In this episode of Signal and Noise, hosts Brian Lamar and Andrew DeCilles sit down with Craig Alter, an experienced consumer insights leader at Perfetti Van Melle, to explore how consumer behavior, impulse buying, and innovation research intersect inside the world of candy, gum, and mints.

Craig shares his nontraditional path into market research, explaining how early experience in finance, marketing, and brand management shaped his ability to connect subtle consumer insights to measurable business outcomes. He discusses why many professionals discover research later in their careers and why diverse business backgrounds are a strength for the insights industry.

Craig also discusses innovation and product testing as one of the most rewarding areas of consumer research. He walks through central location tests, flavor development, texture evaluation, and how research can serve both product refinement and selling stories with retail buyers. Throughout the discussion, he highlights how qualitative and quantitative methods increasingly blend together to solve real business problems.

The episode concludes with a thoughtful discussion on the role of artificial intelligence in research. Craig offers a pragmatic perspective on where AI can add speed and efficiency, such as summarization and early screening, and where human nuance remains irreplaceable, particularly in humor, taste, emotion, and impulse-driven behavior.

Key Takeaways:

• Impulse-driven categories like candy are difficult to research because consumers often cannot explain why they buy in the moment.

• Observational and in-context research is critical for understanding real shopper behavior, especially at the shelf or checkout.

• Consumer behavior changes significantly by channel, so insights must be tailored for grocery, convenience, club, and digital environments.

• Innovation research works best when qualitative and quantitative methods are combined to refine products and tell compelling business stories.

• AI can improve efficiency in research, but human judgment is still essential for understanding emotion, taste, humor, and nuance.

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In this episode of Signal and Noise, hosts Brian Lamar and Andrew DeCilles welcome Ellen Houston and Jordan Harper from Qualtrics Edge, marking the first time the podcast has featured guests from Qualtrics. The conversation dives into the future of AI, synthetic data, and the evolution of modern research inside one of the most influential insights platforms in the world.

Ellen, who leads the Edge Center of Excellence, outlines how her team focuses on the intersection of market research and artificial intelligence, particularly in developing synthetic respondents and next-generation research tools. Jordan, a senior principal thought leader, brings a scientific and strategic perspective shaped by his background in astrophysics, engineering, technology, and agency leadership. Together, they explain how Qualtrics Edge is working across product, engineering, delivery, and customer teams to establish a rigorous foundation for AI in research.

Throughout the episode, the conversation highlights the opportunities and challenges of AI, including research design, niche audience modeling, accuracy signals, and the role of synthetic respondents in uncovering deeper truths and exposing issues in survey construction. Both guests share examples of experiments, such as priming tests and concept evaluations, that reveal how synthetic respondents behave compared to humans and how these differences can expand the insight landscape.

Key Takeaways:

• Qualtrics Edge is focused on using AI to advance market research, especially through synthetic respondents.

• Synthetic respondents are meant to support human research, not replace it.

• The Qualtrics model is trained on decades of real survey data, giving it a unique advantage.

• Synthetic respondents help reveal issues in survey design and respondent behavior that humans may hide or overlook.

• Future developments include niche synthetic audiences and expanded AI tools across the entire research process.

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In this episode of Signal and Noise, hosts Brian Lamar and Andrew DeCilles sit down with Brandon Richard, Senior Vice President at The Link Group and a long-time AI enthusiast who has been leading multiple AI initiatives across qualitative and quantitative research. Together, they unpack what is actually happening in the research industry as companies race to understand and apply artificial intelligence.

The episode also explores the limits of AI-generated synthesis, the need for trust and human verification, the challenges of capturing nuance in qualitative work, and why the industry must avoid falling into the trap of faster and cheaper at the expense of true insight. Brandon highlights the importance of friction in the research process, explaining that many of the valuable ideas and breakthroughs come from the messy and human parts of research, not simply the final deliverable.

Key Takeaways:

• Where AI synthesis supports analysts and where it still falls short

• Practical examples of AI being used before and after qualitative work

• A balanced view of synthetic samples, digital twins, and personas

• Why accurate forecasting and real-time insight remain difficult for AI

• The risks of creating research that is fast and cheap but not meaningful

• Why friction in research often produces the best insights

• What the future of human plus AI collaboration should look like

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In this episode of Signal and Noise, hosts Brian Lamar and Andrew DeCilles talk with Lindsay Zaltman, Chief Executive Officer and Partner at Olson Zaltman, the firm known for creating the widely respected ZMET qualitative insight methodology. Together, they explore how deep psychological structures influence the way people think, feel, and make decisions, and why traditional research methods often miss these hidden drivers.

Lindsay explains how deep metaphors guide human behavior at a subconscious level and how they reveal the emotional stories people use to make sense of the world. He shares how Olson Zaltman uncovers these underlying meanings through imagery, personal narratives, and symbolic thinking. The discussion highlights how these insights help brands uncover motivations that consumers cannot easily verbalize and how they lead to more effective strategies, stronger creative ideas, and clearer paths for innovation.

