Market Research company Attest raises $3.1m

On-demand consumer insight platform Attest raises $3.1m to rebuild market research around respondents, and bring new insight powers to any business.

London, UK: Attest, the on-demand customer insights and market research technology startup, has just secured $3.1m of funding to expand their agile insights model into new markets and accelerate product innovation.

Over 80 clients, ranging from M&C Saatchi to Deliveroo, FTSE 100 retailers to global FMCG companies, already use the 20-month-old London-based startup’s platform to discover more about customers, explore ideas and monitor evolving trends in real-time.

The Attest consumer insight platform uniquely builds market research around the interactions and experiences for the real people that respond. This approach helps to reach far more diverse and high-quality audiences on-demand, with unlimited capability to follow-up and iterate ideas in real-time.

Attest’s focus on speed, quality, flexibility and efficiency allows clients to build live custom audiences instantly, to answer any volume of business-critical questions about customers with a high degree of confidence, with results in hours not weeks. Powerful, intuitive analytical tools also make the insightful part of research much easier, empowering anyone to explore data like an expert.

Attest is different because in a world where companies want to use 10x more research, everyone else is trying to do the existing 1x a little bit better, while Attest is making the extra 9x possible.

Jeremy King, CEO of Attest said: “High-quality insight and real data should be at the heart of every good business decision. We want to empower more people with better research, deliver the previously impossible, and breathe new life into how research and insights are used. All organisations strive to be constantly customer-centric and data-driven, they’re just lacking a way to actually do it. Attest exists to help companies and customers to continuously interact and share information, in ways that both sides trust, value and enjoy. We call it agile insights. It’s a very powerful way to run research, delivering rich new insights at the same pace you have ideas.”

“The dark secret of the industry is that most research comes from people that love doing surveys and are happy to do it in traditional ways, or people that have a lot of spare time on their hands. Our entire business is built around diversifying experiences for respondents, to reach busier and more affluent people, in ways that suit them, with many different reasons and methods to participate. It’s a totally new approach to research, and it delivers new types of data with new levels of quality.”

Tony Hunter, COO of Attest said:“Market research isn’t the world’s sexiest industry, but it could be so much more useful and accessible. Attest is making that real. Legacy methods are expensive and static, with projects that can take weeks or months. There’s a new way, and it works far better. There’s lots of people doing great things in quick-and-simple or large network-based research, which is excellent to see, but what’s missing is doing the hard, technical stuff with true agility and quality, in efficient and intuitive ways. That’s what we’re doing at Attest.”

“Businesses need to make decisions quickly and keep up with a fast-shifting consumer environment, but what they can’t do is compromise the quality and integrity of research. This is where Attest fills the gap. Our approach is designed to meet the exacting standards of professional researchers, while also being so intuitive that anyone else can gain the insight they need.”

Oxford Capitaland Episode 1 led the round, also adding a range of new angel investors including London Business School Emeritus Professor of Management and Marketing Paddy Barwise. Attest are using the funding to complete the first full version of their ambitious technical platform, expand their offering to new sectors and use cases, to support and create new research methodologies.

Meri Beckwith from Oxford Capital commented:“Attest gives companies the ability to be truly customer-centric and data-driven. From validating ideas and products, to exploring changing consumer behaviour and real-time trends, Attest allows clients to engage with custom audiences on-demand, to make better decisions every time and avoid wasted research spending.”

“It’s exciting to change an industry with an entirely new approach, which is why we backed Attest”.

Damien Lane from Episode 1 added:“Attest is built to be a seamless, beautiful experience for the respondents supplying insights, as well as for the clients that demand ever-greater insights. We believe it’s this that allows Attest to offer such high-quality, naturally-engaging intelligence on almost anything.”

“It’s highly unusual in the market research industry to combine speed, efficiency and quality, and that’s exactly what Attest have done, now across an ever-increasing range of uses and sectors.”

“They’re really onto something special. Attest gives companies new super powers and a true competitive edge.”

King, who was originally a scientist and founded Attest having seen the need for a new approach to market research while at McKinsey and Harvard Business School, adds:“We bring new agility and depth to the world of research, which gives companies rich insights in hours not weeks, with data that’s ultra-transparent, reliable and easy to explore. It’s what modern companies are telling us they really need. Attest’s new take on market research, building around the respondents who actually supply the research, unlocks access to new groups of real people and delivers far higher-quality data. Even though we’re very new, it works better than we ever imagined. We’re expanding how research is used.”

Attest provides a real-time link between brands and their potential consumers, to bring voice of customer into decisions, and give companies new insight powers. It’s an exciting time for major change in the $43bn global market research industry, and Attest is leading the way in developing the most technical and valuable areas.

King finished:“Our ambition is to become the leading platform for evidence-based decision-making globally. This industry can and should be so much larger. Companies are looking for a place to find all the research and insights they need, ever-expanding agile intelligence you can trust, and that’s exactly what we’re doing at Attest. We want to empower more people with better research, anytime.”

“Companies are looking for a place to find all the research and insights they need, and customers want to feel like they’re being listened to. We want to empower more people with better research, anytime.”