Join Chicago AMA on Thursday, January 25 as Unilever and the Chicago Tribune deliver key insights and methodologies on driving successful brands.

Key Takeaways:
- Drive growth from market insights
- Deeply understand customer motivations
- Dialogue with your customers on their terms

POWER of CONSUMER INSIGHTS

At the recent Mplanet 2006 event, the Chief Marketing Officer of Yahoo!, Cammie Dunaway remarked that the role of marketing is to, “drive profitable growth by unlocking consumer insights.” The elevation of the Insights function has truly arrived but are we ready for it? Insights professionals are being asked to do increasingly more and add value in the “fuzzy front end” of innovation when we are historically more used to conducting research further downstream. Many companies and researchers, B2C and B2B alike, are struggling with how to use research to lead customer-driven innovation.

Many are also trying to understand what research techniques and methods will work in a new era of consumer control where it is getting harder and harder to keep up with the consumer and gain insights in their own environments. Two people have figured out powerful, non-traditional ways to connect with modern lifestyles to drive customer-driven innovations.

PROGRAM CONTENT -- 1.25.07

How did Unilever enter the US market for body spray with AXE and go from nothing to 80% share and extend the brand into the much bigger deodorant category for males? Alison Zelen, Director of Consumer & Market Insights at Unilever, outlines the research strategy and execution which led to insights that would propel the brand to #1 in the US and launch an extremely successful extension into body sprays and other products for men. Ms. Zelen’s research on the Axe brand, in partnership with Communispace, earned her the 2005 EXPLOR Award for technology innovation in the market research industry.

How did the Chicago Tribune, an aging brand confronting an era of a multimedia, multitasking, instant-access consumers, figure out how to re-engage with young consumers in a big way? Lynne Kerger, Director of Research at the Chicago Tribune shares her story about leading the research effort to develop, launch and refine the Red Eye, an on-the-go condensed version of the Chicago Tribune.

PROGRAM AGENDA -- 8:00 to 11:15 a.m., Park Hyatt 800 N. Michigan Ave.*
8:00 to 8:30 -- Breakfast and Networking
8:30 to 8:45 -- Introductions
8:45 to 9:30 -- Chicago Tribune
9:30 to 9:40 -- Break
9:40 to 10:25 -- Unilever
10:25 to 10:45 -- Questions
10:45 to 11:15 -- Networking and Program Wrap Up

*(Discounted Valet Parking $20)