Market research is a niche service for many. The biggest companies in the world use it consistently to fuel insights, promotions, and strategy. But for smaller and mid-size companies where budgets are smaller, market research is often thought of as a nice to have, and not a must have.
What is this derived from?
Part of this is driven from a lack of knowledge about the process. What exactly is market research? How does it work? What benefits can it provide my organization? When should I use it? These are all common questions we receive from small and mid-size businesses about the topic. Valid questions too. When they do not have much experience or staff expertise in the subject area, these questions get asked and understandably so.
Our market research company hopes to clarify some of these points for you today. At the very least, we will give you 5 reasons your business should use market research. These reasons are largely dictated by some of the most common ways market research is utilized by companies and organizations around the globe.
Here are 5 reasons your business or organization could use market research.
Reasons 1: To Learn More About Your Customers
This is a given. As a business or organization, you must understand who your customers are, why they buy, why they do not buy, and other key performance indicators (KPIs). A basic market research study with customers will help you understand some of the unknown surrounding your customer base as well as verify some things you already know. Any customer satisfaction survey (CSAT) includes key demographics such as gender, age, household income, etc. These metrics are invaluable for marketing.
Reason 2: To Learn More About Market Needs
If you already have a strong handle on your customers, what about learning from the market or your non-customers. Organizations often use a market research company like Drive Research to put this other half of the puzzle together. Understanding who is not your customer and why is critical to growth. In this type of market research you'll better understand awareness of your brand, perceptions of your brand, and other key metrics. This will help your organization find new customers and hit them with the right message backed by data.
Reason 3: To Measure Performance Over Time
Another common usage case of market research is measuring scores over time. This may include tracking net promoter score (NPS) year-over-year. It may also be an image and awareness study with the market to understand how your marketing campaigns have impacted awareness and perception of your brand in the region. Another area we'll discuss in a moment is measuring employee satisfaction. It's critical to have a measurement tool in place there to understand what is working and what is not. All in all, market research should not be an ad-hoc study. It should be continual and longitudinal. Each new survey or study builds on the former to create a more comprehensive view.
Reason 4: To Launch a New Product or Service
When launching a new product or service, your organization will first want to conduct a feasibility study. The feasibility study is a way of reducing risk and it makes sure your go-to-market strategy is based on facts and evidence. This is often required by organizations from investors or lenders. These investors want to see third-party evidence the new product or service will create demand before offering up a loan to the sponsoring company. The feasibility studies include components like in-depth interviews (IDIs), secondary research on the market, a competitive assessment, and a survey. They predict future success or failure of a concept through an independent lens.
Reason 5: To Learn About Your Culture and Employees
Last but not least is employee research. This can be as basic as an employee survey or Voice of Employee (VoE) study. The assumption is happy employees equal happy customers. With that in mind, organizations should start looking inward to make improvements before looking outward for growth or increasing satisfaction with customers. Employee surveys create a wealth of insights for an organizations but are also often one of the least utilized forms of market research. Companies often fear negative feedback, stirring of the pot, and the inability to make changes employees request. So rather than face those challenges they simply do no employee research which is the most dangerous choice of all.
Contact Our Team
Drive Research is a market research company located in Syracuse, NY. Interested in learning more about our market research services? Email us at [email protected] or call us at 315-303-2040. Or send us a message on our website here.