Review of "Marketing With Strategic Empathy: Inspiring Strategy With Deeper Consumer Insight," by Claire Brooks

Review of

Marketing With Strategic Empathy: Inspiring Strategy With Deeper Consumer Insight, by Claire Brooks ISBN 9780749477547

Five out of five stars

 The content of this book emphasizes the strategic more than the empathy in the title. For it is all about marketing based on the gathering and interpretation of data so that the seller understands the behavior of the consumer/customer. The author is the president and managing director of ModelPeople Inc., a global consulting firm. Most of the examples cited and explained in the book are actions taken by this company.

 The extent to which Brooks argues data collection should be performed is illustrated on page 102.

“The observation context may require the participant to do something private or personal, such as changing in and out of clothing, shaving, brushing teeth or even showering in front of the team!”

In other words, whatever it takes to understand and solve the problem. While the sentence sounds and is intrusive, in the modern world of deep data gathering, it is realistic. There is a form of arms race when it comes to the gathering of data and personal privacy has been rendered irrelevant. For example, Google and Facebook log every message their users send, both in terms of who it goes to and the content.

 This is a book that gives the reader insight into the process of capturing and processing data for the purpose of learning more about the customers/consumers. While some of the points will already be known, there is some very interesting new content that the person desirous of success should read and understand. In the modern world of marketing, most of the big prizes are known and implemented. What is left to discover tends to be small, yet enough remain to turn the struggling business into a profitable one.