Data Gurus

The President of Geopath, Kym Frank, sits down with Sima Vasa for today’s chat. They discuss the history of Geopath, how they use eye-tracking studies, and location data The Uniqueness of Geopath Geopath is a unique organization founded in 1933, as a joint venture between The Agency Trade Association, The Advertiser Trade Association, and the Out of Home Advertising Association. This organization was founded as the Traffic Audit Bureau for Media Measurement Inc., and rebranded in 2016 as Geopath. Their core organizational mission is two-fold:  to independently audit all out-of-home advertising inventory across the United States. For example, making sure a billboard is where it’s supposed to be, or checking the angle to oncoming traffic, or perhaps verifying whether it’s a digital or printed format. Goepath performs this work across all varieties of out-of-home advertising: billboards, benches, city kiosks, subways, bars, restaurants, airports, and malls. They currently audit about two million pieces o

CEO and Founder of MindSpark Research International, Nikki Lavoie, joins Sima Vasa today. They discuss the two niches that Nikki has found work really well together for her Paris-based company: 1) international qualitative research and 2) UX research. MindSpark: Born Out of Necessity From a young age, Nikki Lavoie knew she wanted to travel around the world. With a background in market research, both qualitative and quantitative, she accepted a job in Paris but eventually outgrew it, and was ready to move on to something else.  Not quite ready to return to working in the States, her options for breaking into the local job market as an American abroad were limited.  Starting out as a freelancer 5 years ago, she quickly began taking on more projects than she could handle alone, and thus, MindSpark Research International was born.  “I got offered a job in Paris, and surprisingly, I actually almost said ‘no’. Somewhere, that little phone conversation got to me, and I was like, ‘Your 15-year-old self would

In this episode, Sima Vasa converses with Chief Evangelist for Quantifind, Malcolm De Leo. He shares with us how Quantifind detects signals to help predict outcomes, how he embraces innovation in his career and how he enforced the philosophy of “Corporate accountable, locally responsible.” Chief Evangelist  Malcolm serves as a Chief Evangelist for 20 years now, 5 years of it has been spent with Quantifind. He proudly shares that his main focus is to help the company drive sales through understanding and developing use cases and defining how they can scale and grow these for repeat sales. “I've spent probably my entire time in Silicon Valley, helping people understand how to use data intelligently so that they can make better decisions faster.” - Malcolm De Leo  Extracting Signals From Data He further shares that Quantifind's core competency is finding signals and noise — they take unstructured data and build mathematical algorithms that create intelligent flares that signal extraction. Further, Quantifin

Today’s episode is our second for our two-part series with guest Merrill Dubrow, the President, and CEO of M/A/R/C Research. He shares with us what gets him excited, especially after serving the industry for 25 years. Merrill Dubrow, a thought leader, also gave some relevant advice for industry professionals that is definitely worth listening to.  Getting and Staying Excited  For someone who has been in the business for 25 years, financial gain is not entirely something to be excited about. He candidly shared with our host, Sima Vasa, the main thing that excites him is moving things forward, in terms of the whole enterprise or the insights association. “The reality is I love moving the business forward. We got a nice pipeline of products that are coming out over the past year and they're all having success. We want to continue to have partnerships — the right partnerships.” - Merrill Dubrow Moreover, Merrill said he gets excited mentoring people — having the ability to move people's career forward.  On Merger

Today’s guest is Merrill Dubrow, the President, and CEO of M/A/R/C Research. He shares with us some important industry perspectives on automation and the consultative role of insights companies. This is an episode for industry professionals who wish to stay relevant in this field of work. Six Decades of Excellence Merrill Dubrow has been leading his company towards its 6th decade. He has a passion for building strong relationships and a mission to drive innovation. Through the years, he has witnessed the evolution of the insights industry.  Particularly, he mentions in this episode how the automation of information gathering such Do-it-yourself information kiosks, has done a massive impact on the industry. Merrill further shared that clients want responses quicker and faster, and yet want them a lot less expensive.  “I think that’s the future, I think that’s really where it’s going and you’re gonna hear a lot of clients building storefronts and a lot of companies coming out with platforms such as Zappi ⁠— th

