Metaphor Marketing

Refine the process further, says Kosslyn, and "the potential is revolutionary." For instance, you could segment the market along entirely new lines - not only according to how big people's wallets are but also according to how people think. Some customers are visual; others are auditory. Use brain scans to classify your customer base, and then target the first group with a newspaper display ad and the second with a radio spot.

At the moment, however, Zaltman has taken only a few tentative steps into this new territory. The car-dealership study was of just six subjects - a half-dozen right-handed women. Zaltman and Kosslyn are hustling up funds for more such experiments. Meantime, Zaltman is pushing into new frontiers. Recently, for example, he used ZMET to study 24 executives enrolled in Harvard Business School's executive-education program. The question: What are your thoughts and feelings about being customer-focused? Part of the answer: It means collecting information, analyzing data, anticipating customer needs - all exactly what customer-service gurus advise. But ZMET revealed another part of the answer: Being customer-focused means having integrity, caring about customers in an authentic way, being a company worthy of trust. "The executives were surprised by how much of their individual thinking was shared by others, although they had never discussed these things with anyone," says Zaltman.

In another study of Harvard executives, researchers asked what it means to develop a marketing strategy. Again, ZMET surfaced unexpected meanings. Developing a marketing strategy meant having passion, demonstrating integrity, having fun. "This is not in the marketing textbooks," Zaltman says.

The Mind of the Manager

Ultimately, even a great metaphor has to deliver results - which is why Zaltman treats each project as a test. So far, ZMET has not only delivered the same kinds of findings as more conventional research methods; it has also generated its own metaphor-based insights. "The fact that we came up with what other techniques have also found provided a validation. You couldn't dismiss the special results without dismissing the other results," he says. "But in every case, we've come up with additional insights."

But even those who use and endorse Zaltman's approach are mindful of its limitations. "ZMET is not a replacement. It's a complement," says Jennifer Barron, head of strategic market research at Monitor Co., who has used the technique. "It's more helpful in a category that's not 100% rational. With something like financial services, where there's an emotional element - how you provide for your family - it makes sense. But I don't know if I'd use ZMET on industrial salt." For some purposes, a survey or a focus group does just fine.

Zaltman himself always makes clear that his technique doesn't offer neat solutions to any company's problems. "Research can never tell you what to do," he says. "It can only give you the basis for being creative in what you do. Ultimately, it's the mind of the manager that matters. If managers don't know their own minds, they're not going to understand the mind of the customer."

"Daniel H. Pink" dhpink@ix.netcom.com is a Fast Company contributing editor. His article, "Free Agent Nation," appeared in the December:January 1998 issue. Find out more about Jerry Zaltman's work on the Web http://www.hbs.edu/units/marketing/zmet