Former Conference, November 2005

Making innovation successful trough Empathic Market Sensing

Speakers: Ethicon, Henkel, IBM, Interaction Design Institute Ivrea, MunichRe, Nokia, Sapient

The 2-day EMS Conference 2005 took place in Hamburg, Nov 2005. At this conference 35 managers from international companies came together to explore issues and applications relating to the use of Empathic Market Sensing to drive innovation and growth.

What is Empathic Market Sensing? Studies have shown that the number one reason for failed new products is the lack of good and valuable market information. Unfortunately, companies often experience a disconnect between R&D and marketing. Market research activities typically do not play a major role in innovation and new product development.

On an increasing level, innovative companies go beyond conventional market research to use Empathic Sensing techniques; thereby building upon voice-of-the-customer and observational "applied ethnography" techniques to dive deeply into how market place agents think and act. Empathic Market Sensing integrates these techniques into an overall innovation process. Because Market Sensing data easily gathers dust, it should be actively internalized and translated into action. In this way Empathic Market Sensing can make investment in such data very valuable.

» Conference Agenda in detail

Workgroup topics: Several Inspiration Sessions during the conference allowed the attendees to start in-depth discussions. One intensive session was structured around four major themes which showed up at the event:

1. Understanding EMS Tools in detail: A number of participants were interested in investigating how to design and run empathic sensing activities in detail. This group discussed different research settings, what has to be considered, what can go wrong and how to decide on different designs
2. How to use EMS in B2B industries: Several companies from B2B industries discovered that they had unique challenges which were not addressed by B2C driven empathic sensing techniques. This group explored how better market sensing across the value chain and value network could help to create competitive advantage. The group identified a number of approaches for B2B market sensing.
3. Emerging Markets vs. Developed Markets: Some companies had their focus on market sensing in emerging countries. With valuable input from Aditya Dev Sood from CKS India the group explored how empathic sensing has to adjust to different cultures and what techniques were especially valuable in emerging markets.
4. Advanced issues related to EMS: A group of very advanced companies explored the next level of challenges. The group identified the following areas:
   • Improving dissemination, access and re-use of insights
   • Leveraging the sensing of the whole company
   • Developing a market-oriented culture
   • Managing the `updating´: Ongoing sensing and revision

Companies who participated: Sapient, Henkel, Ethicon, Munich Re, IBM, Nokia, Borealis, BPB, CKS Consulting, Clariant Masterbatch, Credit Suisse, Dow Europe, Draeger Safety, Ethicon Endo-surgery, Hitachi Europe, Innovene, Masterfoods, Philips Medical Systems, Printpack, Purac CSM, Siemens Corporate Technology, Syngenta Crop Protection, Tetra Pak, Volkswagen, Whirlpool Europe