Planet B-Boy, Culture, and Market Research

When we think of culture, our first instinct is to think geographic, ethnic, religious, or racially.  Culture rarely has a visual delineation. If it does, it takes a trained eye to see it.  To be part of a culture, you must understand the basic ideology that makes the culture unique. You can’t simply take what you know or what you’ve heard and believe you understand it. To understand a cultural movement you have to experience it. On rare occasion, people with genuine interest in a movement take time to document the experience.

Planet B-Boy is a documentary that captures the B-Boy phenomena world wide. B-Boying is commonly known as break dancing. Director, Benson Lee attempts to show you a side of the culture that you may not know about. Lee gives you an opportunity to get closer to the experience. While watching a documentary may bring you closer to the experience, it does not replace first hand experience. But once you have a foundation you’ll be able to put your past and future experiences into correct context.

Understanding culture is one of the most important parts of any marketing effort. There is no substitute for genuine understanding and interest. You can’t fake it. People naturally detect outsiders. How well do you understand the cultures you are selling to?

Market research can learn many lessons from documentary filmmaking. If a documentary does not exist for your target group, make a documentary yourself. It can cost as much as a focus group if you budget yourself correctly. If you don’t have time to make one, hire someone with insider access to create one for you. It doesn’t have to be polished. The point is to collect enough stories to get to the core. If done correctly you will discover the common cultural experiences shared within your market.

* Corporate culture is an entirely different concept. We are talking about a more organic type of culture.

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