Confidence, support and partnership: Client needs from marketing research suppliers

Q&A with CEO and founder of the 2023 Marketing Research Supplier of the Year award winner

Editor’s note: Alter Agents is the winner of the 2023 Marketing Research Supplier of the Year (2022 revenue below $10 million) award, a category in the Marketing Research and Insight Excellence Awards. The award winners were announced during a virtual celebration on November 14, 2023. To learn more about the awards go to https://www.quirksawards.com/ 

Alter Agents is a full-service strategic market research consultancy reimagining research in an era of shifting decision-making. The company, founded in 2010, redefines research with a people-first approach, emphasizing authenticity, trust, collaboration and empowerment. 

Certified as a woman-owned and woman-controlled business, five of Alter Agents’ senior executives are women – including Rebecca Brooks, CEO and founder. Brooks started her career in insights over 20 years ago. Brooks’ passion for creating a rich, energized and balanced work environment — while delivering exceptional quality and value — has created a true culture of collaboration at Alter Agents.  

Brooks answered a few questions about aspects of Alter Agents that helped the company win this award.  

What is the overall goal when taking on a client?  

We want to be the best partner they’ve worked with – ever. That’s why we have such a strong focus on collaboration and communication.  

Our senior partners are involved in every project and prioritize the kind of relationships with our clients that deliver an unparalleled level of strategic value. That’s why many of our client relationships have lasted well over 10 years. We operate as an extension of a client’s team, anticipating stakeholder needs as they would, providing the actionable findings and lasting insights they need to move their business into the future.  

It is paramount to us that clients feel safe in our hands and confident in the deliverables, and we all work hard toward this goal. 

What is the most important thing for a supplier to provide a client? 

Confidence. Confidence in the work. Confidence when they take that work to their stakeholders that it is complete, accurate and representative, with insights that will help them address critical business challenges and opportunities. Clients must have confidence that they are fully supported by the team.  

Beyond the data, clients need unlimited support – whether a project is active or not. A supplier’s senior staff must be involved in every aspect so the client gets decades of research knowledge and brand expertise backing up the delivered insights.

Where do you see the market research industry in five years?  

Change is happening quickly as technology advances, so we are done with the era of boilerplate research. 

Traditional models and frameworks are losing relevance fast. This means the market research leaders of the future will be highly adaptive, staying a step ahead of the industry’s changes for their clients. Researchers will blend a wide array of methodologies to bridge knowledge gaps and provide more holistic views of audiences.  

That’s why Alter Agents is already developing custom, multimodal solutions through an innovative mix of tools including neuroscience, behavioral data, trends, qualitative, quantitative, analytics and biometrics.