b'SECTION 03 BUSINESS INTEGRATIONTip 3: ChangeTip 4: Consultancymanagement Its pretty easy to write aboutMany brands are now integrating your data and your business needsconsultancy into their managed Tip 1: More than just research becoming best friends, but the realitycommunities to add direction to is more difficult. Whenever you arethe insight and data. This marriage changing the way in which yourof insight and consultancy needs to Data is everywhere. What most people take for granted is that it takes commercial nousorganisation works, you shouldhappen at both a strategic and and more than a little know-how to turn that data into actionable insight. If your Insightconsider employing some form oftactical level in an organisation. At the team are the only ones who can do this, then you risk the danger that they become achange management. You need tostrategic level, theres a role for expert roadblock. To get the most value from your community you need to train a cross-sectionhave a project owner, sign off andconsultants who understand the goals of the business in what the insight platform is, how you use it and how to draw datasupport from your C-leveland immediate pain points in a brand from it. Teaching them a little on how to read that data isnt a bad idea either!management, a plan and timeline forand have experience in giving advice. the change to take place and someAt the tactical level, you need people reinforcement to make sure it sticks. with operational and project management skills who can iterate Tip 2: Cross-pollinationThe point of good insight is to makehow the tool is used.better informed decisions, but without the right tools, training and appetiteThe consultants would work with the With different business users all using your community, it becomes increasingly importantwithin the business this can often feelbrand to make sure the tools have the to marry together research outputs with business outputs. Research outputs tend to belike another hoop to jump through.right remit to fit their goals. reports, summaries and recommendations where business outputs tend to be decisionsYour brand will get much more valueEnsuring that critical KPIs and and actions.out of an Insight Community ifmetrics and outputs are fed through every part of your organisation canto different stakeholders. The tactical understand the benefits, can easilypeople working at a more junior level To get from one to the other its important to build:access and understand the datawould fine tune, by understanding on and can transform that data intoa practical level what the tool needs the insight edge.to deliver, to who and when. Their role would be to deliver the data according to the needs of the business, talk up the community, and share the output CollaborationCo-creation andData visualisationto normalise use of the community and spaces where dataworkshoppingand insightsqueeze more value out of the data.can be annotatedtools to build on data. dissemination tools.and discussed.All of which are designed to increase the active role key stakeholders and consultants have in interpreting, shaping and sharing the insight. Its a dictum of technology that the more essential This means better informed decisions, taken more quickly, which fit clearly within existinga tool becomes, the less visible it is. It becomes part strategies and goals and are easier for the wider organisation to understand. of the fabric of an organisation. The future of Insight Communities is along these lines - evolving to become an invisible, but vital channel between a business and the customers it relies on to survive.21 | INSIGHT COMMUNITIES 2023 22 | INSIGHT COMMUNITIES 2023'