About Us
The principals of Insightful Alliance are leading practitioners in their field. As editors and writers for QRCA’s flagship market research magazine, “Views”, they share their knowledge with others in the industry. They also advise the developers of some of the leading commercial online market research platforms on how to improve functionality and performance. And they each bring a unique point of view as well.
The partners of Insightful Alliance also are leaders in their field, and they extend and complete the research expertise of Insightful Alliance.
Michael Mercier, Principal, Cincinnati
Michael has knowledge and experience in the realms of digital applications, publishing, green marketing, advertising, financial services, healthcare/medical and education. In addition to market research, he has held positions in product management, marketing management, sales and management consulting.
Michael is the Online Qualitative Editor of "Views", the market research magazine. He worked at PCWEEK Magazine, and oversaw the production of digital applications and websites as a publisher in the college textbook industry. He also worked for an education software company, and once produced and hosted an Internet talk radio show about technology and business.
Michael is the Curriculum Director of The Green Dream Foundation, a non-profit group that provides high school and college students with seminars, field trips, internship opportunities and scholarships related to environmental sustainability. He also is on the Speakers Committee of the Digital Hub non-Conference, a digital marketing and advertising conference held annually in Cincinnati.
Michael holds a B.A. in Psychology from Vassar College, an M.B.A. in Marketing from The University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business, and an M.S. in M.I.S. from The University of Cincinnati. He is a member of the Qualitative Research Consultants Association.
He enjoys running, coffee, cooking, and playing with his son Nicholas and daughter Isabelle.
Amy Savin, Principal, Chicago
Amy Savin has spent over twenty years creating successful marketing strategies and plans. Amy helped companies like Kraft and Avon Products to create and re-create brands, new products and new lines of business. After leaving Kraft, Amy was the Chief Marketing Officer of Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Inc. where worked extensively with the electronic trading system. She also honed her strategy skills working in consulting at McKinsey & Co.
Amy has an MBA from Harvard Business School, a B.A. from Yale College, is a RIVA certified Qualitative Research Consultant and has advanced training in online qualitative techniques. Her online work includes discussion boards, ethnographic immersions, social media and focus groups. She has authored several articles about leading edge online market research techniques in magazines including QRCA Views and Quirks.
These days when Amy is not skiing, hiking or reading food magazines she is working as a marketing strategist and qualitative research consultant.
Dennis Devlin, Partner, Cincinnati
Dennis Devlin is a consumer strategist and learning advocate. His founding and leadership of Consumer Clarity utilizes this dual orientation of an unyielding focus on understanding consumers and advocating continuous learning.Dennis is pleased to be associated with Insightful Alliance, which provides him an opportunity to leverage his extensive quantitative research skills and capabilities that are focused on digital and mobile methodologies.
His 25-year professional research career has been committed to deeply understanding what drives consumer behavior, discovering and sharing clear consumer insights and identifying clear marketing strategy that drives clear business results. He accomplishes this objective through consulting with businesses on accelerating consumer understanding, advancing clear strategic decision-making, and leading and facilitating sessions as well as coaching and mentoring in areas of marketing research and consumer insights.
Dennis is passionate about helping businesses succeed through custom marketing research. He possesses broad and deep research industry experience, with significant experience supporting the research needs of companies of all sizes in a variety of industries including publishing, consumer packaged goods, financial services, pharma and health care - to name just a few.
He serves as the Group Leader of the Market Research Shared Interest Group of the Cincinnati Chapter of the American Marketing Association. Additionally, Dennis is an adjunct faculty instructor teaching market research at the University of Cincinnati.
Deborah J. Mayhew, Partner, Boston
Dr. Mayhew is Owner and Principal Consultant of Deborah J. Mayhew & Associates, a consulting firm offering a wide variety usability and interface design services. She is an internationally recognized consultant, teacher and author.Dr. Mayhew has consulted to companies in many diverse industries on the design of products based on a wide range of technology platforms including mainframe computers with “dumb terminals”, GUIs, medical technology, manufacturing equipment, and Web sites and applications. Her clients have included GE Medical, IBM, AT&T, John Hancock Insurance Co., GE, Hewlett-Packard, Ford Motor Co., GTE, American Express, Apple, American Airlines, Texas Instruments, NASA, the National Cancer Institute, the IRS, The New York City Police Department, Computer Sciences Corp. (CSC), Cisco Systems, ITT Hartford, and The New England Insurance Company.
Dr. Mayhew is a frequent instructor in conference tutorial programs, and has taught courses in many large organizations. She has authored or co-authored four books on usability engineering, and has contributed chapters to many other books.
Dr. Mayhew holds a B.A. in Psychology from Brown University, an M.A. in Experimental Psychology from the University of Denver, and a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from Tufts University.
Elisa Hughes, Administrative Support, Minneapolis
Elisa is accomplished in a varied range of skill sets. She is energetic, accurate and experienced at project execution. For twenty years Elisa has been a valuable team player in areas of administration, research, product development and general management.After earning her BA at Scripps College, Elisa worked as an Administrative Assistant at Kraft Foods. She gained great experience in Packaging, Consumer Promotions and Market Research during this time. Elisa left Kraft to join Hughes Design, Inc., a Visual Merchandising company. She also began her own company, Flying Fingers, where she aids in real-time typing, presentation and report formatting, spreadsheet development and secondary research using a wide variety of databases. Elisa enjoys learning and is accomplished at numerous software applications to aid in achieving the task of the day. She thrives on working with others to produce an exceptional end-product.
In her free time, Elisa enjoys reading, hiking, canoeing and relaxing with her husband and three beautiful cats.