16 July, 2024

How to Use Predictive Intelligence to Conduct Better Market Research

Bringing a new campaign, product, or service to market carries a huge amount of business risk. To mitigate that risk and ensure a healthy return on development investment, companies need a clear idea of how new concepts will perform in-market before they’re launched. Short of a crystal ball, marketers and insights professionals are increasingly relying on predictive intelligence methodologies to drive data-backed decision-making, exponentially increasing their chances of in-market success. Here’s why.

What is predictive intelligence?

Predictive intelligence is a highly effective market research methodology that leverages an advanced behavior-based algorithm to help decision-makers predict trends, product preferences, and future consumer behavior with unprecedented accuracy. Participants in a predictive research exercise are asked to predict how they believe a target audience will respond to an idea, concept, or trend under evaluation, providing both qualitative and quantitative data in the process. Research has shown that humans are much better at predicting how others will behave than they are at predicting their own personal behavior, leading to better-quality data.

3 ways predictive intelligence is being used in the real world today

Predictive intelligence methodologies can be applied in a number of ways to deliver a significant competitive advantage. Here are three top applications of predictive intelligence:

Predictive intelligence in prediction markets

Prediction markets leverage the collective judgment of a target audience to predict future trends, consumer behaviors, and preferences by incorporating both individual preferences and tacit knowledge to predict outcomes. Prediction markets use an engaging betting game in which participants wager virtual currency (tokens) on future outcomes, allowing you to gather data reflecting not only predicted outcomes but also emotion and confidence, which helps surface niche and breakthrough ideas.

Predictive intelligence in predictive surveys

A predictive survey is a market research methodology that provides participants with context and topical knowledge, then asks them to make their best predictions about how they think consumers will react to a product, idea, or message being tested. Predictive surveys offer a great alternative to traditional survey methodologies, delivering more accurate results in a highly contextual, predictive experience.

Engaging creators and influencers with predictive intelligence

Predictive intelligence methodologies can also be used to engage creators and influencers in particular market segments to help predict the future of your category. CRG, for example, offers a 360-degree solution that brings together industry creators, target consumers, AI, and predictive intelligence to identify future consumer needs and category trends, prioritize white space opportunities for product development and innovation, predict the growth and impact of needs and opportunities, and provide actionable recommendations for investment.

Predicting the Growth of Plant-Based Proteins

Learn how HUUNU predicted key consumer trends in the plant-based protein market.

Read Case Study

How predictive intelligence is driving real change across industries

From spotting trends to surfacing breakthrough ideas that traditional methodologies are prone to miss, predictive intelligence methodologies deliver a host of benefits for marketers looking to make every call the right call throughout the development cycle.

Improved customer insights

One of the most important characteristics of predictive market research is the methodology’s ability to mitigate the impact of the various biases that undermine the veracity of traditional market research results. The way predictive intelligence surveys are designed, particularly the prediction market model, works to reduce rational response bias, among others, helping to deliver improved consumer insights. The blend of qualitative and quantitative data collected during predictive research helps marketers and insights professionals go deeper into the motivations and rationales behind consumer behavior and preferences, revealing hidden winners and sharpening data-backed decision-making.

Competitive advantage

Predictive intelligence gives decision-makers the ability to predict future trends, consumer behavior, and preferences with a proven 90% accuracy rate, 3 years out and beyond. This presents an unparalleled competitive advantage when it comes to the strategic and timely investment of resources into exactly the right idea, at exactly the right time.

Proactive decision-making

An ability to “see the future” with 90% accuracy allows companies to proactively anticipate and take action to capitalize on future trends, needs, and preferences. With the kind of insights predictive intelligence provides, decision-makers remain firmly ahead of the curve.

How CRG leverages predictive intelligence using prediction markets

CRG’s predictive intelligence platform tests concepts, ideas, and products in a gamified prediction market. In a prediction market, participants participate in a betting game where they are challenged to bet virtual currency on how they believe others will respond to the concept under testing, with every bet justified by a qualitative rationale. Participants are able to self-select topics and areas about which they already have tacit knowledge, further improving the quality of their responses. The data collected from the prediction market is quantified by a validated behavior-based algorithm, delivering the sum judgment of all participants in the form of a percentage-based likelihood score, for example, “young mothers are 85% likely to purchase this product”. CRG’s HUUNU predictive intelligence platform is able to predict not only the size but, critically, the timing of trends, future needs, and preferences.

Conduct market research in the new age by using predictive intelligence

For over a decade, CRG has been delivering industry-leading predictive market research solutions to Fortune 1000 brands. By leveraging a validated prediction algorithm, combined with a gamified user interface, CRG's proprietary platform, HUUNU®, takes advantage of the collective judgment of a target audience to predict future trends, consumer behaviors, and preferences with 90% accuracy.

Find out how to make every call the right call with CRG Predictive Intelligence now.

FAQs

What is the difference between predictive intelligence and predictive analytics?

Both predictive intelligence and predictive analytics are used to forecast trends, consumer behavior, and consumer preferences. Predictive intelligence is a broader term that encompasses a range of various methodologies and tools, one of which is predictive analytics, which is a subset of the predictive intelligence discipline focusing on building statistical models and ML algorithms to facilitate accurate future casting.

What is the difference between a prediction market and a predictive survey?

Both are predictive intelligence methodologies. However, where the prediction market deploys a virtual betting game exercise to collect predictions from a target audience, predictive surveys maintain a more traditional survey experience to collect data.

How accurate are the predictions made by predictive intelligence systems, and what factors can affect their accuracy?

Generally, predictive intelligence methodologies are far more accurate than traditional methodologies as they are inherently resistant to the biases that undermine traditional market research results and they follow many of the tenets of behavioral science. CRG’s validated behavior-based predictive intelligence algorithm, for example, has a proven 90% accuracy rate, three years out and beyond.