One of the most troubling insights from recent psychological research is that we might not really understand why customers make low-consideration shopping decisions. First, we take a decision, then we invent the reasoning retrospectively. So, how can we truly unearth what consumers want if we can’t really trust what they tell us? This week, our lead Data Scientist Robin Gower explains how VYPR can unlock the difference between stated attitudes and actual purchase behaviour.

Daniel Kahneman describes a battle in our brains between the fast-thinking System 1 (which is quick to act and judge) and the slower, more deliberative System 2. We can take an immediate decision with System 1 and then – when we’re asked to explain our reasoning (let’s say in a focus group or in a supermarket exit survey) – invoke System 2 to invent a rationale after the fact.

This undermines our attempts to uncover insights from consumers. It casts doubt on the validity and usefulness of focus groups. It also affects non-traditional research tools like VYPR. We can’t ask people “would you buy this healthier alternative?”. We may as well be asking “would you prefer to be healthy or unhealthy?”. The responses reflect our personal desires to be fit and healthy (or our recognition that this is socially desirable); not what we choose to put in our shopping baskets. 

In reality, we eat a lot of food that is less healthy than we’d care to admit. If you ask someone to account for their choices at the checkout, they’ll perhaps come up with a reason such as “I went to the gym this morning, so I’ve earned these chips”, but this isn’t necessarily what they were thinking as they walked through the supermarket aisles.

So, what’s the solution? How can we tap into System 1 – sometimes impulsive – shopping behaviour? In short, we need to learn from decisions, not opinions. We need to ask our panellists to choose between products (e.g. chips versus boiled potatoes), not concepts. The options we present to the panel should be products that exhibit the attributes you want to compare.

For instance, if I ask a consumer “how important is the tractor mark to your decision to buy milk?”, we’re asking them to engage their System 2 process to invest far more time than they would normally spend on a decision at fixture. Whereas, if I ask two comparable audiences to make a purchase decision on a carton of milk – one of which containing the tractor mark – we can immediately see what impact the tractor mark has on purchase intent. VYPR provides a “Split Test” for exactly this purpose. The difference may seem subtle, but adopting this approach leads to much more robust analysis than would be possible from traditional focus groups or exit surveys.

Get To Better Products Faster.

Ask anything of our panel of 1000s of consumers, available 24/7 via the VYPR App and website. Sit back and watch the results as they come in. VYPR makes rapid prototyping a reality, enabling suppliers and retailers to quickly validate unlimited hypotheses throughout the NPD process, from early stage product development to prelaunch refinement. Our geo-fencing technology enables consumers to answer questions live, during their shopping missions in store and at fixture. 

Over 90% Of Clients Generate ROI & Renew Their VYPR Licence Every Year. 

VYPR can save you £000s in product development and failed launch costs, as well as getting your product to market faster. That’s why the UK’s leading product developers, marketers, commercial managers, category managers and buyers choose to deploy VYPR every day. Every SKU can be optimised to the nth degree, ensuring that every product achieves its greatest potential.

Contact us now to road-test VYPR.

To learn more about how VYPR can help you, simply dial +44 (0) 161 694 6320 or complete our contact form below.

We’re open Monday to Friday 09h00 – 17h00.

Every year, we are inspired by the festive launches from the world of retail and M&S Food has long held a pioneering status in the innovation stakes, showcased annually at Christmas in store. Here at VYPR, we’re massive advocates of the power of incrementalism, defined as the gradual enhancement of product performance through a blend of innovation and marginal improvements, delivered over time, component by component. Just take our montage on the humble Christmas turkey and it’s obvious to see that M&S have been delivering a masterclass on this in spades for generations!

M&S combine their inimitable heritage in food with a passion for seeking out new innovation and a relentless pursuit of enhancing and reimagining their existing range, with just enough twists and turns to entice the foodies that want to impress, without putting off their core audience looking for staple favourites.

New and existing products are harmoniously planogrammed at fixture (often with equal billing), in order to reassure and inspire customers in equal measure. Treasured favourites are given a new lease of life in festive golden packaging, new flavour profiles enhance existing ranges and every message, ingredient and name is meticulously considered, both in isolation and as part of the broader range and theme. Their Summer campaign was also a great example of this.

At the heart of our ethos and technology is to give manufacturers and retailers the confidence to launch new creations and reimaginings of existing products by building stronger connections to their consumers. VYPR enables our clients to test, test and test again with our consumer panel to identify new concepts, refine existing ideas and understand every component of a product’s anatomy’s contribution to purchase intent.

Road-test VYPR’s technology & consumer panel today.

We’d love you to road-test VYPR, give us your feedback and enjoy the benefits of better product intelligence. We’ll connect you to 1000s of consumers and you’ll get unlimited opportunities to test your latest innovations or iterations.

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If you love VYPR, we’ll get you an annual licence set up. If you don’t, we’ll leave you be. VYPR works best on low-consideration purchases such as FMCG, fast fashion, small consumer durables.

Contact us now to road-test VYPR.

To learn more about how VYPR can help you, simply dial +44 (0) 161 694 6320 or complete our contact form below.

We’re open Monday to Friday 09h00 – 17h00.

April Preston (Executive Head of Food Innovation at Harrods) shares her perspective on how VYPR is helping businesses to speed up the NPD process, optimise success rates and increase sales from applying greater intelligence to FMCG NPD and innovation to steal competitive advantage.

“In my view, one of the biggest challenges facing FMCG is the NPD and innovation process; it’s just too slow. There are too many people involved, the process can be governed too much by subjective decision-making and we still don’t genuinely put the consumer at the heart of what we do daily. You’ve just got to look at how the communications and automotive industries have transformed themselves in the last 15 years and compare that to the humble ready meal: it has barely changed in the same timeframe!

