How to gain insight into the real needs of consumers?

China is becoming the most imaginative market in the world. Under the impact of globalization, China's consumer goods market is also changing from the previous product-led era to the consumer-led era, and has formed a mature buyer's market. Consumers have become the protagonists of the market economy stage, and the choice is in their hands. The choice of consumers determines whether an enterprise can survive and develop.

And consumers are always "insincere, insincere." In fact, "insincere, insincere" reflects the contradiction between thought and behavior-consumer subconscious. Only by truly understanding the real thoughts and needs behind consumers' behaviors can we "observe their words and actions" and grasp consumers' mental resources.

1. Never go against consumers' hearts.

It is the most powerful magic weapon for a brand to understand consumers' inner expectations of products and the real thoughts hidden in the subconscious, so that consumers can gain firm brand loyalty and emotional dependence.

The world-famous "Coca-Cola" brand has also suffered a tragic ending due to the market survey results of trusting consumers' opinions. At that time, "Coca-Cola" decided to launch an upgraded version of Coca-Cola-a brand-new Coca-Cola, and used thousands of investigators to visit 10 cities to investigate whether consumers were willing to accept the brand-new Coca-Cola. The question in the questionnaire is: "A new ingredient will be added to the Coca-Cola formula to make its taste softer. Will you? " "Do you want to try a new drink?" According to the survey data, more than half of people think they will adapt to the new Coca-Cola, which means that customers are willing to try the idea of a new taste of Coca-Cola. Based on this, the Coca-Cola Company decided to replace the traditional Coca-Cola with "New Coke" and stopped the production and sales of the traditional Coca-Cola. This move caused an uproar. Some people loyal to the traditional Coca-Cola in the United States began to organize demonstrations to boycott the "new Coca-Cola" in order to restore the production line and sales of traditional authentic Coca-Cola in the United States. In the minds of most Americans, only Coca-Cola can best represent the United States. More than half of the customers who originally claimed to like "New Coke" changed their original attitude, and the sales of "New Coke" did not improve. Public protests intensified, and Coca-Cola Company had to resume the production of traditional formula. This is a marketing disaster caused by a questionnaire survey based on consumers, which was finally quelled by the return of traditional cola, which verified the difference between the conclusions given by consumers in market adjustment and their inner real thoughts and the complexity of inner changes.

2. The elusive consumer behavior

In the early 1980s, McDonald's and KFC will soon enter China at the same time. In the survey of China consumers' diet structure by market researchers, McDonald's thinks that China people's eating habits are quite fixed and it is not easy to accept foreign fast food; But KFC judged that China is a vast fast food consumption market. 1987, KFC's largest fast food restaurant officially opened in front of Beijing. Today, the market results prove that KFC's market forecast is correct. KFC, which lost to McDonald's in the global market, has been far ahead in Chinese mainland.

China is a country with a long history of tea culture. China people are good at drinking and tasting tea. In people's usual consciousness, it is known that Leng Cha and overnight tea can't be drunk. Old people always teach young people not to drink herbal tea or overnight tea, which is not good for their health. However, people in Taiwan Province Province boldly innovated and sold tea as a drink, which changed people's consumption concept. As a result, tea drinks such as "Master Kong" and "Unification" became popular in China.

A survey of the concepts of herbal tea and fruit tea in the early 1980s showed that tea consumers in Britain would never accept and like these "funny teas". However, in fact, when these new products are introduced to the market, they are quickly recognized and accepted by consumers. The predictions of foreign research institutions are also wrong.

Visible, foreign and China markets have wrong predictions about consumers' words and deeds.

3. What is the real demand behind the consumer's "consumption behavior"?

Nowadays, more and more healthy life is advocated, and milk is paid more and more attention by every family. At that time, an enterprise wanted to introduce new Tetra Pak Pillow milk packaging, so a question was set in a questionnaire about milk packaging: "Milk is packed in plastic bags, would you drink it?" Most housewives who are mainly responsible for buying milk answer "no" However, the company decided to boldly try to launch the milk packed with Tetra Pak Pillow, and wanted to see how the market reacted! Because of the reduction of packaging cost, the price of the whole box of milk packaged by Tetra Pak Pillow has also decreased accordingly. As a result, tetra pak pillow-packed milk has become the most popular choice for housewives among all milk categories. The conclusion of the questionnaire is completely contrary to the actual situation of consumers snapping up. The reason comes down to the fact that ordinary consumer families take housewives as the main product decision makers and buyers. When they buy any product, they will like to choose something cheap and negotiable. In this way, when chatting with other housewives, they can show the image of "housekeeper" who knows how to keep the house, save money and live, and express that what they really care about is "price".

