Yale Adds Customer Insight Center

The Yale School of Management is opening a new research center devoted to understanding customer behavior. The Yale Center for Customer Insights (YCCI) will bring together industry leaders and scholars from multiple disciplines to focus on joint research relevant to the marketplace.

Co-directors of the new center are Ravi Dhar, Professor of Marketing at Yale SOM and Professor of Psychology at Yale University and Dick R. Wittink, the George Rogers Clark Professor of Management and Marketing at Yale SOM and Editor of the Journal of Marketing Research.

William Pace, CEO of consultants Kurt Salmon Associates, a global consulting firm specializing in the retail, consumer products, and healthcare industries, has been named Chair of the YCCI Advisory Board.

Professor Dhar says that putting customer insight at the heart of business strategy can be critical to the success of new products and services: 'Tapping into these complex areas requires the expertise of multiple disciplines. For example, psychology informs how emotion and reason influence purchase decisions. Sociology gives insight into shared values and perceptions. The Center is distinguished by its ability to draw on the breadth and depth of world class researchers throughout Yale and beyond to better understand how customers think and act'.

Current research by YCCI fellows includes how individuals choose among financial planning options, the effects of marketing activities on the demand for prescription drugs, shopping patterns on the Internet, and the link between customer satisfaction and purchase behavior. The Center's first major research project, in partnership with IBM, deals with the difference between selling products and selling solutions.

According to Professor Wittink, the Center aims to create 'a highly collaborative environment that encourages the interaction between researchers who are generating new knowledge about customers in an interdisciplinary manner and the users of that knowledge within companies, government agencies, non-profits, and institutions. To make this happen, YCCI wants to work with executives starting with the initial phase of a research project. We are interested in building a team of affiliates to partner with us'.

The other membersof the Advisory Board are: David Daniel, CEO of Spencer Stuart; James A. Firestone, President, Xerox North America; Thomas E. Gage, Sr. VP & General Manager, Verisign Communications; John L. Lindsey, President, Thomas Publishing International; Tim Love, President, Global Clients & Co-Chairman of G1 Worldwide, TBWA World; Dr. Anil Menon, VP, Marketing Strategy and Worldwide Marketing Management, IBM; and Laura R. Walker, President & CEO, WNYC Radio.

The center is online at www.cci.som.yale.edu

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.