Key Takeaways:

• Why traditional research struggles to reveal emotional truth

• How ZMET identifies the subconscious patterns that shape behavior

• The role of imagery and storytelling in uncovering hidden needs

• Examples of deep metaphors that changed brand strategy

• Why emotional meaning is the foundation of consumer decision making

• How deep metaphors support creative development and positioning

• The value of psychological depth in a fast-moving and automated world

• What it means to understand the stories behind customer choices

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In this episode of Signal & Noise, hosts Brian Lamar and Andrew DeCilles speak with Ben Cortese, Vice President of Decision Sciences and Innovation at KS&R, to explore how custom AI chatbots are reshaping the way research insights are accessed, shared, and expanded beyond traditional deliverables.

Ben explains how his team is combining qualitative and quantitative research with secure AI systems to build proprietary chatbots that allow clients to interact naturally with their own data. These tools help stakeholders ask new questions, explore nuances, and identify early opportunities without re-fielding studies or relying solely on static reports.

The discussion covers how KS&R structures these models to remain accurate, safe, and aligned with proven research findings. Ben also walks through the technical evolution of the tool, including early failures, the role of system guardrails, the importance of loading structured data, and why transparency and validation matter more than speed or novelty.

Key Takeaways:

• What it means to extend insights beyond traditional deliverables

• How custom chatbots are powered by proprietary qualitative content

• Why guardrails are essential to prevent drift, hallucination, and off-topic responses

• The process of grounding AI output to match known research narratives

• How AI can support ideation, early concept testing, and faster client exploration

• Where AI can accelerate the workflow versus where human judgment remains irreplaceable

• How researchers may evolve into curators, validators, and strategic translators

• The future role of AI in tracking, longitudinal analysis, and blended data environments

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In this episode of Signal & Noise, hosts Brian Lamar and Andrew DeCilles welcome the team from Verisoul, a company redefining fraud detection in market research. The guests include Henry LeGard, Founder and CEO, Joey Maddox, Chief Strategy Officer, and Erinn Taylor, who joins the conversation to explore how Verisoul uses banking-grade technology to detect and eliminate fraud while keeping real respondents in the data set.

Henry and Joey explain how Verisoul’s background in cybersecurity and fintech enabled them to develop invisible fraud-prevention tools that identify bots, VPN spoofers, and fraud rings in real time. The team discusses how their system detects human behavior through device patterns, network signals, and even physics-based methods like latency and impossible travel analysis, all without disrupting survey participants.

Brian and Andrew dive into how legacy fraud detection tools often over-block legitimate respondents, creating bias and frustration. The Verisoul team outlines how their approach balances protection with precision, reducing false positives and improving data integrity across the research industry. They also share insights from Verisoul’s large-scale fraud study that analyzed more than 50 million sessions, revealing global fraud trends and the role of device types in fraud rates.

Key Takeaways:

• How Verisoul applies banking-level fraud detection to market research

• The global scale of organized fraud farms and location spoofing

• The impact of false positives on respondent experience and data quality

• Privacy compliance across global markets

• Insights from Verisoul’s fraud research and data quality report

• The concept of real-time fraud and value scoring

• The growing importance of authenticated AI agents in fraud prevention

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In this no-filter episode of Signal & Noise, hosts Brian and Andrew dive into one of the most pressing issues in market research: the misuse of fraud detection platforms. They unpack how digital fingerprinting tools, while valuable, are often implemented in ways that damage data quality and block legitimate respondents.

Brian and Andrew explain how overly-aggressive fraud settings can create non-response bias, limit sample diversity, and frustrate real participants. They reveal why using multiple fraud detection tools or relying solely on automation can lead to distorted data and wasted resources.

They share lessons from industry research, stories of clients who turned off their fraud filters and saw better outcomes, and practical insights into balancing data protection with respondent experience. The conversation builds toward Brian’s “Eight Steps to Winning,” a clear framework to improve quality, restore trust, and move the industry forward.

Key Takeaways:

• Why misusing fraud detection tools can do more harm than good

• How false positives block real people and skew your data

• The hidden consequences of using multiple fraud platforms

• The Eight Steps to Winning framework for better data quality

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In this episode, Brian and Andrew sit down with Isaac Rogers, CEO of Sago Health, for an in-depth conversation about the rapidly changing world of healthcare research.

Isaac shares his path from technology entrepreneur to leading one of the most respected names in healthcare insights. Together, they explore how qualitative and quantitative research are merging, how artificial intelligence is shaping the future of patient and physician studies, and why the healthcare sector is becoming one of the most innovative areas in the research industry.

• Isaac’s Journey: How a single lunch meeting with Jim Bryson set the stage for an unexpected and rewarding career in market research.

• Sago Health’s Mission: What the company’s new independent structure means for clients and the healthcare research community.

• Hybrid Research: Why integrating qualitative and quantitative methods provides a more complete view of both patient and physician experiences.

• AI and Synthetic Data: How technology is helping researchers reach hard-to-find audiences and improve efficiency in healthcare studies.

• Industry Trends: How pharmaceutical companies, medical device manufacturers, and healthcare systems are adopting new methodologies faster than ever before.

Stay tuned until the very end of the episode to hear blends of expertise, humor, and practical insights!

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