AI in Market Research: How Leadership and Insights Are Evolving

In an industry built on process, artificial intelligence is rewriting the rules. In this CEO Series conversation, Andrew Reid explores how AI is shifting market research from execution to expertise—where critical thinking, adaptability, and human insight matter more than ever. From redefining what makes an “A-player” to navigating fraud, automation, and synthetic data, this discussion reveals a future where success isn’t about doing more research, but asking better questions and delivering sharper business impact.

Transcript

Leonard Murphy: All right. Hello everybody. It's Lenny Murphy with another edition of the CEO series. And today I am joined by Andrew Reed uh from the the infamous uh famous you want to describe it uh Reed family. Uh Andrew and I listeners, we've known each other 20 years. Um full disclosure, we we've collaborated and worked on a variety of projects over those years. I consider Andrew a friend. Um, so I'm going to give him a little bit of hell here and there,

Andrew Reid: Thanks,

Leonard Murphy: But uh,

Andrew Reid: Lind.

Leonard Murphy: You're welcome. But rather than me trying to steal your thunder, uh, Andrew, for those who don't know you, um, tell give us your

Andrew Reid: Sure. Sure.

Leonard Murphy: Bio.

Andrew Reid: Uh so so we are a uh Canadian family. Um so my father Angus Reed started the Angus Reed Group in 1979 on our family kitchen table or dining room table and ended up growing that into the largest market research company in Canada. Um was you know it sold to Ipsos sort of 20 thou 1999 circa 2000. Uh when Ipsos moved into the US, they bought MPD, ASI, then they bought Reed. And so we were IPOS was there was Ipsos Reed for a while. We were that that read. I was not a overly great student or maybe kid as a as an adolescent. I have I have a couple now. So it's funny. It's like irony. And I ended up going to film school. Um I had no desire to really do academia. I didn't view myself as someone. I had a father who was uh quite smart and was you know you sort of have that father that's got a bit of a shadow and is is is really sharp in a lot of areas and you're looking for partially I'm a creative person and secondly areas to go where they don't have skill set because then you can have your own domain expertise and so in 1995 I did a program um and that program was a weird one-year program where you spent a couple of months learning about video all things video editing then you learned about sound engineering and sound design. Then you learned about 3D modeling and 2D modeling and animation. Then you learned about back then it was CDROM authoring director lingo scripting and some light HTML because while I was there Microsoft Internet Explorer 1.0 know came out Macromedia bought a company called Future Splash which became Flash which for the old people uh that was a thing on the internet for a hot minute and um it was cool and so that really got me

Leonard Murphy: That flash was cool.

Andrew Reid: Fired up and ended up working in interactive advertising for a couple years and started to work with Angus in 1999. uh he just wanted me to help rebuild his website and so I showed up and um ended up uh doing that and subsequently launching vision critical um in 2000. Uh we scaled that business up got to a point where we kind of figured out this idea of of insight communities. Um, prior to that we were doing a lot of 3D modeling and building simulations for doing discrete disagregate discrete choice modeling um for for PNG and and brands like that. Um, that business was exciting. We scaled that one up quite quite large. Got to a point where really we we really onto something and ended up sort of switching seats with Angus around the same time my sister Jennifer got involved in the business. Um, and uh that was really fun. And then in 2016 decided to leave and start again. I found that um found myself sitting on the couch uh after work one day just having that weird realization of of why is social media drive all this dopamine in surveys don't at all and why can't we make that survey experience give you the same that same vibe and and why can't we take some of the um hooks of how chat mechanics work with leave return leave return which is a perfect way to think about doing research with someone and apply that. So started Rival and ended up um in 2018 starting a full serve research co company called Reach3 Insights. In 2025 we merged in Angus' brands that he restarted and now here we are with um a technology company, a consulting company and a Canadian US panel. My sister and I are are co-CEOs of the rival group. And so I I head up the technology side, uh the sales and marketing side. My sister runs the consulting and the panel side of the business. And it's uh it's it's you know most days it's a lot of fun. And so um it's I think that's the scorecard we all have to have in this life right now is like are most days is it like is it you know you have to be having fun with what you do. um given the space we're in and given how fast things are changing. So um yeah, and then you know I've got a couple kids uh live in Vancouver and I get a chance to write for

Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: Entrepreneur magazine on a regular basis and um you know I think there's a couple other things I've missed but that that's that's a fairly long version of my bio.

Leonard Murphy: No, that's that's great, Andrew. And for the uh for those who don't recall when so we met around 2005 around the time I was uh launching Rockhopper and the and we

Andrew Reid: Mhm.

Leonard Murphy: Were looking at vision critical as our foundational platform for online research and uh and the thing that was really cool was the visual. It was flashbased, right? you look at the the images of the magazines and it was heat mapping and all that great stuff and god I remember it was so hard to to get clients to buy off on that and I just thought it was the coolest thing ever.

Andrew Reid: That's gonna be It still is though.

