While working from home (#WFH) has gained prominence over the past few decades with the proliferation of the Gig Economy, strides in technology and increased flexibility from corporations, nothing seems to impact this growing working environment more than the threat of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

When In-Person Research Isn't an Option... and Your Business Can't Fall Behind

Most of our partners know us best for our in-depth qualitative research offerings. While we love spending time with our clients and consumers in-person, we know that may not be an option at the moment.

SEEK offers a wide variety of digital and remote research offerings which generate empathic insights with deep human and category understanding while removing the need to travel!

Last year we brought you #BRANDMOVESWELOVE, and in 2020 we’re evolving it to #InnovationsWeLove. As a market research and innovation firm, we are always interested in brands and people who are pushing the envelope. Innovation today is happening everywhere and at a seemingly rapid pace. In this new series, our team shares the #InnovationsWeLove as well as the human insights that may have led to it. Here’s what’s sparking our interests this month…

Black History Month is a multifaceted tradition commemorating our past while indulging in self-love and positive affirmations for our present. It generates the energy that motivates us to put one foot in front of the other, moving forward despite the powers that push against us.

In my opinion,, The Super Bowl has three functions: one, to watch football; two, to eat my weight in fried foods and enjoy every bite; and three, to watch the commercials.  This year, titans of advertising took the stage (Google, Tide Verizon), along with some others less expected, and gave it their all in 60 seconds of pinnacle marketing prime time.  Some years have been great, others have fallen short in the entertainment department, but every year, I watch as an empathy benchmark, to see how far brands have come in understanding the people they are serving, and thus how much work SEEK can do. This year was a big step. Here are my thoughts on three that definitely struck an empathic chord.

With my own personal experience in helping close family members battle both chronic and acute conditions, I have witnessed a variety of approaches on how healthcare professionals attempt to help patients. Even in today’s technology laden world, what fascinates me is often the lack of support when patients want to make a behavior change and/or lack the knowledge regarding the impact that a behavior change can make on their condition.

NPR’s Hidden Brain podcast did an EPISODE CENTERED AROUND EMPATHY several months ago. Their featured guest was Stanford psychologist, JAMIL ZAKI. In the episode, Zaki argues that empathy is like a muscle — “it can be strengthened with exercise and it can atrophy when idle.” The episode goes into what it means to calibrate our empathy so we can interact with others more mindfully. The ideas that were discussed are still stuck in our minds, so we wanted to share our top five takeaways. 

I had the good fortune this week of participating in a research project focused on holiday purchasing, and one overwhelming theme keeps sticking with me: the sheer force of guilt that overwhelms most people during the holidays.

I have worked at SEEK for almost 6 years, and in that time, I have experienced and learned a thing…or twelve. My job is essentially to help brands better understand the humans they serve, allowing them to make innovations that can improve their lives (via insights, ideas, brand strategy or creative storytelling). 

What I am. What you are. What we are. We are job descriptions. We are titles. We are roles and responsibilities. Salaries and statuses. Add to all of this the day to day actualities of work done, of requests answered and of realities faced. This is who we are. But only some. We are more. Way more.

I have a bit of a guilty pleasure. Every day, I log into my Amazon account, go to my wish list and see if any of the books I have on there have randomly gone on sale. It happens maybe once a month and I never know when it’ll be - but I’ll be scrolling and randomly see one for $4.99.

I love to make things.  I’m an engineer. I’ve built two small businesses. I’ve made five daughters ;)  At SEEK, I help brands make new products that improve the lives of the consumers they serve.  Last week, I was at a conference for makers, creatives, & entrepreneurs called Ocean. I want to share with you the one thing that stood out to me the most -- Josh Garrels makes music. 

The feelings accompanying drastic life changes often include dread, anxiety, and stress. These are feelings that I have been all too familiar with recently as I crawled to the finish line of my college graduation and prepared to start the first full time job of my career, all while expecting the birth of my first child. Talk about a lot of big “firsts.” And yet, even in the midst of these gigantic firsts, what I feel most is peace.

As the world of social media takes such a strong precedent in our lives, the conversations we may have in-person are changing, too. Our exchanges that take place in person are becoming much more fast-paced and transactional, and the way we communicate on social media is becoming the more familiar way to connect on a deeper level.

Every second, there are 30 tourist arrivals. That’s 1 billion tourist arrivals a year. Tourism has become one of the fastest growing and most important economic sectors in the world. The industry contributes to 10% of global gross domestic product and accounts for 1 in 10 jobs worldwide. In the last decade alone, the tourism industry has surged upwards with the rise of globalization. More people in our world are traveling, and tourism trends are rapidly changing both the market and the world we live in. In honor of International Tourism Day, we’re diving into a few of the trends that are fueling the tourism industry and the effects that some of these trends have on our world.