FlavorWiki 2024: A Complete Customer Insights Solution

Daniel Protz, CEO and Founder of FlavorWiki, brings a wealth of experience from top global firms including Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, and Groupon. His background includes designing, building, and implementing technology to support inventory, customer service, content publishing, and pricing automation for ecommerce businesses exceeding $1 billion USD. Daniel holds a bachelor's degree from Dartmouth College and an MBA from Stanford Business School.

FlavorWiki is a innovative digital customer insights solution that offers agile technology powered by patented A.I. This platform provides businesses with the fastest, most affordable, and sustainable insights solution on the market. DeliveryRank finds out more.

Daniel, how does FlavorWiki's approach to consumer insights differ from traditional market research methods?

There are two distinct aspects of our approach that differentiate us from conventional market research methods. Firstly, we offer a unique location-based service accessible via mobile phones or web browsers. This allows us to track user behavior throughout their entire consumer journey, starting from a web page to an e-commerce purchase site. We can monitor their actions, such as clicks and eye-tracking, and seamlessly transition them into a retail environment. Here, they can engage in various activities, including taking photos, videos, and answering questions, providing us with comprehensive insights into their consumer experience. 

While similar services exist, our platform is optimized for this purpose, ensuring the authenticity and validity of the data collected. This enables us to conduct complex research missions cost-effectively, a capability that sets us apart from others in the industry. With a presence in over 100 countries and commercial operations in 55 countries, we can rapidly gather real purchase experience information from diverse global markets.

Secondly, we have developed a patented approach for evaluating consumer experiences with abstract aspects of a product, such as taste and flavor. This innovative method allows us to capture sensory data directly from regular consumers as they interact with products. For example, when assessing a beer, we can determine its bitterness, sweetness, and other sensory attributes experienced by the consumer. This approach enables us to create detailed profiles of consumer experiences, helping us understand why consumers prefer certain products over others or how a product falls short of expectations. 

This method is applicable not only to food products but also to items like perfume or running shoes, where consumers normally use qualitative language to describe their sensations. By quantifying these experiences, we can develop models that provide a comprehensive understanding of consumer preferences and purchasing decisions.

What specific benefits does FlavorWiki offer to businesses in terms of understanding and connecting with their customers?

We have a direct connection to our consumers through our own community, which comprises well over a million people and is continually growing worldwide. Our approach to recruiting new consumers for various demographic or commercial targets is unique and agile. This means that if a company wants to delve deeper into consumer experiences, we can directly contact them without relying on external recruitment partners, which could hinder communication. This direct connection is a unique aspect of our approach to connecting with consumers. Additionally, our method of measuring and quantifying this information to make it more provable is another unique aspect of our work.

Can you elaborate on how FlavorWiki ensures the diversity and authenticity of its consumer tester community?

We have developed a highly sophisticated technology platform that allows us to validate photos, imagery, and the timing of responses to different questions. We analyze how people answer sensory or descriptive questions, making it very difficult to deceive the system. For example, it can detect if someone falsely claims to be a senior citizen. We can authenticate answers based on data patterns. Additionally, we collect information such as national IDs to verify the identity of participants and track their location worldwide.

We usually incentivize participants with product value or cash back, rather than cash, which reduces the likelihood of attracting individuals seeking to fraudulently earn money. Furthermore, our stringent validation processes make it challenging for dishonest individuals to access our surveys. While this approach may make it more difficult to recruit participants, it results in higher data quality. Unlike some companies in the consumer research industry that pay participants to complete surveys, we focus on recruiting a larger number of users and place less emphasis on paying them to complete surveys. This helps maintain the integrity of our research and ensures better data quality, because our users are genuinely engaged in the product category.

How does FlavorWiki's digital platform contribute to reducing costs and increasing efficiency compared to traditional research approaches?

We concentrate on tasks that can be automated to increase efficiency and reduce costs. We believe that automation is the future of research, and we're dedicated to developing tools that streamline processes while maintaining high quality.

Research is a necessary cost for businesses, unlike marketing, which directly generates revenue. Therefore, companies are always looking to optimize research costs. We believe that automation is the key to achieving this goal, and we're committed to leading the way in this approach to research.

In what ways can businesses utilize FlavorWiki's insights to innovate and stay competitive in their respective markets?

In our work, we primarily focus on two key aspects, although we implement various strategies within these areas. Firstly, in the innovation process, particularly when developing a new product or concept, we conduct statistical drivers of preference studies. This involves analyzing existing or closely related categories to understand what drives consumer preference. For example, we might examine how to create the perfect potato chip or determine the next breakthrough in endurance shakes. 

Using an agile approach, we develop models that quantitatively identify the key product features that are most critical for driving consumer preference and purchasing decisions, such as taste, flavor, texture, price, imagery, and sustainability. This helps us pinpoint which aspects are truly influential in the market, as some features, while excellent, may not significantly impact consumer purchasing decisions.

Secondly, when working with products already in the market, we establish benchmarking standards to assess performance. We conduct regular tests, often quarterly or monthly, to ensure that the product maintains these standards over time. This is crucial because various factors, such as manufacturing issues, ingredient quality problems, or shipping delays, can affect product quality and consistency. By conducting these tests, we provide brand owners with visibility into these aspects, enabling them to uphold their promise to consumers. 

This proactive approach helps prevent issues with sales or market share, as we can identify potential problems before they significantly impact the brand. This is especially important because financial data may not reflect these issues until several months after they occur, by which time the brand may have already suffered losses. Overall, our goal is to help brands anticipate and address potential issues to maintain their market position and consumer trust.

If you would like to find out more about FlavorWiki, please visit https://business.flavorwiki.com/