True North Market Insights

True North Market Insights is a market research firm focused on learning, growing and testing new technologies to provide real insights. The team is full of experienced client-side researchers working on projects for clients. The real insights consist of management-ready findings by leveraging this client-side experience, seasoned researchers, and the latest in behavioural economics insights.  The company helps its clients to create meaningful experiences, to identify the most compelling product features and benefits, and to identify the strongest and the most motivating messages by first understanding the brand’s position and drivers of choice.

Analytics Insight interviewed David Santee, President and Founder of True North to know how the company deploys his Operating Principles to get distinguished from thousands of other firms in the industry and get a better understanding of the client-side efficiently.

Comprehending Drivers for Customer’s Experience

True North Market Insights is a full-service market research firm that acts as client’s eyes and ears for the competitive market.  True North works within several industries but has developed especially strong expertise in financial services, companion animal products, retail, and general consumer. There are unique qualities that distinguish True North Market Insights from other firms that build their business based on this expertise. The account executives have held significant roles on the client-side by running the research teams of Fortune 500 firms. The company is focused on building a firm that could never be found on the client-side.

It is, indeed, not an uncommon behaviour of True North to take on roles and tasks typically assigned to those on the client-side due to the team’s client-side experience. Given how understaffed most client-side market research teams are, this has proved to be extremely useful to clients.  This frees the clients for higher-value work to ensure insights are heard within their organisation.

While on the client-side Dave and team discovered that many of those who have only been on the supplier side tend to be transactional and are focused on delivering a report. They may try to be partners but they do not understand the concept completely since they have never been in those roles.

It is due to this reputation that once a client gets exposed to True North and utilises its services, the business with them will grow subsequently. The company is a partner as well as a problem solver in communications but it is essential to see it, feel it and experience it.

Trust Through Operating Principles

The mission of True North Market Insights, is to build the market research team that they could not find while on the client side--- a true partner and problem solver.  We are not here to just deliver data.  Our biggest reward is when we see our clients succeed with our recommendations.  It is especially rewarding to see our direct contacts succeed within their organizations when using our insights.

Multiple firms are focused on delivering a fat PowerPoint report as fast as possible so that they can move on to the next project--- that is reporting data, not analysis, and certainly not insights. There is a large void in this profession that offers true problem solving and partnership together.

David created the Operating Principles to ensure that there will be major differences from other firms in the market. The following are a few of these Operating Principles--- do not let the tail wag the dog (i.e., start with the need, not the method), the project is not over until the client gets what they need (it’s not about the PowerPoint, it’s about solving a problem), understand the topic (i.e., we should know something about brand strategy, not just how to measure a brand), grow and have an impact (i.e., always get better, have a real and meaningful impact on our clients, each other, and our community).

The team at True North always ensures to focus on a lifetime value from a business perspective; the focus is always on the client rather than just on the current project.We focus on the partnership, not the transaction.  The primary goal is to be trusted. The team is required to follow a quote by Seth Godin, “Earn trust, earn trust, earn trust. Then you can worry about the rest.” Those who failed to understand this quote are not currently working with the team. It has taken a bit of time to create such a team that has the same outlook and works well as a team. The team insists on supporting each other, who wants each other to do well, who is relentless in serving the client well,and who even likes each other as teammates. This type of a team can achieve anything.

The business started with a few local clients in the beginning. Now, the company is a primary vendor for multiple large and global firms. It is not an accident that at the same time there is a presence of an excellent team.

An Insightful Industry Leader

David Santee, President and Founder of True North Market Insights loves the industry and what the company does. He does not like how the business of market research has evolved and how the world has become data providers but not insight providers. David’s goal is to maintain the key role of this profession to offer insights for decision-making. The industry appears content with providing data and calling it ‘insights.’  Or worse, the insights are generated from someone who does not have a clear understanding of the real decisions that a company faces and as a result provides sophomoric recommendations.

A study by The Corporate Executive Board, revealed that 82% of senior executives want a market research to be a strategic partner with them. But only 23% believe that they are. Thus, there is a canyon between what decision-makers want and expect more from the industry.

David wants True North to be a part of the solution by equipping the clients so that they can have meaningful conversations with the management with real insights instead of only data and tables.

The published articles of David try to push the team towards this view of the role. The past blog posts centred on how to best communicate with senior management and help them understand the insights. It also included how to frame the issues in a way that they can quickly understand without the need to fully understand the methodology behind the numbers.

