Anticipating Consumer Wants

In her talk about customers and anticipating what they want next, Delia Dumitrescu offers a counterintuitive thesis: to stop looking at consumers and instead focus on businesses and the companies people are paying attention to. The trend forecaster explains how brands are changing societal expectations, citing Uber, Tesla and Airbnb as examples. Although expectations rise and change, businesses are successful with they can gage what customers will want next and know where they are headed. Traditionally, marketers have asked or watched them to gain insight.

However, the talk about customers states analysing ground-breaking businesses is how to spot change.This is because such companies manage expectations and master branding on a global scale. The speaker believes expectations are being set "outside your own industry in your customers' own heads."