For another example, a well-known consulting company did not foresee the real reason behind the rapid expansion of the market scale-social value in the past mobile phone market survey. But now, the mobile phone has become an indispensable part of consumers' daily life, which has been divorced from its actual functional use to a considerable extent and has become a link between people. In the rapid development of social changes, mobile phones, as a communication tool closely related to the outside world, have become a part of their own living habits. If you don't have a mobile phone, you will have psychological panic, just like the feeling of no oxygen will suffocate you. Similarly, he will feel as nervous as being forgotten or abandoned by the whole society!

Chanel, LV, Dior and other internationally renowned clothing brands. It will make slim models walk on the runway in their fashion shows, lead the latest trends and attract countless dream women groups full of dreams and pursuing fashion feelings. Although they will inevitably feel inferior to their figure when they see the graceful fashion model performance, they will have psychological feelings of belittling their value. In a survey, when interviewing ordinary women about fashion models, the conclusion is: I hope to see the image of ordinary women close to ordinary life appear in advertisements and fashion shows. However, in practice, if a bloated or ordinary woman is displayed at the press conference of a clothing brand, it is equivalent to the image that the brand gives people is not beautiful or fashionable, which is contrary to the social aesthetic trend of "thinness is beauty". On the other hand, if it is unpopular, no one will go to see it again. The fashion of this brand will not be recognized, and the sales volume will be directly affected!

For another example, whether it is a large international auto show or a domestic auto show, you can see a beautiful landscape, that is, there will always be a beautiful woman next to the luxury car, posing in various attractive postures-car models. Although the auto shows are all luxury cars and concept cars, every auto show will be crowded with people, but most of the visitors are male spectators. Besides enjoying the visual shock and excitement brought by top luxury cars, why not look at the beautiful car models and bring them psychological pleasure?

A country in the Middle East holds an auto show. Although there are many famous cars, there are no beautiful car models for religious reasons. As a result, the number of visitors to the auto show dropped sharply, and the answer is self-evident! This explains why a charming car model should be placed next to every luxury car at all international or domestic auto shows. According to the test of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), the peak excitement of men when they see expensive sports cars and beautiful women is the same. Therefore, the fragrant car must be matched with beautiful women, otherwise it is not worth seeing.

Kahneman is the only scholar who won the Nobel Prize in Economics for his research on human psychology, which is enough to prove the great influence of human psychology on social economics. For example, an economist objectively analyzes the advantages and disadvantages of buying a car from the perspective of economics that he is good at. He has just analyzed that he must buy the car with the best cost performance, and then when he really makes a lot of money and decides to buy a car, he will buy a brand-name luxury RV with inappropriate cost performance. Why do you give others a clear analysis, but you are not! This also shows that both economists and ordinary consumers can correctly analyze and judge things with rational thinking on the surface, but their internal value judgment is to think directly from the perceptual point of view. There is an essential contradiction between a person's behavior and his heart, and his inner feelings often prevail when making decisions.

There is a company specializing in women's pantyhose products. His boss said that the most annoying thing about women's pantyhose is falling silk. He said, after research, we invented a kind of pantyhose that is very strong and comfortable and will never fall off. In fact, what do girls really expect pantyhose to bring them? Let's take a look at the history of pantyhose in the past: nylon stockings were invented by DuPont and swept the whole Europe and America at once. Then came World War II, when all the materials used to make nylon stockings were transferred to military supplies, which made it impossible for nylon stockings to buy them in the market. At that time, there was a career: painting socks on girls' legs-like tattoos now. After World War II, girls can finally queue up to buy a pair of nylon stockings, and they will be excited to wear them in public on the street. In Hollywood movies, female stars have little affection for pantyhose. A common scene in the film is that the first thing a Hollywood actress does when she comes home is kick off her high heels and throw her pantyhose into the corner. If it's comfortable, why is it so annoying? First of all, wearing pantyhose is definitely uncomfortable, and secondly, it is definitely not strong. The real inner need of women wearing pantyhose is to exude sexiness, so as to attract the attention and praise of the opposite sex, and to find reasons for affirming themselves through the recognition and appreciation of others, thus increasing their inner self-confidence. If so, you should not go against the spiritual resources of consumers. Women don't want a pair of socks to be so strong. A pair of socks is very cheap. You can buy another pair in any shop without silk. So socks must not be sold comfortably and firmly. Your socks sell comfort and firmness, which is definitely wrong. Taking the real needs of consumers as the appeal point is the key to the correct strategy!