Today’s guest, Chief People Officer Nicole Patel joins Sima Vasa to discuss the recruitment process and employee retention at LUCID. Further, she shares the processes they employ within the organization and the culture they promote that is centered on openness and transparency.    Nicole and LUCID Lucid was founded in 2010 in New Orleans, Louisiana and currently has offices in New Orleans, Gurgaon, London, New York, and Sydney. Nicole has provided much support to the growing company, as she helped grow Lucid's staff by 500%. Before joining LUCID, Nicole spent 15 years in human resources across multiple industries. After working in corporate financial benefits at Baker Hughes, she spent the next 12 years in financial services at Lehman Brothers and Neuberger Berman. Ultimately, Nicole left financial services and moved to New Orleans and has been at Lucid ever since. Growing and Retaining People Nicole and her team pride themselves in growing the company — from 30 to 50 percent, growth in customers and revenu

Today’s guest entrepreneur Jason Krantz of Strategy Titan joins Sima Vasa to discuss a wealth of information about data analytics and insights in the B2B space. He shares his personal experience in having a balance between technical and business skills. Further, he discusses how these skills helped him navigate the elusive HVAC industry.   The Immense Power of Analytics With over 10 years of business analytics, data science, and strategic leadership experience, Jason Krantz recognized the power of analytics early on his career. He also has extensive executive experience in sales and marketing strategy design, financial reporting, market research, price management, and supply chain optimization.  “It's amazing, it continues to amaze me. The raw power of data, analytics and the ability to generate insights and ultimately helps inform strategy and in the end, drive financial results.” - Jason Krantz He pursued entrepreneurship and founded his company, Strategy Titan, which helps companies "weaponize" data and t

In today’s episode, Sima Vasa sits with Executive Director of Client Development at Paradigm Sample Katie Sands, together with Sr. Consultant for Sampling at Burke Inc., Brad Franz. Both are considered next-generation of leaders for the market research industry. Together, they discuss perspectives on data collection and shifts in the industry both for clients and the overall market.    Next-Gen Leaders As a member of Paradigm Sample, Katie Sands has cultivated a diverse portfolio of accounts—ranging from market research, technology, healthcare, and consumer packaged goods companies. She is the Executive Director of Client Development. Her colleagues consider her a very passionate person⁠—when it comes to her job in the market research industry. Likewise, Brad Franz is considered another next-gen leader. He’s been working at Burke Inc. for 12 years and is currently Sr. Consultant for Sampling. He is considered to be highly skilled at Quantitative Research, Market Research, and Online Research.   Shifts in D

In today’s episode, Sima Vasa sits with Priscilla McKinney, CEO of LiTTLE Bird Marketing. Together, they talk about her company and their edge in content marketing, some tips on personal branding and her struggles and triumph as an entrepreneur.   LiTTLE Bird Marketing Priscilla McKinney has a background in Cultural Anthropology. She finds herself an easy fit in the world of Market Research (MR) because she comes from a social science perspective and she understands the nature of the work, which is relatable to ethnography⁠—a systematic study of people and cultures. She then spearheaded her own company named LiTTLE Bird Marketing. The company is a marketing agency that specializes in content marketing strategies that bring lead generation. They cater to busy leaders who need confidence in their content marketing and who ensure that this content resonates with both long term and short term goals.   Marketing in Marketing Research Priscilla’s experience and understanding of the core principles and applicatio

Karen Lynch, Senior Director of Qualitative Insights at InsightsNow Inc. joins us today to talk about PlayFULL Insights™, an innovative approach to qualitative research. Karen was granted the Market Research Disruptive Innovator award for her work which benefits consumers, clients, and fellow researchers.   The Rise of Qualitative Data Researchers and marketers want to gain more insights into the patterns and trends behind the figures of quantitative researches. They want to understand why these figures are such and what forces are driving it. This is why the need for qualitative data is on the rise.  The bulk of the work done by Qualitative Insights is for people who are just trying to understand the consumer journey, what's attributing to what, and the drivers of the ratings or rankings. “Its all about telling stories. If we understand the data, we can tell a better story about it  ‘cause once we know the reason and rationale for what the trends are showing us, it becomes more actionable.” - Karen Lynch  

