LENS™

Magenta's approach to building a deeper bond with your consumers.

Most brands believe they’re speaking their customers’ language. Often, they’re not. The words you choose and the images you use send signals you may never have intended, and your audience reads every one.

LENS is Magenta’s unique approach to closing that gap. It applies academic rigour to real commercial challenges: brand communications, language development, policy, product innovation or research design, and delivers insight that is immediately actionable.

Discourse analysis: surfaces what people can’t articulate. The words they use, their tone, even the small ‘umms’ and ‘aaahs’ reveal what’s really going on. Uncovering this means brands tap into the subconscious, ensuring your language genuinely resonates. We can apply it to any written source, social media, focus group transcripts, brand guidelines, to meet a range of research challenges: developing and testing messaging; auditing language in existing materials; identifying how language differs between audience groups; exploring stigma or sensitivity; and strengthening qualitative research by revealing hidden attitudes and patterns.

Semiotics: in today’s visual world, are your visual cues sending the right messages? Semiotics examines how images, colours, fonts and visual conventions communicate beneath conscious awareness. We map a category’s visual language, from its heritage to its emerging trends, to establish where your brand sits within it, and how to align your brand and products with what target consumers actually want.

Words and images don’t work in isolation. LENS combines both approaches in a fast, cost-effective way, giving you practical insight and quick wins so your communications land exactly as intended.

‘The output from one relatively small study was extremely valuable in understanding how the language used in e-mails is perceived. It provided a real ‘a-ha moment’ for our teams and stakeholders’

Director of Insight, Ancestry

Where LENS is most useful

LENS works wherever there’s a question about how to talk to your consumers and what language they really use when speaking about you and your category.

What clients say

‘With Magenta you get passion, you get challenge that affects thinking. Mix it all together and you realise you’re working with a team that deliver brilliance, seemingly effortlessly.’
Head of Research & Insights, GWR (Great Western Railway)

‘Discourse analysis helps us understand patterns and use ofwords in a way that consumers would not be able to articulate themselves, and provides a real ‘a-ha’ for our teams and stakeholders. It is a real ‘must’ for understanding the language target consumers use - and how our messaging is received and understood. ’
International Head of Insight, Ancestry

‘The impact of Magenta’s LENS approach has been transformative. The insight has fundamentally changed our brand’s visual identity and tone of voice. I now have complete confidence that we’re connecting with our target consumers in a way that truly resonates — a level of certainty I simply didn’t have before.’
Global Brand & Innovation Manager, Essity

Read LENS™ case studies

LENS Finding the right words for The Woodland Trust TRAVEL Elevating a premium dining experience for GWR LENS Decoding hint email language for Ancestry

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