Are We Confusing New Qual ‘Data’ Sources with Analysis?

Rosie Campbell

Director, Campbell Keegan Ltd

May 2008

Language is more

than the

sum of its parts..

‘…Let us go, through half deserted streets,The muttering retreatsOf nights in one-night cheap hotelsAnd sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells….’

T.S.Eliot

‘…Let us go, through half deserted streets,The muttering retreatsOf nights in one-night cheap hotelsAnd sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells….’

T.S.Eliot

“My heart aches and a drowsy numbness painsMy sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk…”

John Keats

“My heart aches and a drowsy numbness painsMy sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk…”

John Keats

“’Twas in another lifetime, one of toil and bloodWhen blackness was a virtue and the road was full of mudI came in from the wilderness, a creature void of form“Come in” she said “I’ll give you Shelter from the storm”

Bob Dylan

“’Twas in another lifetime, one of toil and bloodWhen blackness was a virtue and the road was full of mudI came in from the wilderness, a creature void of form“Come in” she said “I’ll give you Shelter from the storm”

Bob Dylan

‘And when there’s nothing left to buyIts only love that gets you high’

Seal

‘And when there’s nothing left to buyIts only love that gets you high’

Seal

Wittgenstein believed that ‘language is fateful’…

Freud thought slips-of-the-tongue were ‘literally’ intended…

‘……language supplies so many of the hot

potatoes of our public and private life.

We are verbivores, a species that

lives on words…’ Steven Pinker

We – should – love language because it is at the root of

analysis ….and analysis is not

‘findings’ or even ‘data’…

‘MEANING AS USE’

…Wittgenstein again

Insight…?

Is there an emerging polarisation…?

The ‘found’ materials or outputs are the insights…or ‘analyses’…?

What we see is what we get….viewing the group is the ‘answer’…?

…Linguistic Armageddon…?

Perhaps we only have ourselves to blame…

How have we ‘languaged’ our work, historically?

How have we described our analysis processes?

The ‘Mystery Voice’ of the Invisible

Consultant…

‘…on balance the brand can be seen to..’

‘ …it was found to be…’

‘…a pattern emerges…’

‘…what can be taken away from…’

We’ve become so good at hiding our tracks that – maybe – we are forgetting how we make them…

What Academia Says…• Grounded Theory – ‘follow your ears’

• Narrative Analysis – focusing on the nature of stories and reports

• Textual Analysis – considering the ‘politics’ (esp) of texts; phraseology, implied subject position etc

• Speech Act Theory – how utterance within conversation ‘works’ (and how much and how accurately we ‘guess’ about a fellow speaker )

• Systemic Therapeutic thinking – ‘Stay Curious’ (Gianfranco Cecchin)

A usable hybrid approach to language analysis…

3 Levels: how to view them

Stories told

Words Used

Cultural Discourse

Take Two Markets…

Financial Services Laundry Products

Cultural DiscourseCultural Discourse

“…people see him as a true self-made man”

“… when its something you believe in..”

“…we’ve always respected people who have a vision and take risks”

“…the security of bricks and mortar”

“…you can’t go wrong with property”

“…you can’t feel good if you’re not on top of the washing”

“…our standards are getting higher – we expect to have washed things every day”

“…Its like dirt is something we’ve evolved beyond – something we’ve conquered “

Stories Told

“…In my family debt was always frowned upon”

“…I’m a spender at heart – my wife’s the one who keeps a check…”

“…I’m afraid I’m the one who has the obsessively tidy house; I plump the cushions at night , I have to put clean clothes away”

“…I wash stuff because I’m too lazy to sort it out – I’m very busy and probably a bit extravagant”

Words Used

“…Money just slipped through my fingers”

“…I worry about letting my husband see what I’ve bought…he’s better off not knowing till afterwards”

“…I’ve got so many sheets to wash, I don’t think people always realise. My washing seems to go on and on…”

“…The washing gets done by mid morning and it should all be away that day”

• How did ‘language listening’ help in developing advertising?

• What were the learnings about women and weight ?

• How did they feed the development of Start Your Story?

The Cultural Discourse

Be slim and beautiful

Celeb culture = slimness

Fat = low self-esteem

Overweight is normal

Sainsburys is full of temptation

Feminism celebrates all shapes

LOSE IT

DIET

TECHNOLOGYKEEP IT

EATNATURE

“Women feel better about themselves – more confident when they lose weight”

“…We shouldn’t be oppressed by the looks mafia. There’s more to women than a perfect body”

“The role models nowadays are super slim models in magazines “I don’t see why we should conform to

some magazine’s idea of slimness”

“…and there’s no better feeling. It’s mainly a confidence boost”

“Being thin won’t make you feel better, won’t make you happy…”

Stories Told• ‘STORIES’ were – literally – key to how

women framed their self-descriptions…

• Women often tell clear and well-rehearsed ‘stories’ surrounding their weight

• Sometimes these can become stylised, employing metaphors and acting as ‘unthinking’ reportage, almost trapping the tellers…

I’m a victim of my hormones…

“I’m a thin person fighting to escape a fat body…”

“I’ve always been the big girl – I have big girl dreams…I might never recognise myself thin!”

“My mum used to encourage us to eat up everything on our plates; I think I’ve had that drummed in. I can’t stand leaving food. That’s been the thing all my life..”

“…I’m a hoover …when the children have finished”

Some ‘mythical’ weight stories emerged…

Weight as a ‘third person’ or disembodied…

“ It was the car that put weight on me”

“I only have to look at cake for the weight to pile on”

“I look and I think,' what are these rolls.? why have they decided to settle on me?’ ”

Weight as a battleground…

“ I’ve basically battled weight all my life”

“It’s a constant struggle for me..”

“War on chocolate! – no, the enemy is wine for me, and then I watch it all go and I give up the fight in the Indian on a Friday night”

And the Words Revealed…?

• The significance of ‘story’ as a form – and the word itself

• The importance of the ‘I’ or individual position

• The upbeat, motivating descriptions around the ‘start’ of weight loss…

The fresh start…the start of ‘my’ new story

Again, Language held the Key

“ I feel I’m on a high when I get started…when the weight starts to shift”

“Its like having a new chance, you can consider all kinds of new ideas..”

“oh yes, once you’re in the zone..”

“Once I get on a roll, I feel I can do anything. I’m actually looking forward to it…to getting started. I’m (almost) eating more so I can really start again…I love it when I get going”

If we don’t listen to, or notice,the culture, narrative and linguistics of our respondents’ language…

…we miss the gems that make the difference; we fail our clients through inadequate analysis

…and it becomes hard to ‘speak the right language’ in advertising or other commercial communications

…We risk being deceived by the shiny surface of what our ‘findings’ appear to show us…

When, in fact the message was different, more complex…

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