Finn Raben, Director General of ESOMAR, joins us today to confer about how data collection and analysis have shifted to data curation. With huge amounts of data available today, Raben emphasized the importance of providing correct and effective analyses to governments and trade organizations. Commitment To Quality Research ESOMAR is a non-profit organization that was created in Europe in 1947. The company owners recognized that they cannot guarantee the quality and commitment to research during this post-war period. Due to this, ESOMAR developed a code of conduct for excellence which aims to advocate, promote and defend the cost of data, analytics and insights. With such a rich history, Finn Raben shared that the organization prides itself on continuously evolving whilst maintaining its role as information disseminators to governments and trade organizations. ESOMAR has created standards for the industry and they have lived up to their commitments.  From Collection to Curation The evolution of the industry b

In today’s episode, Sima Vasa sits with Tania Yuki, CEO of Shareablee. Together, they talk about what inspired her to create Shareablee and how it helped advertisers, influencers, publishers and brand owners determine share-worthy content. Lawyer Turned Social Media Analyst Tania Yuki tried her luck as an Internet attorney before finding her way to social media analytics. At the moment, she is considered an expert on social media marketing, digital audience measurement, and web analytics, among others. "It started into something like 'Im so intrigued as to why people would take this brand video and share it out to everyone they even know'" - Tanya Yuki Where It All Began Shareablee originated from Yuki’s natural curiosity on “people’s motivation in sharing social media content”. From there, the platform focused on measurement, advertising effectiveness and deep content analytics on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. "Shareablee was really born out of my personal curiosity about why people sh

Co-founder and executive chair for Reid Campbell Group Eileen Campbell joins Sima Vasa today. Together, they talk about Eileen’s history and her undying curiosity, passion and hard work that ultimately birthed her tremendous career in the industry. “I think if you're intellectually curious, it's a completely gratifying way to make a living.” - Eileen Campbell Eileen Campbell - Starting Out Early Eileen started in the industry really young when she was still the proverbial starving student in university. She worked full-time in a company called NFO (then they dubbed the National Family Opinion) through her final year of university. There, she met incredibly talented women leaders who became not only her mentors but life-long friends. Throughout her career, she had the opportunity to keep reinventing. She handled project coordination, management, and even worked directly with clients. Then at 26, she convinced her boss to let her move to Minneapolis and put up an office, a transformative step. “When you have s

Sima sits down with the co-founder and managing partner of Oberon Securities, Nicole Schmidt. On this episode, they talk about Oberon, investments and the role perseverance plays in earning entrepreneurial success. “It's really 90% perseverance and 5% talent and 5% luck because I think in a way, you make your own opportunities by sticking it out.” - Nicole Schmidt Nicole Schmidt - Backing Up Entrepreneurial Endeavors Armed with her knowledge of what it takes to get a business off the ground, Nicole has always been supportive of entrepreneurial pursuits. This is only fitting. After all, people trust those who work in the investment banking space to represent their business in an objective manner. Pretty much any business takes blood, sweat and tears to build up. Most entrepreneurs spend 15-20 years to grow their business into self-reliant entities. Only then can they truly operate on their own, which is why Nicole co-founded Oberon. ‘Sticktuitiveness’ and the Formula to Success Nicole teaches an entrepreneuri

Today, the CEO and founder of Gazelle Global Anne Brown sits with Sima Vasa. Together, they talk about the company’s beautiful 25 years from its conception to present celebration. Anne Brown - Taking Stock of 25 Years Anne says that this moment is incredibly opportune to take stock and look back where they started. When Gazelle Global was but a fledgling, it was nothing to send a job out to 60 sites—even with the limited power of copiers. After all, her job let her experience a lot of new things. “I have an extreme love of working internationally and what I liked about that time was that if you worked internationally, you had to go.” - Anne Brown Building Gazelle Global Gazelle Global started out when Anne was vice president of operations at CRC. In one meeting, one of her clients turned to her and her co-founder and said he lacked in-house operations. He then offered that they worked on the field and DP to build the business, and they proceeded to write their history. For small to midsize research companies