Leonard Murphy: Um, and I know that wasn't Go

Andrew Reid: I think it's still That's the irony. It still is. It's that there's a lot of people that um I think there's the people that really care how the sort of sausage

Leonard Murphy: Ahead.

Andrew Reid: Or how the pizza's made and they really want to make sure that's as thoughtful as possible. There's the folks that say they do, but really don't want to spend any money. And there's the ones that are just like,

Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: I want to as how do I get this done as cheaply as humanly possible? And there's a huge chunk of the population that's sitting there and also recognizing, you know, I gotta, you know, deal with this issue of fraud. But, uh, that it's funny how that hasn't changed. And that was, you're talking about a 2004,

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: 2005 world. Uh, you know, that was a long long time ago.

Leonard Murphy: It was well I'm it I just remembered this. Do you happen to recall that it was right before Christmas probably 2007208 and uh we had a client AFLAC who had budget to spend and they wanted to do uh the the heat mapping uh image test and I I remember vividly being on the the phone with you right before Christmas of like we got to do this.

Andrew Reid: Let's

Leonard Murphy: We got an opportunity finally to to test this and uh and deploying that and and it was it was very cool and it was finally the the first time from my standpoint that I had a client say yes I want to do this and we were able to uh and it was a great

Andrew Reid: Do something innovative. I might actually have the money for it. Yeah, it's uh it's it's unevenly distributed but and it's again it's just interesting that

Leonard Murphy: Project.

Andrew Reid: In some ways the world has changed a lot at sometimes at some levels in our industry the mindset hasn't been

Leonard Murphy: Yeah. So,

Andrew Reid: Fortunate

Leonard Murphy: Uh, you know, one of the things we would like to cover here is kind of that that CEO journey and, um, the your, uh, as you just in your bio, uh, outline is kind of an unorthodox approach, right? Kind of trying to create your own space, uh, uh, outside of your, uh, your illustrious dad. And, um, but yet you keep winding up back in this industry, uh,

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: And and leading these companies. And I I personally have seen you grow uh tremendously as a as a as a CEO and I'm privileged

Andrew Reid: Thanks.

Leonard Murphy: To have the chance to talk to you pretty regularly uh from that standpoint. But what has that been like for you right as you're balancing this family plus business uh when your inclinations are more creative? Um what's that been like for

Andrew Reid: Yeah, I think it's age and stage.

Leonard Murphy: You?

Andrew Reid: I mean, I'm 49 now, so turning 50 this year. And and and um and and that's Yeah, I love new things. I think I've always been excited about whatever comes around the picture, around the corner, pardon, around the corner. Um, you know, we've been fortunate to have so many chapters of exciting technology fueled change and I've also been someone who's always been curious about adjacencies. So, you look at what's going on and, you know, play go play a video game and go play the latest video games and then start thinking in your mind, okay, how can I pull elements of this mechanic into what we do? And so that's been that that was always for me, you know, something that was exciting. But then yes, as a but then with your CEO hat on, you're supposed to you gota it's budgets, it's you know, it's hiring people, it's reviews, it's accountability, it's all those things. And you know, if I'm brutally honest with myself, I'll say I think I was good at hiring people that could play those roles. And you know there was you know I think back in the very beginning of um starting Vision Critical there's a woman named Tamara Pritchard and you know she was one of our first employees and I feel like she probably was a bit of a babysitter of mine because you know I was I was pretty young and we're winning things and she was she was really helping to hold the fort down and as I got older I think you get a little better at uh understanding what's important and you start swimming to the things that um you know once you if If you if if you look at your behavior and that drives an outcome and that's not and you look back and you do the retro on it and it's not how you wanted to behave, you know, continuing that same behavior over and over again is not necessarily winning strategy. So I think I've been able to evolve over time and and understand that I'm fortunate now that you know I don't have to just I can use AI to help aid in the tasks that are those seuite tasks and that also just makes it a bit more fun because you can automate things you can use technology and and that's interesting. Um I think sadly listening is probably the best is the skill that it takes a while sometimes to develop for some people. Um, I was fortunate to have some decent EQ my life for most of my life and being able to like read rooms and people, but you know, without the listening part, a lot of things fall apart when you get better at slowing down and listening and um and not and when you want to react to have that internal conversation of, hey, what's going on inside with me, buddy? Why am I why am I feeling so frustrated? Uh, and and and and slowing down with how you react to people. you become, I think, a better leader. So, um, those are things that took a long time to develop, I'm still getting better at. Uh, but yeah, I think if I if I think about the the journey I've been on and you know, that guy I'm related to. Um, you know, has a whole lot of skills. He's not the best listener. Uh, and and maybe he's also been able to demonstrate that at at 70 at 78, you don't you don't have to be. You can have different superpowers. But that's been how I've approached it.

Leonard Murphy: You know, that's really neat. Uh, Andrew, if I what I heard from you from thematically is the the growth as from a professional standpoint, the CEO is locked up with your personal growth as an individual.

