BOCA RATON, FL: Samsung, the electronics manufacturer, has successfully demonstrated how market research can help brands cut through the Black Friday clutter by providing deeper insights into shopper needs.

Meet Shah, manager/consumer market insights at Samsung Electronics America, discussed this topic at The Market Research Event, a conference organised by the Institute for International Research (IIR).

Generally speaking, he told the delegates, Black Friday is dominated by two major themes – the first of which is all too obvious.

"Everyone wants to buy because the product is on sale," he said. (For more, including examples of how the firm activated its insights, read Warc's exclusive report:

The second issue usually attracting attention involves supply-chain management at a time of massive demand. "You also have inventory issues," continued Shah. "So having a good inventory plan is definitely important."

However, the research Samsung received surrounding this bellwether shopping occasion was, in the main, failing to provide any unique information moving it beyond such matters.

"We weren't seeing anything different anymore," is how Shah characterised the problem.

In response, it allied with market research company Quester on a two-wave program that incorporated both qualitative and quantitative work based around in-depth conversations.

"We did those two pieces, and what we were starting to see is that these conversations were identifying patterns," said Shah.

"The funny thing is, we weren't looking for these patterns. We were just trying to find a different way to get different insights, but through our first phases of analysis, we started seeing these patterns through the conversations."

Drilling down into this information, Samsung found a trio of customer cohorts that could shape its strategy – "deal-driven experience haters", "Black Friday experience lovers" and "price-focused experience lovers."

"We started to understand that there were three pretty big groups," said Shah.

And by thinking in terms of what could benefit these specific audiences – from targeted email to TV spots and in-person activations – the company was able to create bespoke strategies that drove up sales.

Data sourced from Warc