Dialog with Hala Moddelmog

  

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Welcome to the March 2010 edition of The Marketing Dialog. This month’s guest marketing leader is Hala Moddelmog, CEO and Founder of Catalytic Ventures, LLC. Hala leads the company to provide strategic and operating consulting services in the areas of foodservice, healthcare, franchising, retail and non-profit. Previously Hala was the President and CEO of Susan G. Komen for the Cure and President of Church’s Fried Chicken, a division of AFC Enterprises. Click to learn more about Hala.

To thank our guests for their participation, Polaris will make a donation to the charity of their choice. Hala has chosen the Jack and Jill Late Stage Cancer Foundation. As the only organization of its kind in the nation, the Jack & Jill Late Stage Cancer Foundation provides memory opportunities for children who have a Mom or Dad with late stage, limited life expectancy cancer. “Thousands of moms and dads in their 20's, 30's, and 40's with late stage cancer will die each year, despite the advances in research. These parents are leaving behind grieving children, and this foundation helps them enjoy time with each other, in spite of the situation,” said Hala.

We invite you to make a contribution of your own or to learn more about the Jack and Jill Late Stage Cancer Foundation by clicking this link: http://www.jajf.org/favicon.ico.

TMD: Thanks for participating in this month’s Dialog, Hala. We usually start with the basics and ask why do you think marketing research is important?

Hala: Frankly, my views regarding marketing research have evolved quite a bit over my career, and it is most probably because my roles have also evolved quite a bit. I’ve spent the last 15 years of my career in president and CEO roles, while spending the first 10 years of my career in marketing strategy and research roles. Early in my career, it was my job to convince senior management that the research results should drive decisions - that the correct methodologies had been used, and more importantly, that the results were being interpreted in a manner that would move the business forward and create value for the customers and for the enterprise.

TMD: And how did that change?

Hala: In my senior leadership roles, I found myself challenging some of the very assumptions/methods that I had relied upon to put forth strategic recommendations. However, since my early career had afforded me a very strong grounding in market research, I had empathy and understanding when putting forth those challenges. I really listened to the answers and tried to help use the data even beyond the surface presentations.

My bigger issues arose when strategic initiatives were put forth without the appropriate market research and analysis having been undertaken.

TMD: Ouch! What happened then?

Hala: If an organization happens to have marketing professionals who are not well-grounded in market research, sometimes the correct questions are not asked and that is when having an extremely experienced outside resource is critical. I’ve definitely learned that as leaders, both junior and senior, we are sometimes too close to the business to see fully what the questions are or should be before we implement new strategies and set our baseline measurements for comparison. I’ve also come to appreciate out-sourcing for specialty skill sets more and more as the ways of gathering data have increased significantly over the course of my career.

TMD: Very true. One of the reasons I came back to marketing research was because of the great new tools and techniques that are available to us. Hala, tell us about a time where a bad marketing decision was made due to the lack of research.

Hala: During my tenure as President of Church’s Chicken, we market-tested co-branding a new Mexican food concept within the Church’s restaurants. We conducted all the obligatory product testing – the consumers loved the products. We tested the advertising – they said it was fabulous. We tested the pricing – they said it was right on target, and on and on with all the expected research on an undertaking of this magnitude. What we failed to discern, or at least failed to ask correctly for true discernment of the customers’ behavior, were two very important points: Would new customers “go to a Church’s” for these products they claimed to be ready to purchase, and would existing customers make additional visits for these products they also claimed to be ready to purchase. Of course, we asked these questions over and over and in many different ways during the market test period, but we did not really get the true answers until we had spent a lot of money and a lot of time and had to pull the plug on the project.

TMD: So the brand couldn’t stretch that far.

Hala: Right. So in this case it wasn’t so much a lack of research per se, but perhaps a lack of the “correct and sophisticated” research needed AND our lack of listening to what the research was trying to tell us. This example is a classic case of executives hearing what they wanted to hear.

TMD: What were the most important lessons you learned about marketing research in the early days of your career?

Hala: The first important lesson I learned early in my marketing research career was that the numbers had to tell a cohesive and comprehensive story. People learn by hearing stories, and they are engaged by both the left and right side of the brain if the research results are presented correctly. I was an undergraduate English major with a graduate degree in journalism and I loved business – I liked the spreadsheets and the P&L’s and the way those numbers told a story about a company’s past, present, and future. When I had the opportunity in my first job out of graduate school to be a marketing research professional for Arby’s Franchise Association, I was so excited because I got to gather numbers/data from consumers to tell the story about what a product or advertisement and a brand meant to them and how that brand might influence them to spend more money and increase their loyalty and emotional engagement. Market research and strategy construction are an exciting blend of numbers and words.

TMD: We have had other marketers talk about telling the story – it’s such a critical part of communicating research findings. What’s the next lesson?

Hala: Lesson number two, which really came on day one, was that the market research professional had better have his or her eye just as trained on the bottom line as on the top line. Certainly, marketers are expected to drive sales, revenues, the top line; but marketers who don’t understand the bottom line and treat it with as much respect as the top line won’t be around long to work on that next top line project. Plus, it is simply more rewarding for the company and the person to meet both challenges.

TMD: Very true! What’s your best tip for Marketing Researchers?

Hala: After all my years in consumer-based businesses, focus groups are still one of my favorite methodologies, though one of the methods most fraught with the perils of misunderstanding of the data or misuse of the data. My number one recommendation is to start and end with an excellent, smart, flexible, and persuasive moderator. Anyone reading this blog has been exposed to a less than desirable moderator, and they have experienced “untrained” executives misusing focus group data either through lack of understanding or due to driving an agenda they believe in strongly. If your moderator is smart and flexible, he or she can course correct during a session without risking the integrity of the process or the data; and if your moderator is smart and persuasive, he or she can help the marketing research professional avoid having the data misused or misunderstood by the company.

TMD: Do you have any career recommendations for marketing research professionals? What are the pitfalls they need to watch out for?

Hala: One general recommendation for marketing research professionals is to be consistent, firm in your conviction, and avoid holes in your data. This last comment may seem overly obvious; but again, we’ve all been exposed to executives who will take your data when they like the answers and ignore it when they don’t. Much of the job is to earn the trust so that the data can truly speak for itself.

TMD: Hala, thank you so much! This is very valuable insight for our readers.

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