What does a research analyst do?
A research analyst finds out what is true before the agency decides what to do. They design and run studies: surveys, interviews, focus groups, desk research, social listening, competitor audits, trend reports. They gather data from syndicated sources, industry reports and the brand's own records, interpret it and write it up as findings a strategist, a creative director or a client can act on. On a documentary or a heritage project, research means archives, interviews and fact-checking; on a launch, it means knowing the audience and the category better than the people who live in it.
The role sits under strategy in most agencies, feeding the brand strategist, the content strategist and the creative team. Some analysts specialize in quantitative work, some in qualitative, and the best move between them depending on the question.
Why it matters
Why a research analyst matters
Most creative mistakes are assumptions that nobody checked. The audience the brief describes does not exist; the competitor already owns the position; the trend the client is excited about peaked last year. A research analyst catches these early, when they are cheap. Research also gives the creative team something to be bold about: a real insight about how people behave is a far better starting point than a mood board, and a documentary built on what actually happened is a better film than one built on what everyone remembers.
In practice
How a research analyst works in practice
- 01
The analyst starts with the decision the research needs to inform, and writes the questions that would change it. Then the method: a quick desk study, a survey of a few hundred customers, a dozen depth interviews, an archive dig, or a combination. Sources are weighed for reliability, data is cleaned and the analysis looks for patterns rather than confirmation.
- 02
The output is a short document that leads with the findings and what they mean, with the evidence behind it, presented to the team before the brief is written. On documentary work the analyst builds the timeline, verifies the claims, sources the archive and prepares the interview questions, so that the director arrives knowing the story.
At RIOT
Research analysts at RIOT
Our documentary and heritage work begins in research. The Lew Frankfort "Bag Man" documentary we made for Coach, the Schlumberger film and the Louis Comfort Tiffany jewelry talks we produced for Tiffany & Co. each rest on a history that had to be learned properly before a frame was shot. The same discipline sits behind a brand film: before we write it, we find out what is true.
Watch out
What people get wrong about research analysts
Commissioning research to confirm a decision already made. An analyst asked to prove the client right will usually manage it, and the research will be worth nothing. The other mistake is hiding the analyst behind the strategist. Letting the person who did the interviews present them to the creative team gets more of the insight into the work than a summary slide ever will.
