Strategic Market Intelligence in the US

Interview with Jouko Virtanen, President of Global Intelligence Alliance North America

Why is GIA organizing a Conference on Strategic Market Intelligence in New York?

We have discovered a significant need and demand in North America for events focusing on pragmatic ways of implementing world class market and competitive intelligence programs. Ever since GIA launched its World Class MI framework, we have been asked to organize an educational and conference around the key success factors. This conference is organized to meet that need.
 
What are the key take-outs of the NYC conference in your opinion?

I have personally spent a significant amount of time in June-Aug to discuss with all the presenters, workshop facilitators and panelists. I can honestly say that the agenda is extremely good and speakers are very experienced experts. It is the best agenda I have seen, even better than our recent conference in Europe. The key is to share best practices that the participants can take with them and start using. We won’t be providing theory, it is all about practice and education. Key topics will include, how to build truly world-class market intelligence capability, how to make your MI generate revenue and enable sales, how to build foresight and capacity to anticipate competitive moves, and how to make sure your MI program is truly part of decision making.
 
What makes the GIA conference so different from the other MI/CI conferences?

As mentioned, it will be very practical first of all. We won’t have vendors presenting, only seasoned experts and facilitators. I guess as a rather new conference organizer in North America, we are also bringing a new, fresh approach to networking and best practices sharing. I would also argue that the list of speakers, and facilitators is the best I have seen for a long time. It will be highly educational and fun. Remember also that 100% of the participants in our recent conference recommend GIA conferences, that is pretty strong.

Who should participate in the NYC conference?

I would say any market intelligence/competitive intelligence practitioner, especially those in charge of developing world class MI programs. Also, strategy, sales and business development decision makers responsible for developing corporate intelligence programs. Anyone who is interested in learning how best in class companies build decision making support.
 
Is GIA now entering the conference business in North America?

For us this is not about entering the conference business. If we were to do this, we would invite all the vendors and make money on this. As a thought leader and innovator of the world-class market intelligence model, we want to make sure that we pass along practical expertise. We will probably continue to organize one event per year going forward, we already decided to have the next in Amsterdam in 2011. I think that should be enough for the global market intelligence community, in addition we will definitely continue to organize smaller local events as we have done so far.