Client description: Global for-profit education company

Practice area: Market Research and Analysis; Strategic Positioning and Planning

Geographic scope: Korea

Industries involved: Language training, automotive, software, consumer electronics, IT

Services applied: Market opportunity study; go-to-market strategy; competitive intelligence; strategic messaging; strategic positioning

Business challenge: Education company desired to test a new language product concept initially developed for the consumer market as a business-to-business solution for the corporate market in Korea. The client needed to understand how to position and market the product to corporate HR and Training executives as well as evaluate the value proposition against incumbent competitor solutions.

Methodologies: In-depth qualitative research including 5 focus group sessions in the target market; detailed secondary research to understand the market, competition, emerging trends and challenges.

The result: While the language models were suitable for any user from a pedagogical standpoint, we heard clearly that respondents wanted a B2B product to reflect a more corporate context and include business language, scenarios, and situations. The client had hypothesized that only the marketing and messaging needed to be tailored but the qualitative insights provided clear direction for product modification. We also identified unmet needs in the market that offered the client the opportunity to differentiate themselves from their competition.