Instant.ly Says It Can Tell Brands

Instant.ly Says It Can Tell Brands Which New Products People Will Actually Buy

 Platform measures consumer purchase intent ByMelissa Hoffmann

• July 22, 2014, 8:01 AM EDT
• Advertising & Branding

If you recently found yourself hovering over a box of Chewy Chips Ahoy With Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and then took that box of chocolately cookie goodness up to the cash register, you are not alone.

The product came in at No. 1 in a new index that purports to quickly and accurately rate purchase intent for a wide array of CPG brands and products recently released to supermarket shelves in limited runs.

Through uSamp's Instant.ly Shelf Score Index, each product is assigned a purchase intent score, measured through a platform that a company rep said "gathers in-context insights from consumers about new products as soon as they hit the shelves." The index also considers innovation and "category disruption from small or unknown brands."

CPG brands are always seeking a faster way to measure consumer intent to purchase. Sales data, long the best concrete expression of intent, is backward-looking and can take four to six weeks to get back, preventing brands from responding quickly to the data. For newly released products or those about to launch, these early-stage assessments can be even more valuable as brands try to decide which new products to throw their money behind.

The index is not only faster, but also less expensive than current testing methods, said Instant.ly vp Karyn Hall. "Speed is a natural byproduct of our approach and design—technology is the driver that makes our process move faster. Similarly, cost is naturally lower because we are able to automate much of the process and limit how much customized service is required for each test." 

"We estimate our costs are a third lower than traditional concept testing," she added.

For each new product or concept being tested, 300 consumer evaluations are aggregated and reported on a dashboard; consumers only see one product within each test experience, and are not allowed to return to examine other products. They were polled via mobile devices at home and in-store, where "they were shown a photo and a detailed description of of one of the products and answered questions about purchase intent and differentiation, among other key metrics," Hall said. 

The Shelf Score will come out monthly across different categories. 

Here's a look at all of the top 10 new CPG products (released in June) that consumers said they'd probably buy: