What is Market research - How to Do It?

What is market research?

Market research is like your business compass. It's the tool you use to navigate the vast and often unpredictable world of commerce.

At its core, market research is all about understanding your environment – your customers, your competitors, and the ever-changing landscape.

It helps you make informed decisions, identify opportunities, and ultimately, stay ahead in the business game.

Types of market research

What is Primary research?

Primary research is like your personal investigator. It involves collecting data directly from the source, whether from surveys, interviews, or focus groups.

Primary research is all about first-hand information straight from the horse's mouth.

It's time-consuming but incredibly valuable as it's tailored to your specific needs.

What is Secondary research?

Secondary research, on the other hand, is like your research assistant. It involves gathering data that already exists, like reports, articles, and statistics.

It's a quicker way to get insights into market trends, competitors, and customer behaviors without starting from scratch.

Let’s talk about a scenario.

Imagine you're planning to launch a new app in the market. Rather than beginning your research by conducting surveys and interviews, secondary research lets you start with the process quickly with the existing reports.

Report exploration such as consumer preferences in the app industry, articles about emerging technology trends, and access statistics on app market growth.

This wealth of pre-existing information helps you make the right decision and understand the spacing before getting started.

How to do market research?

✅ Understanding your customers

To truly understand your customers, put yourself in their shoes. What problems are they trying to solve? What are their needs and preferences?

A successful business finds a way to serve its customers' desires.

✅ Find out the problem and opportunity

Every problem is an opportunity in disguise.

Market research helps you identify the pain points your target audience faces. By finding solutions to these problems, you're not only helping people but also opening doors for your business.

✅ Interact with the right people

Effective market research requires the right conversations. Interact with your target audience and industry experts. Seek their insights, opinions, and suggestions. They are the key to letting out the facts or an idea of your market.

✅ Make use of the data

Data is gold in today's business world. Collect and organize that systematically. This data will act as your guiding light when making decisions for your business.

✅ Analyze the data

Data alone is not enough. You need to analyze it critically. Look for patterns, trends, and outliers. What do the numbers and feedback tell you about your market?

Is that positive or negative?

If it’s negative, you have got more chances to make it positive.

✅ Know how customers feel about you

You mean - not exactly, you.

See what’s their perception toward the offer you’re ready to bring to the table.

Use market research to gauge how customers perceive your brand. Do they trust you? Are they satisfied? Is something better needed?

Knowing this can help you know the actual circumstances and build a loyal customer base.

✅ Identify how you'll be BETTER

In a competitive business landscape, being better is the goal. Use market research to pinpoint what sets you apart from the competition. What makes your product or service superior? This is your competitive edge.

How market research can impact your business?

1. Customer Segmentation

Market research allows you to divide your audience into segments. By understanding the unique needs of each group, you can tailor your marketing efforts to be more effective.

2. Marketing strategy

With these helpful insights, you can hone your marketing strategies that directly speak with your audience.

Whether it's the right message, the right channel, or the right time, market research guides your marketing decisions.

3. Pricing Strategy

Setting the right price for your product or service can make or break your business.

When doing market research, you get to know which pricing is attractive to the user, and which can be reasonable to charge.

4. Product or service improvement

Market research tells you where your offerings excel and where they fall short.

Use this feedback to tailor your products or services continually. This commitment to improvement can elevate your customer loyalty.

5. Being better than your competitors

Knowing your competitors is half the battle.

Market research provides you with insights into what others in your field are doing. With this data, you get an idea to come up with better strategies.

In the world of business, information is power, and market research is your gateway to that power.

It is merely a process, but doing market research doesn’t assure success.

You need more than that.

They are,

• Your offer must have a certain demand
• You come up with the best pricing to charge
• You leverage the best marketing strategies to create a presence
• Your offer reaches the end users
• They get satisfied
• They recommend
• You have your own raving fans
• And you plan and scale your business

Market research can be a good help in your starting pace. It gives ideas. Leads you to the right path.