How Chobani Uses AI Text Analysis to Improve Customer Experience
Shopping Experience • Product Development • Accelerating Time to Insights
Chobani, an innovative food company, turned to Canvs AI to unlock critical insights from unstructured text. Chobani’s “small but mighty” in-house insights team is now saving hours of time and generating deeper insights and analysis of consumers.
Check out the short video below to hear Chobani discuss the benefits of using Canvs, or check out the full video over on our resources page.
Insights ROI
- Time Savings: By using Canvs, the Chobani team is saving 2-10+ hours of analysis time per project.
- Getting the most out of open ends: Canvs helped Chobani incorporate unstructured text as a source of core insights.
- 100% more emotional quantification: By using Canvs, Chobani was able to develop deeper consumer empathy and understanding.
Chobani Fast Facts
- Chobani, a “Modern Food Company,” has evolved beyond yogurt in the past two years and has expanded across six dairy categories, such as oat milk, creamers, and probiotics.
- They’ve expanded distribution to include not just traditional retail and convenience markets, but also restaurants, bars, hospitality, and commercial channels.
- Supporting Chobani’s growth and channel expansion is its “small but mighty” in-house insights team, operating across three pillars: Platform & Innovation, Shopper & Pricing, and Marketing & Media research.
Problem
Given the company’s category growth and channel expansion, coupled with the “dynamic” state of the post-pandemic consumer landscape, to say Chobani’s insights team has a lot on the docket is an understatement. The team not only serves as the “voice of the customer” within Chobani but is often partnering with their channel partners to deliver category insights and thought leadership. The team needed a text analysis tool to analyze their open-ended responses and deepen their consumer understanding.
Solution
Chobani’s insights team conducted different consumer surveys and used Canvs to analyze the open-ended questions to discover these three examples within the Shopper & Pricing pillar. These examples not only show off the capabilities of Chobani’s insights team, but also the unique value that open-ended questions delivered (with a little help from Canvs AI).
National Retailer Shopping Experience
One study was conducted in partnership with a national retailer on the dairy aisle. The quantitative data revealed that 94% of respondents had a positive view of the shopping experience. However, analysis of the open-ended questions revealed a more nuanced picture. Based on responses to the question “How could the yogurt aisle be improved?”, consumers provided answers such as:
- A greater variety of flavors
- Modified signage
- Better organization on shelves
- Improved promotion
- Improvements related to expiration or out-of-stock issues
Dream Smoothie
To help a fast-casual restaurant partner with menu innovation, Chobani asked respondents to describe their “dream smoothie.” The team utilized an open-ended question to capture respondents’ preferences, sparking creativity, while avoiding survey bias. Using Canvs, Chobani was able to quantify the comments to identify top flavor and flavor combinations, identifying two key “themes” for smoothie flavors:
- Fruit-Forward
- Functional Additives
Inflation & Yogurt "Pack Type" Selection
With inflation increasingly in the news, the Chobani team wanted to provide thought leadership for its retail partners regarding the potential impact on pack type selection (i.e. single-serve vs. multi-serve tub vs. multi-pack). Using an open-ended question allowed the Chobani team to maintain an unbiased research methodology (i.e. not “leading” the respondent based on predefined answer choices), asking consumers what would make them switch formats. Analyzing the open ends revealed the surprising finding that flavor remained the most important factor in consumers’ selection, with pricing second.
Benefits
Boosted Research Productivity
By using Canvs, the Chobani team is saving 2-10+ hours of analysis time per project. They are processing large amounts of data, which historically took weeks to sift through. Canvs has helped Chobani dramatically cut down on the analysis time and offer both a qualitative and quantitative perspective.
Deeper Consumer Insights
With Canvs’ help, Chobani can now uncover insights from their open-ended feedback that might have otherwise been overlooked, given the generally positive ratings from the quantitative questions. By utilizing open-ended questions in their surveys, the Chobani team maintained an unbiased research methodology, enabling them to obtain more accurate answers and thereby gain deeper consumer insights.
Emotional Measurement
Canvs helped Chobani achieve “100% more” emotional quantification. Using Canvs’ robust emotion analysis capabilities, the Chobani team was able to measure the emotional sentiment behind open ends. Based on the responses from their smoothie survey, they were able to measure the extreme feelings around different smoothie flavors.
