Zappi wrote a book!

Writing a book isn't something most companies do (especially with another company) but it’s something we’ve been talking about for years. 

After shifting our company focus to become an enterprise-grade platform, we spent a lot of time working closely with 10 major brands and their consumer insights function. Through this, we learned how the technology needs to work, how the research side needs to work and the people and process changes that were required for insights to flourish.

And while there’s never a “good time” to embark on a project like this, this past year we decided to take the leap. And who better to write a book with than PepsiCo, our biggest partner and company who’s been such a large part of our journey. More specifically, our two great friends Kate Schardt and Stephan Gans.

Together, we worked through how to distill our collective knowledge, the book’s flow and structure, as well as how to infuse all four of our voices. It was a process that demanded time, creativity and collaboration, and we’re so proud of what we created. 

In this blog, we'll share the story of how Zappi and PepsiCo came together to create our book, what the experience was like, and of course, the end result: The Consumer Insights Revolution.

First, here’s some background information on the authors.

Steve Phillips, founder and CEO at Zappi

With over 30 years of experience, Steve founded Zappi in 2012 to digitize market research and empower creators with actionable insights. Previously, he founded Tonic Insight, Tuned In Research and Spring Research, leading teams to uncover global consumer behavior insights. He is also a founding member of the Supper Club, a London-based organization for entrepreneurs.

Ryan Barry, President at Zappi

Ryan helped start Zappi’s US business in 2014. He’s worked in the consumer data business for over 15 years, having consulted with hundreds of brands over that time, and still sees the same mistakes being made — which is why he’s driven to help market research teams become more consumer-centric by making access to consumer opinions easier and more efficient.

Stephan Gans, Chief Consumer Insights Officer at PepsiCo

Born in the Netherlands, Stephan gained a master’s degree in econometrics and then joined Unilever as a marketing trainee. After 15 years in their personal care and food categories, he left to help build global marketing consultancy EffectiveBrands, which was eventually sold to the consulting division of Kantar.

He then spent three years as the chief strategy officer at Interrand in New York City before joining PepsiCo in New York as the Chief Consumer Insights Officer, where he’s been for the past six years.

Kate Schardt, VP, Global Insights Capabilities & Partnerships at PepsiCo

As a global transformation leader with over 20 years of marketing, insights and analytics experience at PepsiCo and Nielsen, Kate’s focus is raising the bar of creative and brand excellence. She places a strong emphasis on delivering better returns on media investment and brand equity and on fueling consumer-centric growth from world-class innovation. 

Currently as VP, Global Insights Capabilities & Partnerships at PepsiCo, Kate’s role is to lead the digitalization of brand, advertising and innovation insights through implementing game-changing partnerships and technology.

Writing a book is an ambitious project for any company, but it was also a fun and very unique experience for us. 

Once we finally decided to take the leap with Stephan and Kate, we worked very closely to align on not only the true objective of the book, but details like the overall structure, what to include in each chapter, how to merge the voices of four different authors and provide the right examples — and of course, ensure it was useful to readers without being a boring read. 

To make sure all of this flowed correctly, we ended up reading the book at different stages, multiple times until it was ready to be turned into a manuscript. This was an especially interesting time for us because it was almost like we were in limbo, adjusting to a sudden period of silence before promotions and PR started up. 

But once that began, and particularly once we saw the book cover, is when we started to feel like it was truly coming to life. And once we started sharing it with friends to get their honest opinions and began receiving endorsements from people like the head of market research at Yale University, our excitement only continued to grow. 

Overall, we think the most incredible and challenging part of this process was what we learned from writing with four authors, which was how to encapsulate the knowledge and uniqueness of each of our perspectives and experiences and weave them into the right chapters in a harmonious way. What we didn’t want was for the book to be disjointed, and we believe we succeeded in creating something that shared all of our experiences in a cohesive way. 

In the end, co-authoring produced a book that’s richer and more layered than any of us could have written alone.

Words can hardly express how thrilled we are to announce the release of our new book, The Consumer Insights Revolution: Transforming Market Research for Competitive Advantage. 

This book provides a complete guide for market research professionals and organizations looking to modernize their insights capabilities and drive organizational change. It also gives you an inside look at the secrets behind the transformation of PepsiCo’s consumer insights function into a globally connected, consumer-centric powerhouse.

Diving deep into the complexities of market research, you’ll get insights on how to modernize insights functions, with practical steps and real-life stories to evolve your insights team. You’ll also get advice on how to evolve strategically, developing your people, processes and technology to drive significant organizational change.

On top of that, we also share our Connected Insights framework, which you can follow to help you ultimately achieve insights maturity.

This framework helps you discover how to:

• Transform disconnected operations into a unified, globally connected insights team

• Adopt agile research methods to anticipate market trends and meet consumer demands

• Shift from isolated data silos to an integrated, widely accessible data system

• Evolve into a strategic partner within your organization, driving both growth and innovation

As we look back on our journey of co-authoring this book, we're struck by how much we've grown together. This experience has not only deepened our understanding of each other but also strengthened our commitment to collaboration. The insights we've gained and the bonds we've formed will undoubtedly shape our future endeavors, and we can only hope it will help shape yours as well. 

Our book will be available on September 16th, but if you’d like a sneak preview, you can read a sample chapter and request a free copy of the book below.