Private equity backed customer research group Maru has launched its Maru/Blue platform to give companies ‘better-informed decisions about their business strategies’ when targeting consumers in the US and Canada.
The company, which has operations in Southampton and is backed by Primary Capital Partners LLP, provide real-time data insights for firms using new tech and their platform will use communities from market research firms Springboard America and Maru Voice Canada.
Challenger brand
Maru has acquired four market research firms and rebranded them under its own name since it was founded in 2016. For example, it acquired eDigitalResearch in 2016 and rebranded it Maru/Edr and bought tech research firm Usurv, changing its name to Maru/Usurv.
It currently operates worldwide with offices in North America and the UK, while it says it has customers in over 40 different countries.
It bills itself as a challenger brand who is disrupting the traditional market research and insights industry and uses market communities as its audience.
What are market communities?
Market Communities are a type of insight audience used in market research. They typically consist of a closed network of respondents taking part in a series of conversations and structured exercises around a given topic. Unlike a focus group, market communities, or market research online communities, as they are also known, tend to take place over a long amount of time, typically months rather than days or weeks.
Market community respondents are encouraged to spontaneously contribute their own content on a relevant topic, such as discussions threads, video journals, blog entries or other digital content.
Rob Berger, managing director of Maru/Blue said, ‘At Maru/Blue we have an unwavering focus on quality and reliability and are committed to providing our clients with sharp and timely insights.
‘I am excited to be leading the team into this next phase of our development and look forward to working closely with the group as we continue to expand our range of services further.’
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