At Susan Bell Research, our aim is to integrate evidence-based semiotic techniques into qualitative and sensory projects to generate insights which our clients can use and understand.
For too long, semiotics has been an research off-cut - set apart from mainstream consumer research. Semiotics teaches us how culture influences our thinking, so it should be part of the fabric of research, not an off-cut.
Insights from culture
Semiotics is about culture and its effect on people. When used in combination with other qual research methods, semiotics reveals:
- The important and emergent ideas in a sub-culture - which people may take for granted
- How your customer / consumer reads your packaging, your brochures and your ads
- How people use products and brands to reinforce their sense of identity and belonging
- How packaging conveys sensory cues, through cultural codes
- and more.....
Semiotics is a research technique
We conduct semiotics as part of qualitative research projects.
Our semiotics is different from the brand-based semiotics which originally developed in the UK, though of course there are many similarities. This is because:
- Sue is linguistics-trained, and so brings linguistic and communication theories to her work
- We are researchers, first and foremost
- We have based on our work directly on Umberto Eco's semiotic theory, and on the Social Semiotics school of Theo van Leeuwen.
Ask us for a demonstration!
