One of the largest manufacturers of home and office cleaning products and appliances, was interested in redeveloping its home cleaning offerings to better fit evolving consumer expectations and values. After having some prior research completed with a branding agency, they were looking to validate their design direction.

Of course, traditional package testing could have been employed and they’d have been given a simple answer like “Package A had more interest”.

But, their Senior Director of Marketing, knew that solely understanding the result was far less valuable than understanding how consumers came to that decision–what were their motivations? Did they find anything lacking in their packaging compared to their competitors? This information is invaluable. Not only does it give their team the data they need to make packaging decisions, but it builds customer loyalty, improves brand perception, and ultimately increases their bottom line.

So, why exactly did the manufacturer’s consumers prefer one design over the other? Did their packaging designs have gaps that needed to be addressed?

To answer all these key questions, they hired Gold Research, an award-winning customer journey mapping and research firm, to uncover the nuances driving their consumers’ behaviors and purchase intent.

With their team’s guidance, we knew that we had to develop a personalized research strategy that provided these key insights:

🔒Clear understanding of the consumer decision process and influencing factors
🔒Clarity on which packaging improvements to prioritize
🔒Quantified impact for prioritization (business and financial)

Their team team understood that by leveraging our proprietary eye-tracking solution called Gold Eye-Tracking™, they would be able to obtain the objective, statistical validity needed to back their future decisions.

Working with a diverse group of target consumers within three markets, we supplied Gold Eye-Tracking™ glasses that recorded where the users’ visual attention landed. Consumers shopped as usual, creating a natural experience.

In addition to Gold Eye-Tracking™ glasses, participants wore a biometric device on their wrist which continuously measured their emotional responses and engagement throughout their shopping journey. Their team knew that Gold Eye-Tracking™ would be helpful in identifying which elements of branding and packaging are most noticeable while biometric testing would give their team a deeper understanding of the consumers’ feelings and motivations behind those actions.

Following the eye-tracking sessions, a seasoned research interviewer moderated in-depth interviews walking consumers through the video recorded on their eye-tracking glasses and asked them questions specific to their experience. We then repeated this exercise for packaging alternatives.

Due to their team’s unwavering dedication to creating a path of least resistance for consumers, they were able to turn data into actionable insights and put their company in the best position to predict future trends in the market before their competitors.

They were better able to understand their consumers’ preferences and identify packaging elements that had the greatest and least impact on purchase intent. With that information, their team released product packaging that matched their consumer expectations. This research had a 40% greater business and financial impact than originally intended.

The client also reported using this data cross-functionally, creating a cohesive and strategic approach to their product branding and messaging.