Market Research Tips
Why do you need to do market research?
Have you heard of Irish Mist whiskey liqueur?
If you live in the UK, probably. If you live in Germany, hopefully not! When Irish Mist was launched in Germany the maker couldn’t understand the poor sales. It turned out that “mist” means “manure” in German. Clearly, they hadn’t done their market research.
Of course, not everyone believes that market research is necessary.
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”
Henry Ford
But despite what Henry thought, the starting point for anyone planning to launch a new business, product or service surely has to be that it’s a good thing.
Market research reduces your risk.
It would be disappointing to discover that there’s no market for your product or service. But better to get the bad news on Day 1, when you’ve invested minimal time and money, than Day 101 when you’re already committed.
Different types of market research
Broadly speaking market research can be split into two categories:
Qualitative research is about attitudes, interests and opinions.
It focuses on how people feel, what they think and why they make certain choices. This would be in the form of focus groups and / or one-to-one interviews.
Quantitative research takes the form of structured surveys and questionnaires that aim to provide facts and figures rather than opinions and feelings.
Sample size
When planning your quantitative research it’s important to determine what sample size you need.
Your sample is important as it allows you to make inferences about the population whose opinions or behaviour you care about.
There are complex equations for determining sample size based on the degree of accuracy you require (the greater the accuracy the larger the sample size). But as a rule of thumb aim for 10% of your target population with a minimum sample size of 100 and a maximum of 1,000.
Researching a new name
Before looking at ways to carry out market research, here’s a tip.
If you’re looking to use market research to choose a name, remember to do basic due diligence first.
Always check:
· Has the name been trademarked?
· Is the domain name available?
· If the name is for a new company, has the name already been registered at Companies House?
How to carry out market research
If you have the budget to engage a professional market research company there are many out there.
A good starting point is the Market Research Society’s Research Buyer’s Guide with nearly 400 research suppliers.
If, however, you have no or a very limited budget here are some tips on market research you can carry out for yourself.
Primary vs secondary research
First of all, rather than carrying out your own original market research (primary data), you could look at existing research (secondary data).
Secondary research is industry data that’s already been published by third parties.
For example, Deloitte publishes its annual Global Mobile Consumer Survey .
Let’s say you were launching a new app aimed at silver surfers and wanted to know how many pensioners had access to smartphones. Rather than carrying out your own market research you could review the Deloitte’s survey and discover that smartphone adoption among 65–75 year olds reached 65% in 2017. And that information wouldn’t cost you a penny!
A great source of secondary research is the British Library which has reports from leading publishers such as Mintel.
Generally, secondary data is free or very low cost. However, it will not be customised for your exact requirements which may limit its usefulness.
Carrying out your own qualitative market research
There’s no reason you couldn’t carry out your own qualitative market research through focus groups and one-to-one interviews.
The Citizens Advice Bureau has prepared an excellent guide entitled How to run focus groups which we’d recommend reading.
If you’re still unsure of the exact process our tip is to take part in someone else’s research as a participant.
Market research companies, such as Take Part in Research, are always looking for people for their studies.
Carrying out your own quantitative market research
Equally, there’s no reason you couldn’t carry out your own quantitative market research.
Things to consider when writing a survey / questionnaire:
● Clearly define your objectives and ensure the questions cover them
● Explain the purpose of the survey in the introduction but note that disclosing too much may bias the answers
● Decide the ideal number of questions. It’s good practice to state this at the beginning
● Be sensitive to the length of the questionnaire and how much time you are asking participants to commit
● Ensure questions are well-written, easy to understand, unambiguous and not leading
● Ensure questions are asked in a logical order and flow
● Be aware that prior questions may influence answers to current questions
● Decide if you will reward your participants for taking part
How to find participants?
Hopefully, you already have an existing mailing list. If not, a good starting point would be your existing network of family, friends and current or former colleagues. But you need to be sure that these do represent your target audience.
A good middle ground between family and customers are Facebook groups. There are thousands of these groups for people with particular interests eg, food, dogs, adventure sports etc. Find and join these groups and then post your survey (it’s good practice to ask the Administrator’s permission).
Otherwise there are plenty of companies out there that will provide an audience for you…for a price. For example, Survey Monkey would charge £320 to send 10 questions to 500 people.
Popular Survey Tools
There are a variety of free and paid-for tools available to write your surveys. As you would expect, paid-for versions have more functionality.
Facebook Polls
If you’re only sending out your questionnaire via Facebook then Facebook polls are free and easy. You just need to locate the green polling icon and the rest is very simple.
If you have a Facebook business page you may be able to pay to Boost your post so that it’s distributed more widely than your followers. Prices start from $1 a day. You can choose your selected audience by gender, age, location, interests, demographics and behaviours.
Google forms
Another free option is Google Forms which is highly rated by many people.
Google Forms is step up from Facebook polls and has many great features.
Survey Monkey
Survey Monkey is perhaps the best known of the survey tools.
Paid versions offer more functionality, such as the ability to export data and use your own branding.
Typeform
Typeform is another extremely popular survey tool.
Paid versions offer more functionality such as the use of your own branding.
Conclusion
Market research is essential for any new venture.
However, whilst you can pay professional market research companies to do it on your behalf, there’s no reason you can’t do it yourself. There are many free online tools and guides to help you.
The above is an extract from “A Beginner’s Guide to Market Research”, available to download for free.
Originally published on www.jsixq.com
