Who We Are
Galileo is a psychology-based research and strategy consultancy.
Galileo focuses on what we call “High Consideration” categories – categories in which a lot is at stake emotionally or financially, requiring complex decisions to be made, and sometimes even true behavior-change to occur. Such categories include health care, luxury goods, financial services, automobiles, life and career planning, parenting, philanthropy,
travel and leisure, environmental responsibility and more.
Inspired by the notion that fresh ideas spark at the intersection of disciplines, our combined experience in psychology, marketing, market research and advertising generates a unique and powerful new approach for our clients.
“Time after time, their reports reflect not just what respondents have said but rather what they really mean.”
-Laura Sullivan, Senior Market Planning Manager, Genentech
What We Do
We provide strategic consulting, qualitative & quantitative research that leads to actionable marketing recommendations.
“I cannot recommend Galileo Research too highly. They demonstrate a level of vision, business understanding, insight and analysis that is unfortunately all too rare in the field of qualitative research.”
-Cindy Gallop, entrepreneur, former chair BBH New York
In-Depth Qualitative Exploratory Research
We explore consumers’ emotional and rational needs, motivations and barriers, teasing apart the conscious rationales and subconscious drivers in order to identify the optimal strategies to reach and motivate them.
Marketing Communications Optimization
Expose existing and potential customers to communications concepts – advertising, PR messaging, web site content, etc.
Brand Positioning Research
Explore current perceptions of a brand. Identify opportunities for evolution to better meet needs and expectations.
Strategic Consulting
Re-analysis and integration of existing data, concept and platform development, strategic direction.
Product Innovation
“Blue Sky” product concepts generated by triangulating existing customer experience, key industry experts, and creative professionals.
Quantitative Online Surveys
Quant studies can validate qualitative or academic desk research. Where relevant, we use psychology based models.
Design Optimization
Identify conceptual centers of gravity that arouse the greatest interest, emotional resonance and purchase interest.
Market Analysis
Generating market data to identify key market dynamics: patterns of purchase behavior, the typical acquisition pathway, relationship between purchase and demographic, gifting vs. self-purchase, etc.
Our Difference
Our fascination with the psychological complexities of consumer decision making defines us and sets us apart.
To unravel the complex motivations and barriers to behavior change in “High Consideration” categories, it is first essential to access the “Conscious Rationales” – the stories consumers tell themselves and others to justify their decisions and behavior. The “Conscious Rationale” is like an unreliable eyewitness – a mosaic of sparks of truth, missing information,
and fabrication drawn from expected cultural reference – so it is vital to use techniques that acknowledge its complexity, and that then “unpack” the struggle between individuals’ underlying beliefs and the cultural alibis they generate.
In many more complex or emotional categories we also seek to open a
dialogue with the “Subconscious Drivers” – the beliefs, attitudes and emotions that influence decisions at a deeper level. By interpreting the interplay between the “Conscious Rationales” and the “Subconscious Drivers,” we can identify the rich insights that are the triggers to behavior change.
“In some cases where the stakes are especially high and the truth is too uncomfortable to inhabit, people’s true motivations are beyond the reach of their conscious explanations. In these cases, it is vital to use methods like those of Galileo to open a conversation with the sub-conscious mind.”
-Dr. Nick Baylis, Cambridge University, UK
Achieving Depth
Galileo’s unique 360 -degree psychological immersion approach stems from an understanding of the subjective experience of research participation.
Our methods deconstruct and harness these dynamics, both in front of the mirror and behind it. The four essential dynamics at play in 'High Consideration' research include:
1. Group Dynamics and Pace Management
Double moderation changes the dynamic in the room – it promotes openness and candor, allowing us to push participants beyond palatable scripts to more uncomfortable truths and dissonances. Where relevant, we also use double moderation to turbo-charge the energy and pace in the room, to ignite participant engagement and elicit higher volumes of information.
2. Tunnel of Self-Revelation
We begin every discussion with a non-threatening topic, using methods that absolve individuals of responsibility and build collective ‘ownership’ of emotional revelation. Midway through, more personal topics plumb the depths of the psyche to access profound emotional truths. From there, we draw outwards, closing up the layers with less emotionally ‘threatening’ topics until raw emotions are hidden once again and individual psyches are re-assembled, armor intact.
3. Left brain right brain switch up
We switch back and forth between left-brain discussion, which encourages rational processing, and right-brain thinking (via quick-response exercises and games), in order to nurture creativity and facilitate idea generation.
4. Intersection of conscious Rationales and subconscious drivers
The human subconscious behaves like a 4 or 5-year old child (think id, not ego!). As such, it responds to stories and play. Our techniques are designed to harness the interplay between the conscious and subconscious mind to access the deepest truths. We court the subconscious and coax it into self-revelation by disguising our questions as games. The game-like structures focus the rational mind on the “rules,” allowing subconscious truths to slip out unmediated.
Our Team
The Galileo team combines academic rigor with agency acumen delivered in a highly personable, engaging manner.
Dr. Sarah Fitzharding
Co-Founder & Co-President
Sarah has 17 years of strategic planning and research experience spanning the worlds of academia, non-profit leadership and government, as well as advertising and marketing. Having studied at Cambridge, Harvard and Yale, she has a Ph.D. in psychology and a Masters in Criminology, conducted research for Her Majesty’s Prison Service, and has taught qualitative research methods
Cathy Lennox
Co-Founder & Co-President
Cathy’s impetus to co-found Galileo in 2006 was driven by her fascination with the complexity of consumer decision-making in emotionally complex categories - as well as by her frustration with the lack of psychological depth achieved by traditional market research companies. Since Galileo's inception, Cathy has developed long term partnerships with clients as
“Galileo provides just the kind of insights a company needs to make sound and practical business decisions. In addition to being remarkably thorough and intelligent, they are just plain fun to work with.”
– Susy Korb, Chief Marketing Officer, Harry Winston
Katie Duffy
Research Director
Since joining Galileo, Katie Duffy has immersed herself in untangling the complex decision making processes in the health care, luxury goods, technology, fashion, and beauty categories. With a more recent concentration on health care, Katie has extensive experience executing in depth qualitative target exploratory work and brand positioning projects among patients and physicians for
David Sisson
Research Director
David joined Galileo in 2008, having monitored and tracked sales of luxury goods in the US for over 10 years at J. Walter Thompson. His special area of focus has been gaining a thorough understanding of how consumers make high-consideration purchase decisions. He has a passion for innovation and was awarded the David Ogilvy Award for Excellence in New Product Research for his work
“They passionately strive for new territory. They are lovely people to work with, and will probably make your old insights look like mere observation.”
-Keith Newton, Global Planning, Ogilvy
Arielle Trammel-Fisher
Research Director
Arielle has been a member of the Galileo team since 2008, when her experiences in psychological research and marketing converged to focus on high-end consumer decision-making. She has, most recently, brought this multi-lensed perspective to bear within our health care practice, having conducted many studies within sensitive areas such as rheumatoid arthritis, COPD, female sexual dysfunction and stage 4 cancers.
Crystal Allan
Senior Quantitative Analyst
Crystal brings 30 years of quantitative market research experience to her role as Senior Quantitative Analyst at Galileo. She also is Chief Organizer and Project Director at Galileo, using her extensive research experience to see that all aspects of a project run smoothly from the initial planning and recruitment stages through final analysis and presentation. Before joining the Galileo team, Crystal spent 15 years at J. Walter Thompson