Andrew Reid: Yeah. Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: Um, and and I think that's a topic that doesn't get nearly as much attention as it should. So, you know, I I don't have a an MBA or a business degree or I have no degree. Um the so the and and I am keenly aware of my the interlocking the imshment of my life as as an individual as a husband as a father as you know as a brother as an employer as a CEO and recognizing where those strengths and weaknesses are and to your point you know building systems that emphasize the the former, right, the strengths and mitigate against the the latter,

Andrew Reid: Mhm.

Leonard Murphy: Which is generally other people around me. Um, and that's that is as much a personal recognition as it is anything else. Um, so I'm just I appreciate you kind of connecting those dots.

Andrew Reid: Thank you.

Leonard Murphy: I don't think we talk about that nearly as much from a leadership standpoint that it's not, you know, it's not the degree. Um it is the the experience and the growth as a human that makes us effective as CEOs as

Andrew Reid: It is and that's the I think yeah and it's not just like the what's the rest tech you're using or how big is your team or

Leonard Murphy: Well.

Andrew Reid: Whatever it's this I think really good uh good leaders you can feel very quickly and I've been able to you know be around some really smart people and I think picking up off that and seeing what seeing what good looks like is also a really interesting thing is that like is that uh if you don't get

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: A chance to spend a lot of time with knowing what good is or what what excellent ent is then it's hard to model after that. So um when you have and you have this I know because we work with your folks you've got a lot of really A+ talents and um it takes a long time to get there and you know that's a reflection of you and your growth as a leader because a people like to work with a people. They don't want to work with a bunch of C talent or and at ages and stages when you're growing a business you can't always have all A's and so that also is um you know an interesting journey and

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: Just in just how you bring people on on and how you you know upscale that team to be

Leonard Murphy: Well,

Andrew Reid: Better

Leonard Murphy: So that's a good that's an interesting segue. So let's let's get into the stuff that we know we we've been you know when you and I chat we often geek out about and that is the the the impact of technology and particularly AI because I think we can make an argument that you know that AI is at least a B+ employee right and in some ways maybe an A um from a process standpoint right it's got the core skills and you know the things that just stuff that needs to get done it's very good at doing the things that need to get done. But the what I have learned is that that so how I evaluate people traditionally the KPIs or you know is more around process or you got this done right you hit this mark you did did that where that is no longer particularly relevant. So the the way that I am beginning to really evaluate folks is uh you're they're thinking you know, their their ability to synthesize information, to think critically, to be able to envision outcomes, um, and to utilize the appropriate tools to drive the outcome. Um, and so if I'm looking for an A person, it's more focused on that. And there's not as much tolerance for a C person because AI is the great equalizer from a core skill set standpoint.

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: So what what what do you think how are you seeing that happen play out in the

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: Business?

Andrew Reid: The first thing I was thinking about when you were chat when you were we were talking is that you know I think Angus taught um us something at Vision Critical while we were growing when we'd hire new folks. One of the first things you'd say to people is like, "We're how are you how do you deal with change and how how do you feel about change?" And they'd be like, "Well, what are you talking about?" I'd be like, "You know, if we change the plan five times in a year, is that going to drive you crazy? Because we we might change the plan five times in a quarter as we're watching and adapting to what's going on." And for a lot of people,

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: Especially this is you maybe circuit 2012,

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: 2013 or or earlier, um that was hard. And so those folks would have a really tough time. And so one of the things is I think is this you still have to have that mindset of like can you can this person

Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: Pivot and is this person going to be okay when we and and the new pivot is a little bit of like okay what was good four months ago is no longer a baseline. I've just moved it up and I've just changed the goalposts and I'm not changing your compensation.

Leonard Murphy: Yep. Yeah. Yeah.

Andrew Reid: I'm not changing anything. I'm not telling you you need to get rid of people in the team, but I'm telling you that the goalpost just changed and how do I deliver that in a way that gets you excited and make sure I have the right people that um that can adapt that way and and so it's not necessarily like you have to that new employee has to have a technical background or has to have the specific, but it's like are they going to be okay with change? Um, and do they have some centering on on on um on getting things all the way across the line? I would say uh and not having some of this kind of thing that happens sometimes where it's like well I'm

