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“Consumer.ology is a refreshingly iconoclastic skewer through the heart of traditional market research methods and reason.  Graves’ peppering of psychological theory with pithy anecdotes of misguided consumer successes and failures is bound to at once ruffle feathers and get heads nodding within marketing and innovation circles.”
Blake H. Glenn, Senior Inventor, ?What if!

"... will send a shiver down the spine of the research industry..."

"Consumer.ology is a rich digest of insights on consumer psychology. It should be essential reading for marketers and general managers, and carefully hidden away from anyone whose livelihood depends on market research."
Alan Giles, Chairman, Fat Face and
Associate Fellow Saïd Business School, University of Oxford

Consumer· ology:
The Market Research Myth, the Truth about Consumers and the Psychology of Shopping

• Leading expert in consumer behaviour   
• Offers a unique, real-world and practical approach for evaluating why we buy what we do - and often don't buy what market research says we will   
• Uses a range of case studies and draws on the latest psychology and neuroscience to expose the reasons that market research can't work   
• Controversial in dismissing the conventional approach as false and misleading and sure to attract the attention of both the marketing world and market research industry   

Market research is a myth. Philip Graves, one of the world's leading experts in consumer behaviour, reveals why the results of the typical market research campaign are completely unreliable. Whether it is company executives seeking to define their corporate strategy or politicians wanting to understand the electorate, the idea that questions answered on a questionnaire or discussed in a focus group can provide useful insights on which to base business decisions is the cause of product failures, political blunders and wasted billions.

Consumer·ology exposes some of the most expensive examples of research-driven thinking clouding judgement, experience and evidence - from New Coke to General Motors, from Mattel to the Millennium Dome - and instances of success through ignoring research, such as Baileys and Dr Who.  It also shows organisations the tools they should be using if they want to understand their customers.

Using his unique AFECT approach, a set of five criteria to evaluate the reliability of any consumer insight, Graves asserts that it's time for a fresh approach that embraces this new understanding of human behaviour. Along the way, he reveals why the current practice of market research is a false science, why we often don't buy what we say we will, and how to undersand consumers better than they do themselves. After reading Consumer·ology business leaders and politicians will never look at market research in the same way again.

Consumer·ology will be published by Nicholas Brealey Publishing on September 10th 2010 in the UK and in November in the US.  It is available for pre-order from Amazon by clicking either of the links below. 

Also available for pre-order or notification of availability from other Amazon stores around the world.