Most business challenges are driven by culture, which emerges from the social activity of people and can only be changed by understanding that activity. With this in mind, we help clients understand their audiences, predict market trends, define and build brands, manage their reputations, foster innovation, balance their people and their technology, and more.
From marketing research to behavior mapping, our quantitative and qualitative services help clients gain a better understanding of their stakeholders by analyzing external cultures of consumers and internal cultures of employees. Some of our competencies include live and digital ethnography, consumer behavior trials, behavior mapping, focus groups, quantitative surveys, customer purchase intention analysis, customer segmentation, trade-off analysis, pricing and elasticity modeling.
In today's world of Big Data, information does not necessarily mean insight, and that information often requires interpretation. We leverage a variety of interpretive mechanisms and visualization tools to help clients understand disparate data points and turn them into actionable insights.
Using our cultural framework, we create strategies designed to foster or change consumer or employee culture. These strategies can take the form of traditional branding and communications approaches or more cutting-edge approaches that integrate digital and physical experiences. Some of our competencies include corporate identity and mission development, storytelling, product messaging, customer and employee experience, change management, reputation management, and digital strategy.
Good research and sound strategy are ultimately useless unless they're properly executed. Helping clients activate the strategies we develop is a core part of what we do, regardless of whether the audience is internal or external. Whether the engagement strategy calls for employee communications initiatives, cultural change programs, rebranding or design initiatives, or corporate social responsibility campaigns, we're ready to get our hands dirty.
Our clients are emerging SMBs that need help understanding and connecting with their stakeholders in order to achieve sustainable growth. Our international client list includes technology companies, restaurant groups, national non-profits, and consumer packaged goods companies. Contact us to learn more about our past work and how we can apply our approach to your organization or industry.
Remington is a diverse scholar and consultant whose experiences include brand strategy at an elite New York City corporate identity firm, marketing and communications at a multinational technology company, advertising in the restaurant industry, political communications, and digital media and web application design for dozens of SMBs. He holds graduate degrees from New York University and Loyola University Chicago, where his research focused on how myths and social systems influence economic behavior. He received his undergraduate degree from Marquette University. He sits on the board of three non-profits and is currently involved in a number of tech ventures. Remington is a basketball fanatic, and enjoys tannic red wine and big cities. Follow him on Twitter @RemTonar.
Jacob is an accomplished marketing professional and market researcher whose experiences include founding and leading the marketing insights department at a midcap technology company, financial and technical instrument sales, business development, advertising, and real estate management and sales. He holds his undergraduate and graduate degrees from Marquette University, where he studied marketing and economics. His graduate studies focused on the application of economic theory and empirics to the practice of marketing research in traditional marketing and macroeconomic models, deriving decisions based on accounting and economic profit. Jacob enjoys golf and good conversation shared over a glass of well-aged scotch. Follow him on Twitter @JacobJasperson.
We are based in New York City and Milwaukee, and along with our extended team can service clients anywhere in the world. Our extended team consists of a number of talented consultants from a variety of backgrounds who we bring in when needed. This team includes architects, designers, technologists, and psychologists who approach their work from a behavioral perspective.
Designing a Design Thinking Culture | 4.15.13
Design thinking has become increasingly popular since the publication of IDEO CEO Tim Brown’s book, Change by Design, in 2009. Although familiarity with design thinking isn’t yet ubiquitous throughout the professional services world, most agencies and B2C companies with younger workforces have been exposed to it. Its focus on innovation and its proven ability to identify and solve sometimes difficult to understand consumer problems has made brought it acceptance within the business community. + Read More
Working From Home: The Bigger Picture | 3.26.13
For those who observe culture from a multidisciplinary perspective, the controversy over the remote worker should come as no surprise. In fact, the rise of working from home, and now the opposition to it, were foreshadowed by trends in philosophy, art, and technology. Analyzing and comparing some of these macro-trends can also help us predict the future of the technologized workforce. Where will it head next? Will it stay at home? Will it head back to the office? Or, will something else emerge altogether? + Read More
Ethnography Case Study Published in Quirk's Marketing Research Review | 2.5.13
This month’s edition of Quirk’s Marketing Research Review features one of our case studies as the cover story. The article demonstrates how group and digital ethnography can be used by organizations of any size to affordable conduct in-depth qualitative research. + Read More
Cultural Marketing: The Future of the Industry? | 1.27.13
Many an agency has sprung up seeking to help brands use cultural trends to reach consumers, but these agencies – frankly – are taking a primitive and unimaginative approach to cultural marketing. A more useful, but admittedly more challenging, approach – and one that Culture Concepts believes will become more popular in the next few years – is to create cultures rather than piggyback off of existing ones. + Read More
The Real Big Data Problem: Interpretation or Organization? | 1.4.13
Figuring out how to organize Big Data is a pressing and important question. But, once the software companies master Big Data organization, it will be up to the insights and strategy crowd to master Big Data interpretation. Indeed, the organization of the data is only the first step towards actualizing the potential of Big Data. The more difficult and potentially more precarious step is the interpretation of that data. + Read More
A Better Definition of Brand (and Branding) | 11.26.12
Current definitions have their merits, but most of them are more descriptive than definitive. They talk about what a brand does, but not what a brand is. A brand is not a relationship, a promise or a reason. Brands create relationships, they make promises and they give people reasons. These are merely functions of a brand. + Read More
Psychomarketing's Missing Piece | 11.8.12
Psychological marketing is fraught with conceptual and practical problems. The most glaring of these is the perpetual tendency among psychological marketers to be suspiciously selective in the theories and research that they use to support their approach. Instead of accounting for an entire psychological theory or considering related schools of thought, psychomarketers tend to pick out parts of a study or a book to make their marketing practice seem as sciencey and obfuscatory as possible. + Read More
Eating Well and Doing Good
The February edition of Quirk's Marketing Research Review, a marketing research industry publication, featured a Culture Concepts case study as the cover story. You can read the article online here or download the PDF of the print publication here.
Consumer Values For a Value
A longer version of this presentation was originally presented at the 2012 Corporate Researchers Conference in Dallas, sponsored by the Marketing Research Association, Quirks, and the Corporate Executive Board. The presentation discusses ethnography and how to conduct ethnographic research more affordably.
Data Driven Decisions
This webinar, presented for the Marketing Research Association, addresses the deficiencies of traditional marketing research methods and explains how an ethnographic approach can give organizations more relevant actionable information.
A Cultural View on Branding
21st century approaches to branding must take into account the cultures that frame consumer behavior - whether those consumers are individuals or other businesses. This short video outlines understanding cultures can lead to better insights, better strategies, and better results.
From Meaning to Magic
In this white paper, Remington Tonar explains how a cultural approach to branding can help businesses understand their consumers on a more meaningful level and create strategies that ultimately lead to more powerful, cultural brands. Download it here.
Data Driven Decisions
In this white paper, Jacob Jasperson explains how culturally attune research can yield more insightful data, help researchers avoid analysis paralysis, and help them empower their organizations with actionable information. Download it here.