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: A part this is my part and this other person's that part. And so trying to get people to I think take more ownership. And then I guess what I find is that even in the last three weeks, like my expectations of what the marketing team at Rival can do have changed and I haven't even necessarily communicated that fully to the team and I'm still thinking through it, but I am very confident that I have the right a players that are going to be able to help drive that and and implement that. And so it's, you know, I guess I'm trying to trying to link it back to like your the, you know, the the point data point you were making around what is it that you know, what is it that we what kind what are the core characteristics that we want to see uh, you know, in people and and yeah, I think if you have that curiosity um and and and maybe it's playfulness, which is sort of a weird thing to say, but this is like sort of if you want to adapt to this new world that you're in. If you don't have a bit of that play mindset that I'm gonna uh we're going to continue to try new things and this is going to be and that journey of doing that is going to be fun versus that is the painful part I have to go through to get to the goods and the outputs and the 5xing and the 3xing I want to do with this tech. Uh you know that that I think that's something that people don't talk about but if you have that then that's great. I was almost my CMO last night. She was like, "Oh my god, we finally got cloud co-working with for a whole bunch of our folks. Uh it took a while to get our security compliance team on side and now they are on side. We don't have it fully on unlocked, but it's fairly on. And she was just like having her whole moments of like, wow, I it was so exciting. And that was got me so excited because she was excited instead of having that whole, oh my god, I had to spend six hours poking around with this thing to get it to do what I needed it to do. So maybe it's that it's it's this sort of willingness to accept and be okay with change, that kind of curiosity and that play mindset that um that that that people have. And that maybe that's why you and I uh get along and are so excited about what's going on. We we haven't been doctrine by a bunch of post-secondary institutions. Uh maybe there's something that's that's maybe there's something that's positive about that.

Leonard Murphy: Maybe I that's a whole other conversation that that I I would posit that that is probably correct. Um but the uh that that's really interesting and this is critical as

Andrew Reid: Yes.

Leonard Murphy: In this juncture that we are right when we we've built and especially the research industry it's fundamentally a process industry. So the uh it was it was built to be a function right to collect data and deliver data that then someone else goes and does something with it right that was the core

Andrew Reid: Amen.

Leonard Murphy: Of of the uh of the business and that is a process. the technology has continued to uh decrease emphasis on process and uh and I love that idea that you know agility, creativity, um intuition um adaptability while also judgment um and and and critical thinking and domain expertise, right? That those are kind of the core elements for success. Um the or at least I keep telling myself that because I would consider myself a domain expert and it's really all I got going for me. So the uh so if I want to keep on making a living then I got to keep figuring out how to leverage my domain expertise.

Andrew Reid: Yes. Yes. Same here.

Leonard Murphy: Yeah. So it it the how we think about there's all the you know the AI doom uh doom and gloomers out there of you know it's going to take every job. It's going to change every job that fundamentally uh I think even even manual labor right even you know kind of blue collar jobs there's going to be efficiencies and changes that that impact process but I actually can think that we are going to see a boom of entrepreneurs and uh more millionaires minted in the next few years from this unlocking of of process and the decreasing barrier to entry and decreasing friction uh than we've ever seen before in history. Uh and I and I think it's going to depend on those skills that you just mentioned that you know the adaptability and and enthusiasm and all that. Uh what do you think?

Andrew Reid: Yeah, I think No, I think you're No,

Leonard Murphy: Am I am I blow smoke or

Andrew Reid: I think you're totally right. I think there's a bunch of things you just said that are that are uh that are kind of bang on there. We you right now um with how fast AI is moving now. You've got the markets reacting in this crazy way. Um I was chatting with VC. We were mountain biking uh in California a few weeks ago from Question Pro and we and we were when we were chatting I said to him what do you think of what's going on with like valuations of tech companies going to

Leonard Murphy: Okay.

Andrew Reid: Zero his whole things like like you know at Vivx he said bro people need to still buy software like they're still going to want subscriptions it's not like Kellogg is going to magically want to vibe code their whole in insight suite and it was like maybe in 15 years or maybe in 10 years but not for the foreseeable future people are want to have purpose-built tools. They want people with domain expertise driving those tools forward. And so we're sitting in this sort of weird spot right now. I do agree that that that this technology is the great evener and that those that are going to lean in can be rewarded um you know in a way that that is that you know for their for their creativity and for what they're bringing to the table and their skill set. I I don't think that we're going to see everything be erased. I do think some things will. I mean, I was talking to my sister last night. She was talking about the consulting team and, you know, someone wanted to hire um someone to help run data, another person to run data. And Jen's comment, my sister's commentary to me was like, I'm not sure that that sort of style of if you're a researcher at a large firm, um, your play is, okay, well,

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: I send you a tab plan. You write me you you then build a bunch of cross tabs. I look at those and I think, hm, I'd love for those to look, you know, slightly different. You send that back to the DP person. They run that again. They send it to you.

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: If that is the world you're living,

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: You look at yourself and be like, "This doesn't make any sense.

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: Like, I I should be able to just conversationally talk to something. Um, we're obviously we're working on something that solves that um on our side." And that was a great when

Leonard Murphy: 100%.

Andrew Reid: Jennifer said that I was like yeah that's you know that's bang bang on versus saying I think that

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: We you know are you know that we should you know somehow take the knowledge base of some of our top minds on the consulting side and turn that into a computer and have that computer do everything. That's not a world that we're trying to move towards. And I think we're even starting to see some of the hype around

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: Synthetic Wayne a little bit as you see um that you know you're really going to need these two things together. You need to talk to real people and you want to take this you know the corpus of information you have and and

Leonard Murphy: Nice.

Andrew Reid: And use that in a collaborative nature and it's not an if. It's not an or it's an and.

