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Is it smart to have a separate market intelligence department?
We have had business intelligence tools in place for a couple of years now, but our company is growing quickly and expanding into new markets. My supervisor was considering creating a separate department just for market intelligence. Given our size, is it a smart idea to create a market intelligence department, or will it end up being a waste of time?
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3 Answers
Ken -
In my experience we have been very successful by separating the market intelligence function from traditional marketing operations. The benefits have come from establishing a group with a clear 'outside-in' perspective - one that allows the intelligence team be focused on external opportunities & threats from not only the eyes of your company but the ability to look at your company from the eyes of your competitors, your customers and your prospects.
This simple separation, empowering the individual(s) to look more objectively at your own business in light of others always, proves to be the most useful aspect of a unique department or group.
The best way to achieve success with this group is to clearly set the deliverables & objectives - and clearly define how the resources can be used by the rest of the company.
If there isn't a structure for transferring this knowledge to the rest of the company (via daily briefings, weekly briefings, etc.), you will have a group of people 'in the know' who aren't providing any value back to the organization as a whole.
Ken
My experience was a little different to Market Intelligence but maybe you can learn from my experience. In a previous company we created a group for Research & Innovation. We took a couple of people from Product Management (me being one of them) and had them focussed on mapping out technology, market opportunities and so on.
The positive side is that you have people who spend their whole time thinking and working in the area and so you get a lot of energy there. Without it I think people find it hard to be proactive and prioritize that type of work even though it might be a part of their brief.
The negative side is that it's very easy to become isolated. This happened in the beginning but we were able to fix it by bringing programs to add value to the rest of the company. If there is no deliverable to the rest of the company then you have to question the value.
It's tempting to think that you will allow the management team to make more informed decisions which is partially true but its easy to leave the rest of the company behind (because of the specialization) and the knowledge and insight does not get shared.
As well as the formal knowledge transfer vehicles that Chris mentioned I also recommend the group be proactive and create some simple programs to support the field directly. This is also good because you need to incorporate (after validation) the street gossip into the market intelligence.
The questions to ask before all the others, "What's behind the desire to address Market Intelligence? What functions will benefit from it?
For me, Market Intelligence has more than one meaning:
Is it competitor focused?
Is it product focused?
After identifying all customer groups:
Is it focused on each customer group's needs and wants?
Is it focused on identifying new customers' needs and wants?
This is the beginnig dialogue.
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