Today, P2Sample’s Chief Revenue Officer JD Deitch joins Sima Vasa. They have a fascinating conversation about JD’s transition to revenue functions from research and analytics, what has changed within the sample industry over the last ten years, and so much more. “So much of what we do is digital and the effort to try to attract people's attention and get them to do something—whether that is to buy a product or to do a survey—all that happens online and happens at a massive scale.” - JD Deitch JD Deitch - Learning How Insight Businesses Operate Truth be told, JD's transition into his current position at P2Sample did not go quickly. He was head of research and analytics at The NPD Group. As part of the European Management Committee, he came to learn how insight businesses function. After he left NPD, he ended up in a great transitional role where he worked in teaching research as well as taking care of methodologies that build surveys. Finally, when he moved to IPSOS, he became responsible for all of IPSOS' No

On today’s episode, the Founder and Chief Experience Officer of MESH Experience Fiona Blades sits with Sima Vasa. She shares how she leveraged mobile advertising long before it became mainstream and how experiential marketing is even more relevant today. Fiona Blades - Company Founded on Encounters Fiona founded MESH for the same reason everyone else starts a company. She was working as Planning Director at Claydon Heeley, handling famous brands like Mercedes Benz. Back then, she knew that it was not just TV advertising but also the plethora of everyday experiences—ranging from a dealership or a neighbor’s purchase—that make people want to buy the car. “Different encounters were making a difference to how people perceive the brand.” - Fiona Blades Knowing all that, Fiona felt that there was a gap that needed to be filled. This was how she came to realize the potential of the mobile phone. Unsung Potential of Mobile Phones Fiona thought that if they could get people to tell them whenever they see, hear and exp

On today’s episode, Sima Vasa sits with Ted McConnell, SVP of Lucid. Together, they talk about his background, how advertising has changed and what marketers need to do to improve targeting. Finding His Way to Marketing Ted spent about the first half of his career in technology communications where he built networks and operating systems. He transitioned into technology development and, when the Internet came along, marketing. From there, he worked as a consultant for lots of data projects with various media companies. And now, he is a man with an unbelievable passion for data and data quality, steeped in the challenges and opportunities within the industry. Changes in Advertising Ted also shares how advertising has changed over the years. The landscape is fraught with various new channels and assumptions that marketers make about what consumers are doing. “What hasn't changed is you still want to get the right message to the right person... and what has changed is how you get it there.” - Ted McConnell Acce

The world’s insight exchange and management platform is evolving with the market research industry. On this first episode of our second season, Richard Thornton and Greg Dunbar join Sima Vasa in a conversation about the changes astride at Cint. A 20-Year-Old Vision Cint is a technology company headquartered in Stockholm. Built 20 years ago to fit into the European market research industry, it has since achieved a global presence. Their platform helps deliver solutions to clients and partners in order to transform how they gather online survey data through insights. Richard, COO and Deputy CEO at Cint, says that their founder built the company with a mission to simplify the industry’s supply chain. They wanted to make it more readily available to customers and partners. This would allow for smarter, faster and cost-effective access to insights to help drive decisions and outcomes. Simplifying a Fragmented Platform It took a while for the market research industry to be ready as it is today for Cint’s disruptiv

On this episode, fellow market research industry podcaster Jamin Brazil joins Sima Vasa. He shares the story behind his company, Happy Market Research, and his eponymous podcast. Jamin Brazil - Birth of a Mantra Jamin has had the life mantra that sometimes, you just have to laugh. He intentionally injected smiles and laughter into his life during difficult times. This belief stemmed from a study of clinically-depressed individuals. Half were treated with medication and the other half, with a 30-minute forced smiling exercise. The latter induced an improved mindset in the individuals who went through it, and this inspired Jamin. “The hallmark for me in starting Happy Market Research was exactly that — to create an emotional connection to the brand.” - Jamin Brazil Maintaining Relevance in MR Traditionally, market research has not been a very happy industry, especially in the old days. This is why Jamin feels that there’s power in infusing joy and playfulness into what researchers are doing. With this change,