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: And so I do agree. I do think that it's it there's a few areas that that yes, we will be massively disrupted and changed, but a lot of things are going to just get supercharged. We're going to be able to do more. My only my worry is that we are on a bit of a time fuse because AI is so good at complicated and market research rests its sort of laurels on complicated that you know my I don't know if it's worry is the right

Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: Word but that is that are some of these are we going to see more of these insights specific internal groups get deleted and have that cost just moved over somewhere else. I'm not going to necessarily say we don't want to do research. So, it's like I, you know, I'm pivoting the conversation a bit, but I think that's uh that's where I'm thinking through,

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: Okay, well, then how do we guide that? How do we guide those groups and how do we set them up for success? And how do we connect them into the loyalty and CRM teams and uh and product teams in a more meaningful way?

Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: Because you know so many awesome researchers I've met over the years that are like you know you'd be lucky to get a chance to work with that person or have that person on your team you know um and you know I've got I've got you know tons of examples of our current clients so I think that yes yes yes and yes yes you're going to see um uh exciting innovation happen yes you're going to see um like value of wealth creation

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: Happen Yes, you're going to see some areas like some of those repeatable tasks don't make sense and you shouldn't have humans doing them, but a lot of what we do do and we're going to do for the next while is going to need to have uh you know the right senior level kind of brain and skill set on to be able to interface with the client and and our clients all make, you know, pretty big damn big decisions. We're not helping, you know, Bob in the corner store figure out, you know, what to put on the sandwich board on Tuesday afternoon. We're we're helping blue chip brands make big decisions and they want to have security on those decisions and that's why they're paying what they're paying. Otherwise, they'd be using Survey Monkey and, you know, they wouldn't beat half the industry. But there's a reason why, you know, Survey Monkey does very well in their class of what they manage and um, you know, and we're able to work with with these larger

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: Brands.

Leonard Murphy: Agree. Agree. Agree. Yes. Yes. Yes. Uh you the um you know so people ask me you know all the time of okay well this disruption it's like I'm I'm not sure that's exactly the right term. the obviously disruption from the standpoint of wait I have to change you know how I think or do things that's disruptive but uh but I think it's really just kind of realigning um and uh recalibrating the industry the fundamental need of of curating information to drive a business outcome uh that has always been the foundation of what our industry does. So the we built business models I'm sorry now my dog is barking the uh we built business models that were based on the process kind of the cost plus component of that and that is certainly changing but we're also gaining efficiencies now so and that started with DIY started with online right

Andrew Reid: Mhm.

Leonard Murphy: Um and it has just progressed and I think we get to a

Andrew Reid: Mhm.

Leonard Murphy: Pure form of value creation um of not needing to worry so much about the process. Um not mean that methodology is not important. It's not what I mean at all. I think we do have to think about method what what is the right tool to address the business issue 100%. The but fundamentally our task as an industry is shifting towards how do we have the right information to answer the right business question and it doesn't matter who the the client is. who owns that business question to your point is democratizing. But we're really good as an industry of helping a client who doesn't have time, energy, whatever to uh to deal with trying to manage this process to get to that outcome. And that has always been what earns us our seat at the table is delivering on the business outcome.

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: Um anyway,

Andrew Reid: I agree. I No, I I think I think so.

Leonard Murphy: Sorry that was soap boxing.

Andrew Reid: I think at the same time that business owner has the ability to, you know, technology's gotten very good at being able to analyze the past and the wake I leave with my credit card and be able to inform the future on that. We know we can do that. Um, and then you've got guys like like Stan at I Genie that are

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: Saying, "You know what? I I'm let's just study what people are doing online and let's just listen to the conversation and that will be more legitimate than us actually talking to people." Um, as long as those as long as those feeds are magically available, that model works. That I'm not sure if those feeds are going to magically be available.

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: You'll be able to buy Tik Tok uh themes threads the way you can in the future. I don't know. And I think increasingly probably that's going to get turned off.

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: It's shocking how easy it is to go and buy exhaust data from the internet right now. So I I do agree that like that then we that brings us back to you know how

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: Important our area our industry is which then brings us to that point that exciting conversation around like okay well then you better make sure you're talking to a real person and you're not talking to someone that's simulating being a person.

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: Um, I will say I think since the launch of things like OpenClaw and

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: Others, we're seeing more attempted um,

Leonard Murphy: Sure.

Andrew Reid: You know, fraudulent behavior in the last three, four, five weeks than we ever have before. It's

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: Just

Leonard Murphy: The bar entry is so small. Like why wouldn't you just deploy a deploy a bot to go try and earn

Andrew Reid: Well, it wouldn't The first thing you would do is say, "Okay, scour the internet.

Leonard Murphy: Rewards?

Andrew Reid: Go find any single website that's advertising any incentive to do anything and sign up for it. I

Leonard Murphy: Yes. Oh, did you see I'm sorry. I just saw this last week and it's it's it's example of this.

Andrew Reid: Mean.

