Marketing Intelligence

The Marketing Intelligence System
A marketing intelligence system is a set of procedures and sources that managers use to obtain
everyday information about developments in the marketing environment. The internal records
system supplies results data, but the marketing intelligence system supplies happenings data.
Marketing managers collect marketing intelligence in a variety of different ways, such as by reading
books, newspapers, and trade publications; talking to customers, suppliers, and distributors;
monitoring social media on the Internet; and meeting with other company managers.
Before the Internet, sometimes you just had to go out in the field, literally, and watch the
competition. This is what oil and gas entrepreneur T. Boone Pickens did. Describing how he
learned about a rival’s drilling activity, Pickens recalls, “We would have someone who would watch
[the rival’s] drilling floor from a half mile away with field glasses. Our competitor didn’t like it but
there wasn’t anything they could do about it. Our spotters would watch the joints and drill pipe.
They would count them; each [drill] joint was 30 feet long. By adding up all the joints, you would
be able to tally the depth of the well.” Pickens knew that the deeper the well, the more costly it
would be for his rival to get the oil or gas up to the surface, and this information provided him with
an immediate competitive advantage.9Marketing intelligence gathering must be legal and ethical. In 2006, the private intelligence firm
Diligence paid auditor KPMG $1.7 million for having illegally infiltrated it to acquire an audit of a
Bermuda-based investment firm for a Russian conglomerate. Diligence’s cofounder posed as a British
intelligence officer and convinced a member of the audit team to share confidential documents.10
A company can take eight possible actions to improve the quantity and quality of its marketing
intelligence. After describing the first seven, we devote special attention to the eighth, collecting
marketing intelligence on the Internet.
• Train and motivate the sales force to spot and report new developments. The company must
“sell” its sales force on their importance as intelligence gatherers. Grace Performance
Chemicals, a division ofW. R. Grace, supplies materials and chemicals to the construction and
packaging industries. Its sales reps were instructed to observe the innovative ways customers
used its products in order to suggest possible new products. Some were using Grace waterproofing
materials to soundproof their cars and patch boots and tents. Seven new-product
ideas emerged, worth millions in sales.11
• Motivate distributors, retailers, and other intermediaries to pass along important intelligence.
Marketing intermediaries are often closer to the customer and competition and can offer
helpful insights. ConAgra has initiated a study with some of its retailers such as Safeway,
Kroger, and Walmart to study how and why people buy its foods. Finding that shoppers who
bought their Orville Redenbacher and Act II brands of popcorn tended to also buy Coke,
ConAgra worked with the retailers to develop in-store displays for both products. Combining
retailers’ data with its own qualitative insights, ConAgra learned that many mothers switched to
time-saving meals and snacks when school started. It launched its “Seasons of Mom” campaign
to help grocers adjust to seasonal shifts in household needs.12
• Hire external experts to collect intelligence. Many companies hire specialists to gather marketing
intelligence.13 Service providers and retailers send mystery shoppers to their stores to
assess cleanliness of facilities, product quality, and the way employees treat customers. Health
care facilities’ use of mystery patients has led to improved estimates of wait times, better explanations
of medical procedures, and less-stressful programming on the waiting room TV.14
• Network internally and externally. The firm can purchase competitors’ products, attend
open houses and trade shows, read competitors’ published reports, attend stockholders’ meetings,
talk to employees, collect competitors’ ads, consult with suppliers, and look up news stories
about competitors.
• Set up a customer advisory panel. Members of advisory panels might include the company’s
largest, most outspoken, most sophisticated, or most representative customers. For example,
GlaxoSmithKline sponsors an online community devoted to weight loss and says it is learning
far more than it could have gleamed from focus groups on topics from packaging its weightloss
pill to where to place in-store marketing.15
• Take advantage of government-related data resources. The U.S. Census Bureau provides
an in-depth look at the population swings, demographic groups, regional migrations, and
changing family structure of the estimated 304,059,724 people in the United States (as of
July 1, 2008). Census marketer Nielsen Claritas cross-references census figures with consumer
surveys and its own grassroots research for clients such as The Weather Channel,
BMW, and Sovereign Bank. Partnering with “list houses” that provide customer phone and
address information, Nielsen Claritas can help firms select and purchase mailing lists with
specific clusters.16
• Purchase information from outside research firms and vendors. Well-known data suppliers
include firms such as the A.C. Nielsen Company and Information Resources Inc. They collect
information about product sales in a variety of categories and consumer exposure to various
media. They also gather consumer-panel data much more cheaply than marketers manage on
their own. Biz360 and its online content partners, for example, provide real-time coverage and
analysis of news media and consumer opinion information from over 70,000 traditional and
social media sources (print, broadcast,Web sites, blogs, and message boards).17