SA’s challenge is to mine meaning from a data-rich environment

Governments, businesses and brands muddled through the ages data- and insight-poor.

And those who did manage to find answers had to spend a fortune on field workers.

The digital age was data-rich, but it was a bottomless pool of information. 

“In my view, data itself is no longer a valuable commodity,” says Brandon de Kock, BrandMapp’s director of storytelling. 

BrandMapp is an annual survey reaching more than 30,000 South Africans living in households earning R10,000+ per month. Now in its 10th year, it’s the most extensive independent annual study conducted into the lifestyles, cares and consumerism of the mid-market and up, which comprises the country’s taxpaying base. 

De Kock says: “Being data-rich and insight-strong is a sort of business nirvana, and all it takes is a commitment to being careful not to misuse data and [putting] some effort into innovative strategies to use it correctly.”

For SA brands and businesses, this is a particular challenge.

“The more homogeneous a market segment or a society, the simpler the solutions. But SA is one of the most diverse countries in the world,” explains De Kock.

“So, in simple terms, the chances of a single source of data doing the job is rather unrealistic. To draw insights about SA, you need to find a variety of data and take a far more Jackson Pollock approach: fill the whole canvas with the broad spectrum of colours and hues required to adequately portray our rainbow nation.”

SA marketers now have reams of consumer and transactional data available to them. However, that doesn’t mean they know what’s going on in the minds of consumers.

“With such an abundance of data, it’s easy to get overwhelmed and go off track. If you cherry-pick some data, you might draw unreal conclusions and disappear down rabbit holes. I often use a lovely, simple example from the Covid lockdown era,” says De Kock.

“If all you looked at were sales figures for Marmite, you’d conclude that consumer demand for one of the world’s most popular savoury spreads had dropped off the planet. No-one was buying the stuff and it looked like a weird consumer eccentricity.

“But in reality, pub, bar and restaurant closures in the UK had a radical effect on beer breweries: 65% of them came to a grinding halt. And Marmite is made from their spent yeast. So, plummeting Marmite sales during the Covid era was not a consumer trend, but a supply problem.

“It’s a slightly silly, but very good, example that shows how consumer transactional data, abundant as it is, is not enough to draw meaningful insights.”

A primary feeder of that abundance is the huge increase in the use of reward programmes.

“Having a loyalty programme of some sort is basically a hygiene factor these days and they are very effective at generating rivers-full of transactional data, which is invaluable for the guys in charge of stock control and distribution, but often comes up short in the causal department,” says De Kock.

“In the modern tech-driven world, it’s easy to identify what a consumer bought, but the motivations are harder to discover, [as is] what would inspire them to do it again. That’s where people like us who look for stories in the numbers can play a vital role by adding the ‘why’ to the ‘what’.”

SA is a sophisticated market with discerning consumers, and the best way to understand them is through sharper, stronger insights.

“There’s an appetite recently for a more modern approach to data and insights,” he argues.

“For instance, it wasn’t that long ago that online surveys themselves were considered fragile and the idea of merging, fusing and imputing data sourced from different surveys was quickly shouted down and shamed as a Frankensteinian idea.

“Stammering the words ‘data fusion’ in a boardroom got a similar reaction as whispering ‘Voldemort’ in the dark hallways of Hogwarts.

“Now [data fusion is] being hailed as the only way to do it and we’re seeing amazing results with fused sets that prove one plus one can equal three. So, things are certainly moving in the right direction.”

As businesses and brands invest in people and partners who can produce insight, they will be empowered to provide customers with better services, products and deals.

De Kock concludes: “It’s the ultimate win-win. On the way to doing better business, they will more consistently and more truly improve the lives of South African consumers, and that’s got to be a good thing.”

This article is sponsored by Brandmapp.