Leonard Murphy: Some Spotify, some guy in North Carolina started creating AI songs and load them up on Spotify, right? Then he started he created bots to go and listen to those

Andrew Reid: Oh.

Leonard Murphy: Songs.

Andrew Reid: And and rank them and like so he started cruising up the chat charts.

Leonard Murphy: Yes. Yes. So, so he banked like $6 million the from an AI generated song and then he created the bots to go and rank them so he would get paid. Now, he got he got busted and it's fraud, but I was like, well, yes. I mean, there you Well, I know there could there was there's a part of me was like, I gotta give you credit for finding a flaw in the system,

Andrew Reid: That's awesome. Yeah, I mean that's I mean that that's that's a one and done.

Leonard Murphy: Right? I mean, the

Andrew Reid: Now that'll be fixed, but that's a good example of so anything that you can exploit is going to get exploited this way.

Leonard Murphy: Yes.

Andrew Reid: And this is a bit of the challenge in our industry.

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: I don't know. So, so how you know solving for that is interesting. I mean, we because we use like we use telephone numbers for a lot of our reconts and it's, you know, it's it's somewhat harder to spool up a telephone number. At the same time with EIMS, it's getting it's getting a lot easier.

Leonard Murphy: All

Andrew Reid: And all of a sudden, it was like, wow, we're getting a lot of completes from Kazakhstan and Somalia and all these other areas that I don't think we're running projects. And so, um, you know,

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: We're doing a bunch of work to actually just one of the things we're just shutting down specific regions and telling our research teams, hey, if you're running global work, let us know. We'll open those up, but we'll shut those down. And we've got a like a three or four prong strategy um on how we're we're attacking this. Um, it's needs to be attacked on every on every on every angle. I think the company to watch is if you look at WeChat, if you want to be a if you want to be a merchant in WeChat, WeChat sends you in the mail a flag that's like a silkmade custom flag. They then send you an email days later and they tell you to go to a specific location with a specific latitude and longitude and hold up a picture of a newspaper, that flag, and yourself.

Leonard Murphy: Uh yeah,

Andrew Reid: I mean.

Leonard Murphy: I mean there you go,

Andrew Reid: I don't know if that's going to be would you like to join our community and earn $5 a survey here.

Leonard Murphy: Right?

Andrew Reid: Uh, but that it just shows you that prove your human side of like that's that's a lot better than a capture. Um,

Leonard Murphy: Yeah. Yeah.

Andrew Reid: And I when I remember this is like way back in I don't know 2020,

Leonard Murphy: Yeah. We were looking at going on the weed being in the WeChat ecosystem and I was like, "Oh, wow. That's bizarre. I can't believe they made people do that." Now, when I look back at it, I'm like, "That makes a lot of sense." and you know that those guys are ahead of their time and you know that's I think you are going to have to see more and more of that and that you probably are going to if you're a panelist maybe get sent something in the mail that you're going to have to you know show and... Sure.

Andrew Reid: Demonstrate um you know I'm doing a lot of investigation into metadata on um on mobile cameras right now and so I think there's going to be a lot of this uh take a picture of of your shoes right now.

Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: Take a picture of the keyboard in front of you right now.

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: And I and then through metadata, I can figure out what uh what you're doing. I mean, we have a community that's uh has people that have that own horses, one of our clients, and um we had a scenario where you were asked upload a picture of your horse and all a sudden there's AI generated pictures of horses. Well, that wasn't a real person in the community. But that's clever that the bot was already saying, "Hey, let's figure out how to how to get through this." And so, we'll generate some pictures of horses and hopefully they're going to buy into

Leonard Murphy: Yeah. Well, you know,

Andrew Reid: This

Leonard Murphy: There's another side of this though that we're going to have to grapple with. Uh I mean, obviously I I'm the I believe that there is a use case for for synthetic 100%. the um you know there are scenarios and certain aspects where that that's it's one of the tools that should be part of the research workflow uh etc. you know fine but we're also very quickly are going to have to deal with the idea of let's say you know a brand tracker uh or purchase you know the uh as people deploy agents to do those things that is legitimate. So a human can deploy an agent to you know do weekly shopping in his grocery

Andrew Reid: Yeah, this is this is exactly I I I love where you're going with this. I know exactly where you can I'll let you finish your point if you want,

Leonard Murphy: Store.

Andrew Reid: But I think I know exactly where you're going, which is like so if we're living in a world where Lenny has an agent and the agent's making a bunch of decisions for you. It's your personal agent. And when City Bank sends you a survey and you're like,

Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: "Well,

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: My agent already knows what I like, so I just want it to answer. I don't want to answer and or or I'll answer two questions and it'll answer 10 or it'll come to me where it's when it's

Leonard Murphy: Right. Right.

Andrew Reid: Stuck. So, how do I how do I like handshake that with with the survey company and

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: Say I'm legit. I use this thing and make sure because if you don't then there's a whole

Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: Class of consumers that are going to say f you. I'm not going to do this. I I have a whole method. Why would I give you this feedback?