Yet, we have access to so much data now: we’ve got EPOS data, qualitative and quantitative research coming out of our ears. So, what’s wrong? For me, we still don’t truly understand what consumers are thinking when they pick up a product in store. What is going through their mind? That gap in understanding has paralysed the industry in many ways: people are so afraid to take risks, which is understandable when the investment required can be so high.

The beauty of VYPR is that it really unlocks our understanding of that subconscious thinking and shopper behaviour, which means you get fantastically robust results. VYPR makes you feel more secure about the decisions you’re making in the NPD process, because you can better predict success rates and better optimise for sales by tapping into the minds of consumers, enabling you to stand up to scrutiny from your commercial stakeholders and investors; giving everyone reassurance and the confidence to push things further and take a few more risks, which is really what we need as an industry.

I find VYPR works most effectively at various stages in the process, but ultimately it works best when you want to test lots of different alternatives for an idea that you’ve had or refine key elements of the product in the later stages, whether you’re a great big retailing organisation or a small brand. I’ve used it in both instances with equal success.

The immediacy of VYPR is amazing: it is quick, easy and simple to use and you can weave it into any existing NPD/innovation process. The results come back very quickly and are easy to understand. I also love the fact that it is unlimited: no matter how many ideas we have as a team, we can test them all. There is so much complexity beneath the surface – the technology, data and behavioural science – but, as a user, you benefit from the results without getting bogged down in the detail.

VYPR has made a big difference to how we work: we’re making better decisions, we’re putting the customer at the heart of what we do and it has brought objectivity to the process. Ultimately, that leads to better relationships with customers, retailers and a greater return on investment throughout the NPD process.”

April Preston is Executive Head of Food Innovation at Harrods and has held leadership positions in businesses such as M&S and Two Sisters.

Contact us now to road-test VYPR.

To learn more about how VYPR can help you, simply dial +44 (0) 161 694 6320 or complete our contact form below.

We’re open Monday to Friday 09h00 – 17h00.

According to this year’s BDO Food and Drink Survey, 92% of manufacturers stated that NPD will be the most important factor determining revenue growth, with 66% of respondents looking to technology and automation to improve efficiency. There are two key challenges that need to be considered in this context: 1) finding the right tech to streamline your NPD/EPD process and 2) taking the right steps to better assure certainty of NPD performance. Here’s how we can help.

Technology Can Get You To Better Products Faster.

In an earlier blog, we pulled together a list of methods that you can adopt to improve efficiency, prove ROI and justify the protection of marketing and research budgets that come under pressure when price and margin challenges take hold. Click here to read it.

Increasing automation and technology is absolutely part of the answer to unlocking the potential of FMCG manufacturers to innovate better and faster. For instance, VYPR’s technology enables product developers to test 1000s of different product variations with consumers via smartphone, with statistically robust results landing in your inbox within 24 hours. Every component (packaging, branding, pricing, messaging etc) can be tested to the nth degree, from concept stage through to post-feasibility refinement, with an annual licence costing less than a single focus group/qualitative exercise, which may yield misleading results that don’t translate into the desired behaviour at fixture.

Context Is King When It Comes To Certainty.

The second big challenge is around context. According to the behavioural science boffins, too much faith is being placed in using traditional and expensive methodologies to understand why consumers choose to buy your NPD. In reality, people can’t tell you the ‘why’ behind unconscious decisions. They’ll post-rationalise and generate a good story for you during research, but it won’t be accurate, since people are largely unaware of many factors that influence their decision making, particularly when they are in store. As such, many of the tools used today to prove/validate your NPD can’t be empirically trusted to give you any degree of certainty on what will/won’t work.

In order to get to the ‘why’, you have to test different variables to identify which ‘what’ leads to a significant change in response, which is essentially what VYPR does. VYPR removes a lot of the biases of traditional market research techniques by focusing on addressing ‘in context’ questions and accessing unconscious, System 1 responses. Traditional conscious questions (even conducted in the field) can’t tap into unconscious drivers of action, so if you want to predict what someone is going to purchase in store, you have as far as possible to replicate that environment and decision making process. Our geo-fencing technology enables consumers to answer these questions live, during their shopping missions in store and at fixture; again, via a simple smartphone app.

By focusing on testing (as opposed to consciously asking) what changes consumer behaviour and by doing this in context with short fast questions, VYPR is much more in line with current thinking on Behavioural Science and will deliver more accurate results than alternative methods of research. So, if you’re one of the 66% people that believes technology can fuel better NPD and/or one of the 92% people that believe better and faster NPD is critical to your revenue growth, then please contact us.

Get To Better Products Faster.

Ask anything of our panel of 1000s of consumers, available 24/7 via the VYPR App and website. Sit back and watch the results as they come in. VYPR makes rapid prototyping a reality, enabling suppliers and retailers to quickly validate unlimited hypotheses throughout the NPD process, from early stage product development to prelaunch refinement. Our geo-fencing technology enables consumers to answer questions live, during their shopping missions in store and at fixture. 

Over 90% Of Clients Generate ROI & Renew Their VYPR Licence Every Year. 

VYPR can save you £000s in product development and failed launch costs, as well as getting your product to market faster. That’s why the UK’s leading product developers, marketers, commercial managers, category managers and buyers choose to deploy VYPR every day. Every SKU can be optimised to the nth degree, ensuring that every product achieves its greatest potential.

Contact us now to road-test VYPR.

To learn more about how VYPR can help you, simply dial +44 (0) 161 694 6320 or complete our contact form below.

We’re open Monday to Friday 09h00 – 17h00.