Instant coffee is an epoch-making invention. It used to be very troublesome to drink coffee. You had to grind it before you could drink it. So the advantage of instant coffee is convenience. It is convenient to drink a cup of coffee anytime and anywhere. However, the sales results are not satisfactory, and housewives will feel that it is lazy to pour a cup of coffee for their husbands casually. So Nestle changed its position, no longer selling a cup of coffee conveniently, but selling the purity of coffee, emphasizing the good taste and rich flavor, and the real instant coffee opened the market from now on.

The sales volume of Nestle Coffee in Chinese mainland is much higher than that of Maxwell Coffee, but in the market of Taiwan Province Province in China, Maxwell is the first brand, and its slogan is "Good things should be shared with good friends". However, in the 1980s, when Maxwell and Nestle entered the Chinese mainland market, they commissioned different companies to do market research. Therefore, Maxwell commissioned a survey by a large international company. Before trying to drink coffee, Chinese mainland residents all yearned for intellectuals of western culture, because coffee was imported. As a result, the slogan is elegant-"Didi is fragrant, and the meaning is still unfinished."

On the contrary, Nestle Coffee found out that in the early 1980s, what was the favorite occupation for female college students in Shanghai? The result was unexpected. The first person a girl wants to marry is a taxi driver. At that time, the average salary of taxi drivers was ten times or even dozens of times that of professors at that time. Therefore, Nestle Coffee clearly knows that the target consumers are definitely not university professors and intellectuals, because at that time, the salary of university professors was only over 100 a month, while the price of a cup of Nestle Coffee was more than 20 yuan. Only those self-employed people who have made a fortune will drink coffee. Moreover, Nestle discovered a special phenomenon at that time. People who drink Nescafe will take Nescafe cans to the office as teacups. After a few months, the logo of Nestle on the jar will remain very good, making people feel that I can afford Nestle coffee.

As a result, Nestle, a very common brand abroad, has become a show-off brand in China. Therefore, the slogan of Nestle Coffee is very simple-"delicious"! Nestle Coffee not only shows off its fragrant and attractive taste, but also has insight into the inner thoughts of consumers who want to show off their identity of being able to afford and enjoy high-end drinks such as coffee. In fact, the taste of coffee is not good, especially for China people who are used to drinking tea, a country with a long and deep-rooted tea culture. However, its slogan hints at you every day: "delicious"! Instilling and psychological hints in people's minds every day naturally makes them get used to it, and naturally makes them feel that Nestle coffee tastes good. Just like the slogan "Nongfu Spring"-"Nongfu Spring is a little sweet", it is similar to the "delicious" of Nestle coffee. Over time, Nestle coffee is synonymous with delicacy, which captures the mental resources of the target consumers and makes it occupy an irreplaceable position when it first entered the Chinese coffee market in the 1980s. McDonald's missed the opportunity to find out what the target consumers really want from coffee brands! Can only be classified as Nestle Coffee forever. Its advertising slogan "Didi Xiang Xiang, full of meaning" was broadcast for half a year, and many people thought it was selling essential oils. To understand this slogan, you have to graduate from college at least to understand the language artistic conception conveyed by Macmillan coffee. Therefore, only by truly understanding the real thoughts and psychological feelings of the target consumers can we seize the market opportunity and stay in the leading position. This is also the reason why Nestle Coffee is far ahead of Maxwell Coffee in China market.

4. Insight into the inner needs of consumers.

(1) Focus depth interview

This method is a very practical and effective qualitative method in market survey, which has the effect that general questionnaire survey can't achieve. The essence of focus group discussion is to understand the real thoughts of consumers through listening, not just hearing something that seems real on the surface.

First of all, you must carefully screen the target groups you want to communicate with, communicate face to face and in depth, and judge the ideas behind different attitudes through intuition. For example, you find a certain number of men to talk face to face and say, "What do men care about most?" They will definitely say: "Responsibility, career, family, friends ..." Men all over the world may have the same answer, but this is only what men can say in superficial answers. If we conduct divergent in-depth interviews with target consumers for a long time, we will find out what men like most and care most about subconsciously. Open-ended topics, such as "Please describe your happiest moment and happiest moment? Everyone described the same scene: the vast sea, rolling waves, sailing on the sea. The empty scenery symbolizes the image of a man who likes to be free and doesn't want to be bound by others. What men like in their bones is the portrayal of a free life in which the sky is vast and the sea is vast and the fish is eager to try.

Take beer for example. What beer sells is not taste, quality, lightness or anything else, but the dream of selling men. Why does beer sell dreams? After drinking beer, men hope to see their unreal self and become an illusion to enlarge themselves and surpass themselves.