Distinguished Interpreter of Data

David was named as a Top 100 Marketing Leader by MARsum. This recognition was gratifying because this was not just about the market research but also all of marketing. It appears that he has won this recognition for the following reasons--- the company has created some very unique approaches to some core issues based on behavioural economics insights that have been revealed within the last few decades such as Defection Detection, Rapid Review, Brand Insights and measuring real emotion when evaluating ads through AI.

David has multiple articles published in a market research industry publication known as Quirks, spoken at a national conference every few years including July 2021. He also created a market research blog that is followed by CMOs, market research heads and many other eminent people. David Santee has migrated from that blog to creating videos on several issues. The links to those videos are Brand Insights, Rapid Review, The Problem with scales and Who We Are.

David has also received some meaningful feedbacks from eminent personnel such as:

"We struck gold when we found True North."- CMO, Global Fintech

"In my professional career, few people have had the profound effect on me that David Santee has. He is the most accomplished researcher I have dealt with over the span of my professional career. He understands what it takes to get into the head and heart of a consumer, and uncover the issues, without ever losing sight of the big picture." - CMO, Financial Services Firm

"The best I've ever seen. The absolute best."- Lou Carbone, Founder & CEO Experience Engineering, author of "Clued In"

"David believes in not delivering just data, but interpreting the story within the data and suggesting how it can guide meaningful action."- Brand Planner

Bridging the Gap in the Industry

David notes that the behavioural economic insights have been so revolutionary that Nobel Prizes have been awarded to those who are bringing us these insights.  But the inconvenient truth is that most market research approaches have not changed in decades; as an industry, we are not using these insights. True North is always searching for and testing approaches that are consistent with how humans truly make decisions. These findings go to the core of how the team sets up its studies.

The videos that David has created begin discussing alternative approaches based on these learnings.

Efforts of a Promethean

True North Market Insights is innovative in the following ways--- it has developed new approaches more consistent with behavioural economic insights, the team is innovative in how it works with the clients by focusing on answering questions rather than providing data, the company is innovative in how it manages its staff – it is a virtual company with flexibility in work schedules and it does not track vacation.  Additionally, the team is testing new ways of reaching new clients like short promotional videos, longer explanatory videos, QR codes as well as video reports and the company consistently invest its own funds for research-on-research.

Troubleshooting during the Pandemic

The positioning of True North does not lend itself to a strong acquisition communications message. It takes experiencing True North to truly realise its values. Anyone can say they act as partners and offer management-ready insights, although few truly do it.  Thus, the growth has been dependent on those who know the team and have worked with the company in the past and referrals. The team is constantly testing new ways to reach out to new potential clients.

These last two years have observed a perfect storm of COVID-19, one large client being acquired by another and another large client eliminating its entire marketing department. This had a negative impact on 75% of the business of True North Market Insights. This combination of factors would destroy most firms. But the team had to be wise in how it managed the business and expenses. Some people were to let go, the company utilised contractors for non-mission-critical tasks, and the team was very stingy on non-project expenses. Through it all, True North kept a core, seasoned team in place and the team did not sacrifice the service that it offered to clients. As a result, the company is back to growth and becoming a stronger firm with a more diversified set of clients.

‘What’ over ‘Why’

According to David, there will always be a need for firms to be the eyes and ears of their customers and prospects. Even in this world of AI and Big Data, there will always be a need to sit down with a customer and ask questions, understand motivations and understand how clients can connect with other humans. There will always be a benefit for managers to listen to customers speak in their own words and watch their expressions. All the data analytics in the world will not reveal the real, unstated motivations.

What may be different in the future is; how the company interacts with these consumers. For example, traditional focus groups are giving ways to more virtual alternatives.

The industry will need to take behavioural economics findings seriously and adjust the approaches to reflect these findings. As an industry, companies still have not fully embraced these findings. We read the books, we talk about it, but we still use decades old methods.  When it comes to AI and Big Data, these tell the industry ‘what’ and not ‘why’. The ‘why’ is what drivestowards smart decisions, it is where the home runs live.  The ‘what’ just helps us around the edges.   Moving forward, companies will be required to be open and willing to learn about new approaches and look for opportunities for these disruptive systems to discover the ‘why’.  If they don’t there may be firms such as True North ready to take their place.

Management: David Santee, President and Founder, True North Market Insights

Website: https://truenmi.com/