MISLIŠTE Nada Finderle

Guest Nada FinderleHosted by Sandro KraljevićMay 3, 2026

Nada Finderle

About this episode

What you'll hear in this conversation

Nada Finderle has spent over two decades navigating the often-blurred lines between marketing and sales, building a career on understanding what truly drives commercial success. As the owner of Darna and an experienced educator, she's seen firsthand how businesses succeed—or falter—based on their ability to interpret market signals. She doesn't just talk about strategy; she emphasizes the raw data that underpins every effective decision, noting that the biggest power "lies in knowing how to interpret the data and position it within real market circumstances." This conversation cuts through the common misconceptions, revealing how a deep understanding of market research, even publicly available data, is essential for any entrepreneur. You'll leave with a clearer picture of how to align your sales and marketing efforts and what numbers to truly pay attention to.

Insights from the conversation

What to take from this episode

Nada Finderle, with over 20 years in the field, calls her personal preference for working with numbers "untypical for an average marketer." The best marketing isn't just about creative campaigns; it demands a deep fluency in the data that reveals market reality and consumer behavior.

Marketing defines product, distribution, and promotion, while sales ensures concrete market presence and collection, especially in markets like Croatia. Though closely linked, the clarity of who owns pricing versus who owns payment collection is what truly aligns these two functions within an organization.

The power of market research isn't in the data itself, Nada explains, but "in knowing how to interpret it and position it within real market circumstances." Raw numbers are just noise until someone translates them into actionable business intelligence that clarifies trends and consumer shifts.

If your 2019 sales results were unexpectedly good or bad, and you don't know why, "what happened with your consumers that you thought you knew well?" Market research isn't about validating assumptions; it's about diagnosing the underlying shifts in consumer behavior or market dynamics.

High-quality market data is often publicly available, from the State Bureau of Statistics or chambers of commerce to research published by media houses. The most valuable insights don't always demand bespoke studies; they often require simply knowing where to look and investing the time to find them.

It is always the client, or the brand, "who determines what they need from market information," not the research agency. The starting point for any market investigation isn't the available data, but the precise, unanswered questions the business needs to address to move forward.

Data from social media, Google, and search engines is "relatively easy for anyone to collect." Even without a dedicated research budget, the digital traces your audience leaves behind offer immediate, actionable insights into their interests and needs.

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