Taking domestic Snow Beer as an example, its outstanding feature is emotional positioning, and its target consumers are young people aged 20-35. Snowflake beer thinks that young people are most concerned about "growth", so the slogan is "Snowflake beer, enjoy growth".

If a person drinks beer alone, there will be less. Usually three or three friends get together for a drink. Therefore, the "enjoyment" of Snow Beer publicity is a very good positioning.

(2) Insight into data-data is important, but the judgment of data is more important.

The data obtained in the survey is very important and is the basis for our reference, but the judgment hidden behind the data is more important. There is a way of thinking when judging data called "reverse thinking". It was unprofitable to produce TV sets in the United States in the 1960s, because according to the survey at that time, few people watched TV, so it was concluded that it was unprofitable to invest in the production of TV sets. However, with the increasing richness of TV programs, the growth space of TV sets is also rising. From the perspective of reverse thinking, it is not the decrease in the number of people watching TV, but the corresponding shortage in the quantity and quality of watching TV programs. It is not the relationship between TV sets and viewers, but the scarcity of TV programs that leads to a decrease in the number of viewers and a corresponding decrease in TV purchases.

No matter from the perspective of positive thinking or reverse thinking, we should establish the same consciousness: data is important, but the judgment of data is more important. Many industries in the domestic market have opportunities for fission, explosion and leap-forward development. The development of the market is irregular and there will be opportunities for explosive growth at any time. This is also the most fascinating place in the domestic market. In mature markets in Europe and America, such opportunities are rare, while in China, there are many such opportunities.

From 65438 to 0990, when the first mobile phone was put into use in China, the relevant government departments boldly predicted that by 2000, the number of mobile phone users in China would reach 800,000. In fact, by the year 2000, the number of mobile phone users in China has reached 87 million, which is more than 65,438,000 times the estimated number. In 2002, the number of mobile phone users in China increased rapidly to 206 million. At that time, when investigating the market prospect of domestic mobile phones, market research companies often asked consumers directly, "Will you buy domestic mobile phones?" The answer is often "no". There will even be strong resistance from the respondents-"You will buy domestic mobile phones." However, today, domestic mobile phones have seized half of the mobile phone market by virtue of design innovation and channel innovation. From the development of mobile phones, we can appreciate the magnificent scene of the domestic market.

(3) Entrepreneurship-"intuition"

When we formulate marketing strategies, most of us think about problems from the way of consumer research. However, due to the particularity of domestic market development, entrepreneurs' intuitive judgment on the market is sometimes very important. This also requires entrepreneurs to have the courage to judge, and the so-called courage is before knowledge. Zong Houqing, chairman of Wahaha Group, once said: "I never trust market research companies, but rely on my own judgment." Zong Houqing made an arbitrary decision and only trusted his own intuition about the market. Before making a decision, Zong's trick is to chat with front-line dealers and consumers to get a deeper understanding of the real needs of consumers, which is why he is so confident!

Modern western economics believes that among the factors of production, besides labor, capital and land, the most important thing is entrepreneurship. Under the knowledge-based economy, the most active intellectual capital is people themselves. Schultz, a famous American economist, pointed out in his research on human resources that during the nearly 30 years of economic growth in the United States from 1929 to 1957, the economic growth rate obtained by the investment of funds, land, factories and equipment can be quantified, but the other part of the economic growth rate-the cost of human resources cannot be quantified. For example, the same tangible capital, such as plant, technology, equipment and capital, will produce different results if it is managed by different people. The reason is that business leaders have unparalleled influence on the development of enterprises in the market.

(4) Insight into the inner needs of consumers-ask more "why"?

No matter what kind of investigation you do, the results can't be completely reliable. Information feedback to consumers can't be blind. We should constantly explore the real reasons in consumers' minds and ask more "why"!

In 1970s, Pepsi launched a deadly plan-launching a "taste challenge" to Coca-Cola, which is the leading company in the coke industry. Pepsi invited participants to taste all kinds of drinks without brand logo, and then asked them to tell which drink was better. Two-thirds of the participants chose Pepsi, and in fact Pepsi succeeded. This taste experiment caused a great sensation at that time and became the sharpest weapon for Pepsi to attack Coca-Cola. However, after more than 30 years, the tastes of the two cokes have not changed much, but Coca-Cola still has more brand loyalists. Is the consumer's taste changed, or is there something inside about the coke taste experiment? All kinds of questions make people constantly explore the real reason behind it!

In 2003, a professor of neurology at Baylor Medical College conducted another taste experiment. This time, they used state-of-the-art magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to monitor and record the brain activities of the subjects while tasting bearer cokes (Coca Cola and Pepsi Cola).

