Use case one: Sourcing growth

Identifying new opportunities to position product portfolios in line with consumer needs and aspirations

Uncovering opportunities is critical to any strategy focused on maximizing growth. Access to data-led evidence enables patterning the market to reveal pathways to increased demand, revenue, and new territories. Mapping the market through a lens of quantified demand breaks the consumer landscape into meaningful parts, through a deep understanding of where consumers’ mindsets and their Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) intersect. This structures consumers’ worlds to reveal their demand entry points.

To foster growth, marketers must understand WHO they’re targeting, and HOW to address their JTBD. Building connections that tap into consumer mindsets guides global brand positioning across a range of categories. Meanwhile, addressing their JTBD requires a laser-sharp focus on the short-term positioning of products and portfolios. It also ensures brands can effectively map their portfolios and product positioning against a clear, data-backed understanding of WHO consumers are, what they are looking for, and HOW to target them.

Decode the consumer

to position your brand(s) in line with consumers’ aspirations
to steer product positioning & messaging, portfolio management and innovation in line with consumers’ ‘jobs to be done’

Know WHO: Building an emotional connection by understanding consumers’ mindsets

Segmenting audiences based solely on demographic data no longer delivers optimal sales and growth results. Instead, marketers need meaningful, business-relevant segments. Understanding how consumers approach your broader category (e.g. premium potential, category passion, leading-edge behavior, the role of a brand), and what they value in their lives (e.g. adventure or safety, environmental or social concerns), can bring clarity to your targeting decisions. The outcome? An actionable map of consumers to target.

GfK market segmentation at work in the Major
Domestic Appliances category

Based on this approach, five major consumer
segments can be defined as active in T&D Major
Domestic Appliances (MDA) in Poland:

Achieving consumer centricity in all your actions
with consumer segments based on

category predispositions (e.g. premium potential,
category passion, leading-edge behavior,
role of brand, etc.)
in combination with deeper underlying values
that influence peoples’ choices.

WHO: Consumer segments in the Major Domestic category

GfK Growth Architect case study in the MDA/washing machine category 2022 in Poland; n=1500 respondents

Know HOW: Deep category understanding to unlock the jobs that consumers are looking for in their daily lives

After evaluating the brand fit against consumer mindset segments, the focus turns to identify HOW best to win them in each category. This means uncovering functional and emotional JTBD and consumers’ usage and life context.

HOW: Consumer needs in the washing machine category

Uncovering opportunities to update your
portfolio and product positioning in line
with consumers’ daily jobs to be done

Functional and emotional needs
optionally enriched with consumers’
life context (e.g., general usage
behavior, living context)

GfK Growth Architect case study in the MDA/washing machine category 2022 in Poland; n=1500 respondents

To understand what is driving consumers
to your brand’s products, marketing leaders
must question:

Which benefits and features are driving choice?
How do these benefits differ across the
consumer landscape?
Where new market needs can be found
that offer the brand an opportunity?

Growth Landscape: Turning the WHO and HOW into efficient, targetable demand

Combining the WHO and HOW dimensions into one consistent framework surfaces the opportunities worth pursuing. GfK Growth Architect is a powerful framework that intersects consumers’ mindsets with the consumers’ JTBD. When these two dimensions are layered, high-reward growth spaces are revealed – opening different perspectives to brand, communication, and product stakeholders, and unlocking the positioning insights they need to drive growth.

Growth Landscape in the washing machine category

GfK Growth Architect case study in the MDA/washing machine category 2022 in Poland; n=1500 respondents

Learn how to win within your core segments
and beyond

Target your core consumer segments
(WHO) with different products
Reach various consumer segments with
the same product benefits (HOW)
Map your portfolio to maximize demand

Acting beyond segment silos

The Growth Landscape reflects the true complexity of consumers, acknowledging that people with the same mindset can have different needs, depending on their context, while the same need could also be relevant for different mindsets. Embracing these two perspectives allows you to go beyond segment silos by gaining insights on how to grow within your segment and beyond.

The benefits:

Intentionally sourcing growth now
Embracing consumers’ complexity with one framework to spot growth opportunities within segments or across.
Optimizing portfolio, positioning and communication
Unlocking more effective communication and brand positioning by offering product benefits that consumers want, without neglecting their individual mindset nuances.
Upscaling targeting for long-term growth
Acting beyond segment silos by understanding commonalities across segments to maximize your reach of targeting activities
Consistent strategy execution
Allowing different, but aligned perspectives within one consumer landscape, hence responding to different stakeholder requirements (Brand, Marketing, Communication, R&D)

Diving deeper: Prioritizing and sequencing to target the opportunity spaces that matter

To make smart choices, marketers need data-led cost-benefit analysis that backs up prioritization decisions with evidence. Each growth opportunity must be quantified in terms of the potential value it offers, and the brand’s current position or ‘right to play’ in the space. This brings clarity of action: helping marketers identify both the highest growth targets and the lowest-hanging fruits that can be activated in the context of lower marketing budgets. The result? A clear path to the highest, short-term sales potential.

Using the GfK Growth Architect Priority Grid, marketers can clearly map:

Prioritization and sequencing of growth initiatives according to their prospective payoff, in line with brand positioning
Opportunity potential, identifying the most attractive growth spaces grouped by considering current and future growth indicators
Right to play, revealing the effort it will take to serve this target groups as a brand, based on current brand fit and positioning

Prioritize and sequence
Identify the opportunity spaces that really matter

GfK Growth Architect case study in the MDA/washing machine category 2022 in Poland; n=1500 respondents

Category Growth outcome and insights

Strategic positioning of product portfolios based on consumer needs and aspirations can be achieved by systematically finding new opportunities.

Leveraging GfK Growth Architect insights for targeting strategies

GfK Growth Architect reveals growth spaces with the most potential to maximize returns. By ensuring prioritized growth spaces are strategically relevant and cover a significant market share, Growth Architect ensures marketers carve out unique growth territories while mapping product portfolios to position for future growth and avoid cannibalization.

Optimizing product strategies using GfK Growth Architect insights

GfK Growth Architect gives marketers and stakeholders the deep insights needed to take action. Detailed insights on what to offer (product), how to position communication and messaging (marketing), and to benchmark brand performance against competitors, give brands a comprehensive roadmap on what it takes to win a growth space.