Understand Market Research Before You Regret
“Fools dare where angels fear to tread!”
Companies and marketing professionals who design new products, create campaigns or launch products and solutions without checking the market are the fools that this cliche talks about. SunTzu too would have agreed with this, had he been a marketer. The market is a fluid thing. To enter into it without preparation is to court disaster, especially in today’s globalised world. And to find out about the market is what market research is all about.
Here are three ways in which market research helps you avoid regretting later:
- Market research steers your business strategy. When it comes to deciding on the company direction, heavy investment is on the line. Market research is the essential validation that assures you that you can move forward. Or, it is the warning bell that signals that you need to go in a different product or marketing direction.
- Market research helps you avoid costly mistakes. If you’re launching a new product, market research can give you the data you need to ensure your product is in the winning 5%. Market research builds credibility. Whether you’re trying to create persuasive marketing collateral, become a thought leader in your industry, or impress your C-Suite, market research arms you with the facts to back up your arguments and claims.
- Market research shows you where to go next. We’ve all heard the phrase “innovate or die.” If your business isn’t adapting to market trends and evolving consumer needs, you’ll likely get left in the dust by your competitors. Market research can diagnose when your brand is starting to get stagnant, help you know which new products/campaigns to launch, and guide you on which markets to enter next.
The five steps show you how to broadly conduct a market research:
- Planning: Define your business questions and research goals, outline your project scope, and document your plan in a research brief.
- Survey design: Structure your market research survey, write good questions, and optimize for data quality. Use survey templates and a pre-launch checklist.
- Fielding: Select your ideal survey respondents, determine the right number of people to survey, find out how to reach them, and time your launch for optimal response rates.
- Analysis: Use best practices for preparing your dataset, interpreting and visualizing your results, analyzing trends over time, and understanding statistical significance.
- Taking action: Learn how to find stories in your data, turn insights into strategic business recommendations, and inspire action from your stakeholders.
About the Author.
Colonel Sunil Prem (Retired) is MD and CEO of Brisk Olive Business Solutions Pvt Ltd, a Business Consultancy and India’s largest field force provider, with a network of 23,000+ ex-soldiers positioned across all 741 districts of India. Their teams include trained, handpicked ex-soldiers employed for tasks at which they excel such as Surveys, Audits, Market Research, Promotions, Trainings, Project Execution, Verifications, Rectifications, Last Mile Connectivity tasks, etc.
