Breaking the Cycle to Drive Breakthrough Insights 

Upgrading Your Advanced Insights Community is Easier Than You Think

It’s never been more important to have complete, cutting-edge insights capabilities

In our previous blog, we discussed the 10 Signs it's time to Upgrade Your Insights Community. The decision support needs of business leaders have never been greater than they are today. As technology disrupts business models, brands, consumer behaviors, and go-to-market strategy, competitors are simultaneously moving faster than ever to anticipate and respond to that change faster than you and your team. One valuable tool that brand and insights leaders have turned to win this race is insights communities – an always-on, agile insights method that provides an nimble means to inform answers to a wide range of business and brand questions. While the principle behind this methodology offers so much promise, the truth is that in practice many full-service support teams fall short of what they promise during their pitch. The result is that client-side researchers are often left to experience an ongoing collection of insights community partner paint points and frustrations,  and the effectiveness of the advanced insights community in driving business decisions is constrained.

A smart change can solve your problems and send a positive signal to your organization

While the case for upgrading to a more advanced insights community to solve their pain points is typically very attractive to clients, we often see that they initially dread the idea of “starting over” and believe that rebooting their existing community will require a lot of work for their already stretched teams. If you’ve ever felt trapped with an under-performing insights community partner or are chugging along with an obsolete platform, take a breath. The truth is that it doesn’t have to be a pain and making the change can send a signal through your organization that the insights function is pushing beyond the status quo.

At Finch Brands, we didn’t just design the full-service advanced insights community solution we wished we had when we were on the client side ourselves, we also designed a client-friendly transition process that puts the heavy lifting related to a transition on our plate instead of yours. In our 24-point advanced insights community transition startup checklist, only 3 tasks are completed independently by our client partners (legal privacy/TOS review, community name/graphics approval, and admin user list approval). Our team leads the way on the rest of the launch activities, allowing for easy decision-making and offering “road show” support to help educate internal stakeholders on the upgraded and expanded insights capabilities of the new community. These roadshows show the business that your insights team is pushing the envelope on new capabilities to make a bigger impact on their business.

Here are simple answers to the most common questions

For insights leaders and procurement professionals, the logistics of switching insights community partners are often unclear and mired in technical questions. It can feel daunting. The reality is that it’s much simpler than they think.  

Here are the most common questions we hear:

 Q: If I already have a community - do I need to start and recruit from scratch?

A: Probably not! Insights Community members can be “ported” over from one community to the next, with little or no effort from the member.

 Q: Should I keep my existing community members?

A: When you start with a new partner you should have the option to keep some/add of your existing members or start fresh. The right decision should weigh factors such as what your community’s objectives are, how long it’s been in place, how long respondents have been active, what engagement levels look like, and whether your current audience maps well to the audience you seek in an upgraded community.

Q: How does it work if I want to retain community members?

A: Think of the switch as if you exported your list of email contacts from one piece of software and uploaded it to another. Your current Insights Community partner will export members’ data, and securely transfer it to your new Insights Community partner. That information is uploaded to the new platform - automatically creating accounts for each pre-existing member and preserving their profile data - even usernames and points/rewards balances.

Q: Any legal things to consider?

A: If sensitive data such as PHI is part of this transfer, your new insights community partner will work with your legal team to ensure the data can be transferred and is handled in accordance with best practices. As a best practice, members should agree to an updated Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy as part of time logging on to the new insights community.

 Q: What’s happening from the member’s perspective? Does it impact engagement?

A: The insights community website will simply look different. Even the URL can stay the same in many cases. Members don’t even have to create a new account. The vast majority of active community members remain active after switching insights community platforms. 

Q: How long does this take, and what do I tell my community members?

A: The transfer/upload only takes a few days – meaning only a short gap in research activities. We recommend giving members a series of “heads up” communications about 1 month, 2 weeks, and 1-3 days before the new insights community goes live. Members mostly just want to know what to expect and what will happen to any unredeemed rewards they have.

 Q: What happens after I upgrade to a FinchSight Insights Community?

A: Finch Brands will parallel path the technical details with our dedicated “Discovery” process of getting our team upskilled on your business and its challenges. That way, on day 1 of your newly upgraded advanced insights community, high-impact research can begin fielding and there’s no gap in engagement and learning.

Q: What else is involved in the process and how much work is there for my team?

Other steps in the process include approving a name for the community (if a change makes sense), approving new graphics, sharing who should have access to the tool, and approving launch activities. A quality partner should take the heavy lifting off your plate in areas such as these so that you can focus on simple approvals instead of having a lot of steps you need to own yourself.

 Insight is your edge. Let us help you build yours within your Insights Community.

Are you interested in a new insights community provider? Try us on! Contact Us today to schedule a demo and let’s talk about how we can help you make a smooth transition to an upgraded insights community.