About the Digitization of Customer Insights
A conversation between Janina Mütze and Dr Martin Einhorn
What does the population wish for? What do people desire to change? For more than 100 years, market and opinion researchers have been trying to understand this as precisely as possible. In the fourth episode of Porsche’s Next Visions podcast (German edition), host Christopher Golombek meets Janina Mütze, founder of the digital market and opinion research start-up Civey, and Dr Martin Einhorn, Director Customer Evaluation & Analytics at Porsche. They talk about the challenge of analyzing data, the future of market research and why trust and digital self-determination are so important.
About eight weeks before the American presidential election and about a year before the German federal elections, opinion polls and mood polls are omnipresent in Germany. It is about much more than just predicting the right winner; even if that is difficult enough. It’s about getting a sense of the population’s mood and to understand their current beliefs and fears. A good poll helps to understand society.
That’s what Janina Mütze had in mind when she supported the election campaign in a small Hessian town many years ago, but she also realized that the few people who actively engage in a campaign do not reflect the opinion of the whole town. “We make far too many decisions based on gut feeling, without a data basis,” she says. That’s one of the reasons why the studied economist became a co-founder of the digital market and opinion research start-up Civey five years ago — and was one of the Forbes 30 under 30 in 2018.
“We make far too many decisions based on gut feeling, without a data basis. We solve this problem with Civey.” — Janina Mütze
Many people who visit German online news sites such as Spiegel may be familiar with the little tools Civey uses to ask readers for an opinion on a particular topic at the end of an article. However, this is only a small part of what Civey enables with the largest online panel in Germany: “We advise customers and give them the opportunity to conduct ongoing surveys in real-time very quickly,” says Janina, “We can get into very narrow target groups where traditional market research may not reach everyone”. The reason: a lot of panel data is based on surveys conducted by landline phone or in front of the supermarket. But can you still reach all the people via classic channels in order to get a representative result? Probably not.
Market research as a feedback tool at eye level
The increasing importance of data analysis in market and opinion research is also observed by Dr Martin Einhorn, who has been working in market research at Porsche for ten years. “Decision support based on customer data, it has grown significantly, also at Porsche,” he says. What do people want from the sports car of the future? What special wishes are there in international markets, what interests customers in all regions of the world?
“Our vision is that our customers can tell us their worries and dreams the moment they want to, and we will take care of the rest.” — Dr Martin Einhorn
Yet Martin says that new methodological developments such as data analysis with neural networks are only part of the strategy. “We understand market research more strongly as a feedback tool for customers, and on an equal footing,” he says. “This also distinguishes us from other customer insight departments I know.” In the past, he says, market research was always understood to be anonymous. Now customers can decide for themselves whether they want to give feedback anonymously or openly. If they want to provide their data, they receive feedback and are invited to join the newly created Porsche Advisors Club, for example. This enables a new form of future market research. The goal: radical customer orientation.
Data privacy and self-determination as a future competitive advantage
More openness among customers, however, can only be achieved with maximum protection of data and privacy. A central concern of Porsche. “We see this as a potential competitive advantage,” says Martin. Only the trust that companies or opinion research institutes will handle data responsibly makes it possible for people to grant insights into their personal attitudes.
Janina sees it the same way. “A legal framework that gives each individual more personal responsibility and self-determination is good.” Still, cookies and privacy statements are so cryptic that people do not always understand how business models like Social Media platforms work. She calls for even more self-determination to be made possible through simplification. “You can’t expect people to understand all this, so we need to simplify it.” Everyone should be able to decide as easily as possible what they want to use their data for.
Because more trust and security, makes it possible for the digital market and opinion researchers to better understand what is happening in our society — not only in major events, such as the U.S. presidential or federal elections but also in small Hessian towns.
To learn more about the future of market research, listen to the full episode now on all common platforms like Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Spotify and Deezer. Please note that this podcast is in German.