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: This feedback's a gift. you want me to give it to you. Um,

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: And so that is going to be challenging to your earlier point fully aligned that anything super low incidence and super high volume are these fantastic candidates for saying synthetic is a great fit. Those two areas it makes so much sense not for all of research but for components of it. So I'm align

Leonard Murphy: Yeah. Early stage ideation, you know. I mean, I do that every day.

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: I I'm testing hypotheses and ideas. Not necessarily against synthetic, but I'm Yeah. Yes. So the world is changing rapidly and uh and actually I' I've said for years that I think that we're in the golden age of qualitative and I would I would categorize rival I know you do a qu scale right but the the the discussion right the component of things is inherently more of a qualitative

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: Approach um uh because the need to engage with the questions we ask are probably decreasing the volume of questions that we ask are are going to decrease but the importance of the questions that we still need answers to are going to increase overall. So right it's going to be critical for us to engage with humans to fill in well we'll have the who when and how uh a variety of data sources but the why right and to truly understand humans from that standpoint that becomes mission critical. So those increase in strategic value and importance and the role of research is to facilitate getting to that why more so than anything else. Um and the stuff that including why do you have your

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: Agent do this for you,

Andrew Reid: Yeah. No,

Leonard Murphy: Right?

Andrew Reid: I think and I think with your that we have to also respect the fact the consumers evolve

Leonard Murphy: Um.

Andrew Reid: So much more. We're not like the lab rat in the maze and you're the person with the white lab coat on and this oldfashioned or this this this kind of caddyy survey approach to how you think about research. You don't give two Fs about who the participant is.

Leonard Murphy: Right. Right.

Andrew Reid: It's like I want to ask you the same question. My I my best example I always use is the time I went to Disney World with my family and I think it was like TM Marie was going on or a conference was going on. I had this amazing trip. It was one of those like all tens fantastic. I'm on the plane on the way home and the survey comes in. I'm like yes, I'll fill out the survey. And then they start asking me about like food and beverage 17 different ways. And by the time they do it five the fifth different way with a big cascading battery scale

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: Of grid questions um it's like I'm not happy with Disney anymore and that my my my vibe on them was like has changed because of that. So I think the methodologies have to evolve and then we have to just be really I think the more the ones that are win the people that are going to win are the folks that figure out how to be very you know how to be respectful of the participant. Get them locked in to want to give you that feedback in the most genuine way possible and

Leonard Murphy: 100%.

Andrew Reid: And and have some kind of mutual exchange of value ideally right there and then.

Leonard Murphy: Yep.

Andrew Reid: And it's not always monetary to make them feel like they matter and this was a this was a great thing. I think those the folks that do that are the ones that are going to win. Um and we're starting to see more examples of people that are a great job of of gamifying and and finding ways to tap that. And that's um that's one of the exciting things about what's to

Leonard Murphy: Yeah. Yep.

Andrew Reid: Come.

Leonard Murphy: I I agree with you 100%. Preach to the choir. I want to be conscious of your time um as well as listeners because you and I could go uh on and on. the uh uh last so last thing right is is we've had a chance to work together over the past few months uh and I joke about it all the time pretty publicly of like every time I talk to you it's like look I just vibe code this cool thing over the weekend the uh and and you forced me to just out of competitiveness I guess the uh I'm like well I got to do it too.

Andrew Reid: That's good. Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: So what has that been like right in terms of the uh I mean obviously you've always and you know kind of tech- ccentric and and progressive but the uh from an organizational standpoint um you know running a growing growing company and CEO this unlocking of ability to experiment yourself not to wait on a developer or someone to do stuff but you just I have an idea I'm going to test it out oh this is cool give it to the people to implement is what's that been

Andrew Reid: Yeah. So, it's it's it's changing a lot, right? I mean, I think even when you and I when I was talking about, you know,

Leonard Murphy: Okay.

Andrew Reid: Whenever that was that maybe that was last summer where, you know, I was sitting in the backyard having a gin and tonic and I was vibe coding an application in replet to now where what I'm using three different tools that can build it out in a much more sophisticated way, in a much more um um in a much more mission ready way.

Leonard Murphy: Okay.

Andrew Reid: Uh we, you know, it's good and bad. It's good in the fact that, you know, I can have scenarios where I'm unblocking a deal by building a companion app and then I tell the team I sold this deal and I built this companion app and then my VP of engineering looks at me like, great, now I got to take that and harden it and make it work and make it fit in our security and compliance protocols.

Leonard Murphy: Right, right, right,

Andrew Reid: Thanks so much. And so I've caused some headaches for for some people.

Leonard Murphy: Right.

Andrew Reid: Um, but it isn't it is empowering. It's really iterative and um it is is I guess having been fortunate to be around building software for a while, you kind of have a better idea of the kinds of questions to ask. But that that that tooling is just getting so much better. It is scary the things that I can build. that's telling you like last night we were getting on that I I built a tiny little application to help me stop saying um and that will just while I'm on Zoom calls will flash a light while I'm saying um to remind me I'm saying um so I hopefully don't say um as much. Um so you can get into that level of just a little Yes.

