Market research helps to identify and define business and marketing opportunities and problems, and is often useful in completing a business or marketing plan or in validating a marketing strategy option. This ensures that your marketing—from identifying ideal customer profiles and setting your price and product/service mix, through to deciding your promotional activities—attracts the most customers possible.

Why conduct research?

What do your current customers really think about you and, more importantly, what can they tell you to make your business better? What about your competitors—what can you learn from them to improve your processes?

Don’t play a guessing game! Research is an effective tool to solidify appropriate marketing messages, ensure target markets are clearly defined and that you are reaching your desired customer-base. Market research is an organised effort to gather information about markets or customers and it is an important component of your business and marketing strategy. Research should be included as a regular activity to determine trends or changes in your customers’ needs, and it is vital if you are about to launch a new product or service to the market.

Types of research

Market information: Researches the prices of the different commodities in the market and the supply and demand situation.

Market segmentation: Market segmentation is the division of the market or population into subgroups with similar motivations. It’s widely used for segmentation based on geography, personality, demographics, technographics, use of the product, and psychographic and gender differences.

Market trends: This defines the upward or downward movements of a market over a period of time. The market size is more difficult to estimate if you are starting with something completely new. In this case, the figures can be derived from the number of potential customers or customer segments.

Besides information about the target market, market research can be used to measure marketing effectiveness in terms of:

Competitors: Competitive marketing information is hard to come by in many industries. Market research is a useful tool to benchmark performance and success against competitive elements.

Customers: Understanding and taking advantage of how customers make purchasing decisions can help improve marketing effectiveness. Groups of consumers act in similar ways leading to the need to segment them. Based on these segments, they make choices based on how they value the attributes of a product and the brand.

A few techniques are:

► Customer analysis

► Choice modelling

► Competitor analysis

► Risk analysis

► Product research

► Advertising the research

► Marketing mix modelling

What we will manage

The key to market research success is a systematic and top-down approach. Our structured approach to market research is based on the following:

► Problem definition: We clearly and accurately define what we are to determine. Example definitions include: What is the size of the market of [xxx] services in Queensland? How many other businesses are selling what I'm selling? How many of my previous customers are unhappy? What are they unhappy about? Why are previous customers not shopping with me anymore?

► Initial investigation: We determine a clear definition of the problem and where we may be able to gain information and answers. We may examine published data such as journals, magazines and government reports such as from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, or we may talk with people who have some experience with the problem. At this stage we will identify whether information is readily available or whether we will need to conduct our own research to gather the information.

► Research planning: We carefully plan how we shall gather the data. Techniques which we commonly employ include surveys; market measurements such as market share, size and growth; motivation research—customer purchasing motivation; and sales forecasting—or how often people buy and when. Most commonly-used market research methods are based on asking questions. Understanding buyers' attitudes and beliefs often involves focus groups and in-depth interviews. Surveys and questionnaires are used to obtain quantitative information to draw specific conclusions.

► Information gathering: The optimal technique depends upon the type of enquiry and the depth of information required. A simple yes or no question can be done on the phone, however personal choices such as colour preferences will need to be face-to-face. Other information-gathering techniques include telephone polling, mailed questionnaires and personal interviews. For surveys and keyword research we use inexpensive online services.

► Data interpretation: We interpret the research findings by organising the gathered information or data according to the problem we are trying to solve.

► Conclusion and presentation of data

Investment

The cost of a research project will depend on the size and complexity of the required questionnaire and analysis, the number of complete responses sought and the means by which the research is carried out.

Contact us on 07 3394 8247 or complete our enquiry form to find out how we can assist your research project.