partiers, drinkers, kids” on the ship.
2. Nearly 10% of Carnival consumers are attracted to their budget friendly cruises, but hesitate due to fear that it will be too much of a party atmosphere.
3. Experienced Carnival travelers indicate kids are kept very busy and are not a noisy distraction
4. Carnival’s cancellation policy is perceived very negatively. Particularly surrounding flight delays and flight cancellations due to weather.

Additional Findings:

In addition to the above insights, other interesting findings were uncovered:

• Carnival travelers favor the amount of pre-travel information that’s supplied including destination information and logistics
• Travelers find group travel easy with Carnival
• Some travelers have concern over Carnival’s food, “It can be very inconsistent”
• Many travelers had concerns over the impact of large groups on individual travelers, “I’m stuck on the Star Trek ship!”