Leonard Murphy: Oh, did it just

Andrew Reid: Yes.

Leonard Murphy: Flash?

Andrew Reid: Uh so so there's so there's there's little there's little personal hacks. the bigger enterprise pieces are going to get easier to build and companies like AWS are getting better and better at saying okay we'll figure out all the uh we'll figure out all the security compliance stuff for you so don't worry about that I just wrote an article saying like if you think that you have some moat

Leonard Murphy: Yeah.

Andrew Reid: Uh because of that that's becoming uh an easier thing and something that they're going to solve for really really quickly and have largely in a big way so it's I recommend everyone there's no reason why you I mean you can whether you want to use a cloud code or manis or cursor

Leonard Murphy: Nope.

Andrew Reid: or replet which is getting better like you can go in that thing on a Friday or a Saturday. You could literally do it with your kids or your spouse or your friend and just you know um start thinking about jobs that you have to be done. Take those jobs to be done and then turn that into some prompts and you'll be blown away at the outcome.

Leonard Murphy: Yeah, I could not agree more. The and I'll add my own plug on there. I I I'm a big fan of perplexity um its own model but as well as this it's turned into an orchestrator of models and the uh so for me the the workflow that I'm really

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: Good with is within core perplexity I'll flesh out an idea you know explore do research you know put all those things together etc etc and then go over to computer which is their it's fundamentally clawed the but is the the a I like that is cloud-based so I'm not uh risking my own uh setup um and then start building uh in computers. So I I am finding that exchange and I am a non-technical person. I think we I had mentioned before this like I never liked building models when I was a kid. I liked Legos right because I could just put s*** together and you know do stuff.
  
Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: I hated models because I didn't want to follow directions. So the uh I just wanted the outcome.

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: So this process has been really effective in helping to do that. So I encourage everybody, yes, whatever the tools out there. Uh there's a lot of them. There is very minimal barrier to entry to get out and just start doing

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: Stuff. Yeah,

Andrew Reid: Yeah.

Leonard Murphy: Andrew, uh really really appreciate the time and uh obviously have valued our friendship over the years and and our work relationship as well. Um anything that you want to any final thoughts or advice you want to give to the

Andrew Reid: Uh

Leonard Murphy: Audience especially uh yeah emerging

Andrew Reid: Yeah, I think on the emergency the emerging leader thing is if you work at a firm

Leonard Murphy: Leaders

Andrew Reid: That isn't quite yet embracing AI, don't wait around. I'm not saying get a bunch of shadow IT going, but if you've got some ideas, you know, a lot of times it's that 22 year old or that 27 year old on the team that that is uh that is doing great things. So uh you know, I I'd say make sure you lift your hand up and and and start a club, start a weekly, start something so that you can get that um get that motion moving. And I think you'll be you'll you'll be rewarded. We've we've accelerated some careers of some young people uh on our side incredibly quickly because they really get it and they can really dig in. we're having a conversation and then three days later I'm looking at, you know, a real product or I'm looking at, you know, those ideas fleshed out in a whole different way. Um, the other thing I would say for everybody is if you're an everyday user of like Chat GPT and you've been just doing prompting, um, look up reverse prompting and start thinking about reverse prompting as a way to get much better results. And the whole idea of reser re reverse prompting is like trying to think about who has the expertise in what I'm trying to do. You know on the how are there some like best practices or frameworks I should employ and I should bring in and then the what or these are the jobs I need to get done.
 
Leonard Murphy: Mhm.

Andrew Reid: You'll see a very different delivery system come back to you than what than just putting in a prompt. Um my very last super hack is a website called promptcowboy.ai AI which is I use from time to time which actually creates sophisticated prompts from you just conversationally and then can give you again good outputs. But those are a few ideas.

Leonard Murphy: Sure.

Andrew Reid: It what it's this is a great equalizer. It's like doesn't matter if you're a 40-year vet or if you're in year in month 18 in the industry. It's there's a great opportunity for everyone here to kick ass and take names. I've seen I've been more impressed with stuff I've seen from 70 year olds um also than than sometimes the youngsters because it just depends on you know what your aptitude is for trying new things.

Leonard Murphy: Oh, very cool.

Andrew Reid: Thanks for doing this Lenny.

Leonard Murphy: Very cool. Where can people find you?

Andrew Reid: Oh,

Leonard Murphy: No.

Andrew Reid: People can find me uh yeah my email is Andrewtech.com.

Leonard Murphy: Last thing.

Andrew Reid: Uh you can find me on LinkedIn and um I'm not on other social media so that's the best place. and also read Andrew on X if uh you want to hit me up

Leonard Murphy: Good.

Andrew Reid: There.

Leonard Murphy: Ed. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thank you to our listeners. I hope that you've gotten as much out of this and had as much fun as we did. And uh we'll see you on the next CEO series.

Andrew Reid: Thanks