Market research can be an amazing tool to help you grow your small business.
We’ve talked before about amazing promotional marketing materials every business needs; today let’s talk about how to approach the whole enterprise of market research, and how to use it to create powerful results for your company.
1). Why Should You Do Market Research?
There are some compelling reasons market research is in your best interest as a small business owner. After all, you’re a small business—you don’t need to do market research, right?
Well, here’s the thing: do you like leaving money on the table?
Doing marketing research can help you to design better marketing materials, identify more targeted niches, suggest ideas for new products and services based on pain points, and generally help you minimize your risks and better understand what your customers want and need.
When you think about it like that, failing to do marketing research really is leaving money on the table.
2). Approaching Marketing Research
Okay, so you’ve decided to do marketing research. How will you approach it?
First, you need to understand the difference between primary research, which consists of direct studies of consumers, and secondary research, which is analysis of primary research done by others.
The key questions you’ll want to answer in your research will have to do with figuring out who your customers are – what are their ages, occupations, income, lifestyles, etc.? – and then figuring out what they are buying now.
In addition to who and what, it’s a good idea to dig into why, since this will help you understand what is going on in their heads. Once you’ve reached this stage, you’ll be well-equipped to figure out what will get them to buy from you specifically, rather than some other provider.
Now that we know how to approach market research, let’s look at the major types a little more closely.
3). Common Market Research Areas
A big part of figuring out who is, or should be, buying your product is defining your target market or target audience.
After all, you cannot afford to target everyone, so targeting a specific audience is very much in your best interests.
When you know who your target audience is, you will be able to craft specific messages that they will find appealing. This will also be a much wiser use of your marketing funds, since they will be more likely to buy from you.
Understanding why your customers find your brand, or brands selling a similar product or service, to be appealing will help you with customer acquisition. When you know who and why, you can start pitching your appeals accordingly.
Finally, brand awareness research can help you figure out how well-known your brand is. How many people have heard of you? What are they saying?
Crucially, there are high-quality providers of macroeconomic research who are happy to help you answer many of these important research questions and others besides.
4). Defining A Marketing Challenge
Whenever you do marketing research, you’re going to want to settle on a marketing challenge. What need are you trying to address, and what specific goal do you want to achieve through the research?
When you have a specific goal, your efforts will be much more focused. In some cases, you may find it advantageous to first conduct a qualitative research study to figure out which issues are most pressing for your customers – or you may want to see if anyone else has done one recently on your target market.
Exploratory market surveys like this don’t have to be too daunting: you can host focus groups for them, or conduct interviews by phone or in person. They also don’t have to be long: even a very short survey may be enough to help you start your process.
5). Designing A Good Market Research Instrument
Designing a good market research instrument doesn’t have to be difficult, particularly once you’ve completed the exploratory phase of your research.
Using qualitative research to uncover trends or patterns in that phase can now help you to craft quantitative research instruments that will more precisely address the things you need to know. The most important thing here is to keep the questions tightly focused on your objective.
6). Implementing Your Market Research
Now you’ll need to get your instrument to your target market. Depending on who you’re trying to reach and what resources you have at your disposal, you may want to recruit them online or in person.
For example, older audiences may be less likely to respond to social media or the internet. Direct mail, phone, and personal interview strategies are all more likely to be effective with these audiences.
On the other hand, younger audiences are more likely to respond only to social media or other online surveys.
Conclusion
Market research can provide powerful means to find data to help you grow your business. With the right questions and the will to find the right information, you can gain the insights you need to achieve new levels of success.