"The data from ROOTS’ previous surveys, 2007 to 2013, will all be incorporated into Storyteller. It will include data from our 2019 study when it is released. This will effectively allow marketers and brand strategists to predict consumer trends into 2020/21," says SPARK Media’s joint CEO, Marc du Plessis.
"Storyteller will allow data to be presented in a more visually appealing, geocentric format for easy implementation into presentations and strategy documents. This will allow us to move away from our team having to physically put together PowerPoint slides per area and by category. Marketers simply need to request their required variables and the Storyteller programme does the rest," says du Plessis.
Gareth Pearson, CEO at BMi Research, adds, "For the past 30 years, ROOTS has been South Africa’s largest urban, community-level quantitative survey. It provides marketers with demographic information around purchasing behaviour in a number of categories, including readership, shopping, banking, digital, entertainment, and travel."
Storyteller will provide insights into what appliances, furniture, or digital equipment have been purchased recently, and whether the consumer has bought DIY or painting tools. It can also reveal if consumers visit casinos, fast food outlets, or shopping centres. It reveals how often they buy groceries, what they buy, which supermarket they shop at, and whether they plan their purchases.
Other insights include who they bank with, what accounts they hold, as well as the type of insurance they buy – and which insurers they use. It includes the consumer's main form of transport, how many cars they own per household, the cars they drive, how often they visit a garage forecourt, and what they buy there.
"We’re very excited about our partnership with BMi Research to massively extend the reach of ROOTS. More can benefit from the hyper local data we have available, which shows how people shop and behave at a community level. This just isn’t available through any other research tool," concludes du Plessis.
For more information, visit www.sparkmedia.co.za. Alternatively, connect with them on Facebook, Twitter or on Instagram.