Over the years, ESOMAR has been a strong supporter of young professionals and their ideas. To encourage industry involvement and sharing, the Young ESOMAR Society (or YES!) was launched and with it, the YES Award.
At this year’s Global Data and Insights Summit in Edinburgh, ESOMAR was thrilled to have six students from around the world help out and immerse themselves in the conference. Elisa Bertoncini, of the University of Leicester, has written about her idea in more detail to share with the world…we hope you enjoy!
As a marketing postgraduate, I am always eager to learn. The reason is simple: as our “liquid” society keeps evolving in more complex and surprising ways so does marketing, and so should we as marketing professionals.
Just considering our progress in technology, ten years ago Augmented Reality was seen by many only as a sci-fi trope in films while now it is used by several brands to enhance their products. Some decades ago social media did not exist, today they are one of the major insights’ goldmines. But how can we dig out these precious insights?
Here comes the importance of market research in helping us collect data to better understand our society and behaviour so we can use that knowledge to craft highly effective marketing strategies.
Every year, as it happens with numerous other industries, new “tools” and new frameworks get developed to facilitate the job and to perfect the results.
This is why participating in one of the biggest events dedicated to market research in the world was so important for me: the ESOMAR CONGRESS 2019: The Global Data & Insights Summit, this year held in the magical Edinburgh (8 – 11 September).
Selected students
I was incredibly excited to be one of the six students selected out of hundreds of applicants from all around the world to volunteer at the summit. So I paused my masters’ dissertation for a couple of days and left my home-town in Italy to fly back to the UK for my next adventure.
I had already taken part in the 26th Innovation and Product Development Management Conference organised by the European Institute for Advanced Studies in Management in collaboration with the University of Leicester, back in June, but this congress immediately seemed to be on another level: 4 days of presentations, masterclasses and other special events, more than 80 speakers, over 1200 attendees and not a single moment of boredom.
One of the events I was most curious about was the YES Award where people under 30 had to pitch their most creative and innovative ideas to impact market research. This year two young professionals from SKY developed an app called Live Lens similar to Whatsapp where viewers could talk about a tv show in real-time with the episode airing.
The analysis of the discussions helped identify the key elements which were driving the viewers’ attention (e.g. the most talkable scenes) to then use them to develop an effective advertising campaign. However, there were so many other interesting pitches (e.g. another finalist’ idea involved measuring reactions versus likes’ engagement on social media) that the competition was really tough.
Compelling
Between checking lanyards and handling microphones, I managed to attend some compelling presentations. From Social Media and the Disruption of Democracy by Jennifer Roberton (Respondi) and Matt Browne (Global Progress) exploring the paradox of digital democracy and the links between Facebook users’ behaviour and fake news to The Real Why and the Hidden Who by Christopher Graves (Ogilvy Consulting) and Jon Puleston (Kantar) explaining how Ogilvy combines behavioural science and cognitive segmentation techniques to create more effective marketing communication strategies, based on a new approach to measuring personality and cognitive thinking styles.
However, the real highlights for everyone were the Keynotes, some TEDx-style talks. They featured some really powerful stories, like the one of Claire Lomas who, after an accident that injured her spinal cord, was the first paralyzed woman to run the London Marathon using a robotic suit and then became an amazing campaigner, fundraiser and motivational speaker.
As a young woman, I was personally touched by the empowering words of Dame Stephanie Shirley, a technology pioneer and businesswoman who started breaking the glass ceiling in the 60s, creating job opportunities for women in computing and crusading for female entrepreneurship. Then Chris Burggraeve, founder and CEO of Vicomte LL, discussed the future of marketing, forecasting a shift from the global age to the galactic age of marketing where brands can colonise space, and explained his prototype for the world’s first ever marketing rating model.
In the end, we all laughed at the funny crazy adventures of Oobah Butler, the VICE’s writer who created The Shed at Dulwich, the non-existent London restaurant that became top rated on TripAdvisor and I was lucky enough to have a chat with him before his presentation.
Besides, there were a lot of entertaining surprises at the Congress: from a Scottish whisky tasting session to the big evening event at the National Museum of Scotland with a private tour of the museum by night.
To help run everything smoothly was a great responsibility. However, I was really pleased to find a very congenial, enthusiastic and nicely diverse group of people in the ESOMAR team and my fellow volunteers.
The future
There was Yan from China but currently studying at the Bocconi University in Italy, Arthur from the Université Paris II Panthéon Assas in France, Ana from Portugal but currently studying in Macau, Max from the University of Melbourne in Australia, Jack from YES Press in London and finally me, from Italy, proud to represent the University of Leicester.
I found it incredibly inspiring to be part of this young cosmopolitan generation who is not afraid of travelling or moving away from home, hungry for knowledge. Some of us will probably become future daring explorers in market research. And ESOMAR seems to know that since it created the Young ESOMAR Society to support young people wishing to pursue a career in market research and help them progress, get exposure and connect with other practitioners, this has been very helpful to students.
This is something that I have particularly appreciated about ESOMAR. In fact, I think it is important to give young students a chance. In a competitive job market where employers expect a lot more competencies and experience than in the past, sometimes it can be hard for young graduates to find their starting point. Hopefully, this experience has helped me find mine.
In the end, in this industry it is important to never lose the passion, the curiosity, the desire to learn, and to investigate and discover because the evolution never stops.
Does YES peak your interest? Want to be a part of the community? Or know someone who would? Be sure to check out the YES website and get yourself and/or colleagues 30 and under involved! Speaking, competing for an award, programme committees, becoming published, volunteering as a student…it’s all possible with YES!
