Community has to be one of the biggest buzzwords of this decade. We have always had local communities, of course, but lately there are so many new communities popping up; social media communities, professional communities, sporting communities, a community for every possible sub-culture.

In the context of market research, an insights community is a closed group composed of your customers who have committed to contributing and improving your brand long-term. They are characterized by an ongoing, two-way dialogue between the brand and the customer.

Insight communities are more than a buzzword, they are here to stay because they offer some tangible, outstanding benefits to your business:

• They help to bring the customer into the heart of your business. They allow you to truly engage and interact with your customers on an ongoing basis, resulting in deep longitudinal understanding.
• Insights communities enable in-the moment, contextual research – when you want, anytime you want. Allowing you to uncover trends and issues as they happen, and to be responsive and flexible to a rapidly changing marketplace.
• Insights tend to be of better quality because members are engaged, they actually care, they have opted to be in this community and they want to contribute to your business decision making.

And the results for your business?

• Intelligent business decisions underpinned by customer feedback
• Better products, services, digital & communication strategies
• Improved customer experience and high engagement from executive team to shop floor

And of course, quicker and more cost-effective insights – now who can argue with that?