Anheuser-Busch is Using a 6,000-Person Online Panel to Drive its Marketing Strategy

Beverage manufacturing giant Anheuser-Busch InBev has decided to leave traditional focus groups in the dust with its latest strategy: assembling a 6,000-person online panel of consumers to become hyper-relevant to a greater number of audiences.

Adweek writes that during a keynote speech at the One Show’s Creative Summit on Thursday in New York, the company’s U.S. CMO, Marcel Marcondes, explained that the panel is part of a larger effort to help AB InBev become a more people-centric brand, which includes pursuing ideas that aren’t necessarily centered on beer.

Marcondes also noted that AB InBev connects with the panel on a variety of topics on a daily basis, giving the company a real-time perspective on the ways in which things are resonating with consumers. According to the article, he likened the panel to an in-house polling operation “used by political candidates to understand potential voters’ needs and sentiment.” Marcondes didn’t provide any more detail on how AB InBev utilizes the panel.

“We need to understand them as people,” Marcondes said during the speech cited in the article. “Because this is when we get to understand their real motivations, which are the real opportunities that we have to break brands and products that play a meaningful role in their lives.”