#132: Putting the Consumer Back in the Room | Ideally Co-Founder & CRO Joshua Nu'u-Steele

About this episode

What if consumers were always in the room when decisions get made?

This week on Soul & Science, Jason Harris talks with Joshua Nu’u-Steele, co-founder and CRO at Ideally, about why traditional market research has become too slow, too expensive, and too disconnected from the pace brands need to move at today. Having built his career at Booking.com and Parkable before co-founding Ideally in 2023, Joshua has been rethinking what makes businesses thrive— and now he's applying that curiosity to research.

Joshua explains how Ideally lets marketers test ideas with real consumers overnight instead of over six weeks, why synthetic audiences fall short for fast-growing organizations, and how speed lets brands push bold ideas past cautious retailers. He also shares his outlook on where research is headed next, and what it means to build a company where the consumer is always in the room.

Key Takeaways

✅ Speed lets brands test ideas early enough to still shape them

✅ Synthetic audiences fall short for fast-growing organizations

✅ Consumers can’t always tell you what they want, but they can tell you what they don’t

✅ Real-time research helps brands push bold ideas forward

✅ Research is shifting from a one-time study to an always-on conversation with consumers

Memorable Moments 💡 “I don’t believe ‘research’ will be a word in five years.”

💡 “Businesses don’t die by starvation; they die of indigestion.”

💡 “Consumers cannot tell you what they want.”

💡 "It's answers that arrive before a decision’s already being made."

💡 “The consumer just happens to be in the room with them.”

Brought to you by Mekanism.