Leeds-based independent marketing services group, Audience Collective has invested £260,000 to support the launch of an innovative insights app.

Driven by Spark Market Research, an agency acquired by Audience Collective in 2020, LifeStars is an ‘always-on’ research app – offering businesses unprecedented access to their customers in a quicker and more cost-effective way than traditional market research methods.

Audience Collective was founded in 2020 and is now home to six specialist agencies. The group has recently strengthened its leadership team to support ambitious growth plans. Having worked with leading household brands, including Kelloggs and Pizza Express, Spark recognised an opportunity to capitalise on rising market demand for quicker research to bring customers closer.

Rob Wescott, CEO of Audience Collective, said:

“This is an extremely exciting milestone for our group and we’re looking forward to rolling out the software."

“From our own research, 80% of senior business decision makers agree that access to quicker market research would improve efficiency."

“Each of our agencies is driven by consumer insight, and with LifeStars we can now offer quick first-party data to our clients. This gives them and us a real competitive edge and will strengthen the work of each agency.”

Founder of Spark Market Research and Managing Director at LifeStars, Justin Healy added:

“We spotted a gap in the market to develop a platform that enables quicker, smarter and more cost-effective market research, which brings brands even closer to their customers."

“With the investment from Audience Collective we are able to deliver a platform that will benefit not only our client base, but other agencies in the group meaning we can deliver even better research solutions for our portfolio of clients.”