Unilever Reacts to Online Reviews

London — Unilever UK is tracking online customer reviews and using what it reads to retool product formulations and packaging. Among the changes, the company reduced the salt content in a Knorr soup base, changed the fragrance of Sure maximum protection antiperspirant for women, and started referring to "cooking bags" instead of "baking bags" to mirror consumer nomenclature.Furthermore, the Sure antiperspirant was presumed to pose a challenge for consumers with regard to compliance. Packaging directs users to apply what seems like a miniscule amount before bedtime. "I wasn't convinced customers would follow the instructions on the pack. We were surprised that they followed the directions to a T," says Oliver Bradley, Unilever e-commerce innovation and strategy manager.In fact, the unusual directions for use became part of the brand's story, as told by online reviewers. "It's a little bit of an unusual story, putting it on right before bed instead of before work, so people were sharing and talking about this unusual way to use a familiar product, and confirming that it works," Bradley says.Unilever is able to assemble these stories and other shopper insights thanks to the recent launch of Pulse, a social media monitoring technology developed by Boston-based BzzAgent, the social marketing arm of dunnhumby. Pulse enables CPGs to analyze from a single dashboard who its staunchest advocates are, what they are saying about the brand and how their actions influence product sales. The dashboard connects insights from consumer word of mouth to actual store sales data to assess a product's health, according to BzzAgent."It takes a few different data sources and brings them together, and uses the data to improve campaigns and target the right people," says Chip Terry, senior vice president of product development at BzzAgent.Here's how Pulse works:BzzAgent activates influential consumers to drive sales for brands. Consumers opt in to receive and review product samples, sharing their experiences and opinions online via Facebook, Twitter, retailer websites, blogs and other forums.BzzAgent uses loyalty card data, purchase history and other information to provide relevant freebies.Many "agents" post images and videos of themselves, families and friends experiencing a particular product.Agents provide feedback for changing or optimizing a product or brand offer.Pulse gives brands unrestricted access to tweets, posts, photos, reviews and recommendations shared by agents.Pulse integrates qualitative and quantitative data – social media content and in-store sales from dunnhumby shopper data – in a single dashboard, allowing CPGs to measure the ROI of brand advocacy initiatives and gain insights to improve their marketing messages and product development.BzzAgent has a "backdoor way to distribute reviews to retailers' sites," Terry says, and also directs agents to specific retailers' sites to write reviews. Brands are free to use those reviews for marketing purposes, but their greater value stems from the insights they yield. The Pulse dashboard enables users to sort reviews by sex, age range, shopper segment, region and other demographics, as well as the number of stars.For example, "You can pull out all the one-star reviews and build a case, if necessary, for changing your product or messaging," Bradley says. Unilever has studied agents' photos to gain insights about "the whole context of a usage occasion."BzzAgent works with several major CPG companies in addition to Unilever. After a frozen pizza company received consistent feedback that its pies were comparatively small, it found out the manufacturer was cutting corners and remedied the problem, Terry says.It was also discovered through Pulse that a certain brand of salad dressing was often used in various "off label" ways, such as seasoning popcorn, which opens up marketing opportunities, Terry says.All together, according to Bradley, Pulse insights provide "kind of a forensic understanding of your brand."

Unilever Reacts to Online Reviews

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