The results show that Pepsi tends to make the ventral nucleus of the brain react more strongly, which is the area where the brain produces enhanced reward emotions. At the beginning of the experiment, when the subjects who chose Pepsi drank Pepsi, their ventral nucleus activity was five times that of Coca-Cola supporters.

Next, the experimental organizers began to measure the influence of Coca-Cola brand image. This time, the subjects were told that the experimental sample was Coca-Cola.

The situation immediately turned for the better, and almost all the subjects said that they preferred Coca-Cola. Not only that, but even their brain activities show different situations, and their prefrontal cortex in the middle of the brain also has activities. This area has a high level of cognitive ability in the brain. Pepsi failed to achieve the same effect. When told that the sample was Pepsi, relatively few subjects said they preferred Pepsi.

This is the power of the brand. Thanks to MRI, brand competitiveness can be directly measured.

Two experiments separated by 30 years have proved that Coca-Cola is not necessarily better by comparison. However, in the real world, taste is not everything. In such an accurate neurocognitive system as the human brain, special brand power controls people's taste buds.

In the consumer's inner consciousness, the emotional preference for the brand determines the final choice. The quality of a product does not ultimately determine anything, and the real needs of consumers often determine the final choice.

(5) establish a weak information collection mechanism

Weak information collection mechanism helps us to understand consumers in different ways.

Most enterprises have not established an effective weak market signal collection mechanism. With the intensification of competition diversification and homogenization, the obvious competitive advantage of enterprises is getting smaller and smaller, and the concerns of enterprises on target consumers overlap. Today, with more and more transparent information circulation, consumers are more aware of psychological prevention, and it is more difficult than ever to obtain real information, so the terminal of many enterprises' decisive victory is competition in some subtle fields.

Common methods of collecting information:

(1) Collected from internal personnel of the company. Sometimes, internal employees are also consumers, and the information feedback they get can be close to the real situation.

② Collect competitors' information. Competitors are also getting to know the target consumers in a targeted way, so that we can get some important information that we didn't realize.

③ Collect information from published materials and public documents. The previous data also has certain reference value for the present and the future. The development of society can also explain why people did that at that time, and then explain people's psychological changes.

(6) Evaluation questionnaire

In the survey, subjective questionnaire selection sometimes can't objectively represent the real feelings of consumers, and sometimes even consumers themselves can't express what their real needs are! To have insight to analyze, excavate, discover and guide consumers' hidden real needs, which have not been awakened or even realized by themselves, it is necessary for planners to know consumers better than consumers themselves.

Please look at a questionnaire:

What is your monthly income? A/kloc-under 0/000 yuan, B 2000 yuan, C 3000 yuan, D 4000 yuan and E 5000 yuan.

② Would you choose underwear over 1000 yuan? (Open-ended question) 3 If there are clothes of the same grade in the mall, would you buy them cheaper? (Open-ended questions).

The thinking process of consumers and their answers are probably:

I don't want you to think I'm poor, but I prefer a high income, more than 5,000 yuan, which is actually 2,000 yuan;

2 The figure is out of shape, and I don't spend much money on good clothes to cover up my body defects with high-quality tailoring and cultivation, lest my boyfriend call me bucket waist again! How do you write this? "tasteful"

③ Hum! I don't think I have any money, even if I buy it, I won't buy you. "no"

The final answer to the survey is:

①E 5000 yuan.

2 have taste.

3 don't buy it.

Perhaps, you will think that these are all lies and untrue answers from consumers, but what you end up with is a basket of useless waste paper for enterprises.

Sometimes, you can't completely blame consumers for their dishonest answers. When designing a questionnaire, a survey company should first check whether it has imposed its subjective thoughts on consumers and whether it can impress consumers with limited questionnaire options. Questionnaires that ask themselves and answer themselves invisibly conceal consumers' truest thoughts. If the investigator can consider the problem from the consumer's point of view, perhaps the answer will be consistent with the consumer and there will be unexpected gains.

When doing market research, enterprises should prevent researchers from imposing their subjective ideas on consumers. The design of the questionnaire should also consider the irrational questions that respondents may encounter when answering (it will uncover the real thoughts that consumers don't want to say-causing embarrassment, embarrassment and privacy). In questionnaire design, we should try to put ourselves in the position of consumers, think and design questions from the perspective of consumers, and flexibly control open questions.

Therefore, enterprises should not go against the hearts of consumers. Don't underestimate the IQ of consumers in market research, and avoid being misled by superficial feedback from consumers. Marketers need insight into their own judgment.

How to understand the deep-seated needs of consumers is the most important basic link for enterprises to formulate effective marketing strategies, and it is also the first step for brand building to communicate with consumers.