Marketing research in 5 steps

1. Define your objective for the study.

What do you want to know about your customers or your market. The first step in market research is to define your objectives. In other words - what key information do you want to uncover? By defining the objective first, you can stay focused and be effective. For example, you can decide whether to launch a new product or service. The research will show whether the market will accept your new product/service and how much they are willing to pay for it.

2. Your market, your customers and your competitors

Once you have defined the goal, you can develop a series of questions for the market, customers and competitors.

Ex.

Your market:

  • What are the key demographics of your market (age, gender, etc.)?
  • How will your presence affect the market?
  • Does the area you provide for have a stable economy?

3. How do you gather information?

There are two categories of data collection and both are based on questions.

  • Qualitative information: is more exploratory and involves a smaller number of informants (focus groups and in-depth interviews).
  • Quantitative information: used to draw specific conclusions and involving a large number of informants (surveys and questionnaires)

A simple "yes or no" survey can be done on the phone, but to get information about personal choices, preferences on colours etc., a face-to-face meeting is usually required. The most common ways of obtaining data are

  • Questionnaire
  • Telephone surveys
  • Survey on the Internet
  • Personal interviews

It can be a good idea to network with other business owners and share experiences and information.

4. Interpret your data

Keep the goal of the study in mind at all times as you organise and group your data. This will make it easier to draw conclusions from your experiences. 

Tips for organizing data:

  • Identify trends. Use tables, graphs, charts to organize your data
  • Use your market plan to analyse your data and identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT analysis).

One of the most important steps in market research is interpreting your data. What does the survey tell you?

5. Conclude and make decisions

Remember that all conclusions should be drawn in relation to your initial goal and your business goals in general. Review all data collected and make sure there are no gaps. Use data to make decisions about your market efforts.

Do you want a holistic strategy for your marketing?
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