MARKET RESEARCH

Whether you want to enter the market with a new product, increase the market base of an existing product or give a unique offering to your customers, you need Market Research.

With your target group becoming smarter day by day, and word of mouth becoming stronger through social networks, Market research caa become the one thing which helps you make the right decisions. Market Research provides the right direction such that your customer base is satisfied with you and you get to know which plans and features need to be adopted to retain or expand on the customer base.

So what is Market Research? –  The correct definition of Market research is as follows. “Market research is the systematic collection of information on existing and exponential markets for analysis and subsequent action”. Now to actually understand Market research, you need to understand this statement accurately.

1) Market research is a Systematic collection of information –  Here the key word is systematic. Anyone, even you and me can collect information. But the collection of information is very important and should not be done in a haphazard manner. Imagine yourself, working for days on end to collect a data, and then you find out that the data has not answered 3–4 crucial questions. This is why market research questionnaires are made beforehand. Such that we know which information we have to collect. The information should be useful and to collect it, you need to have a complete system in place which helps you perform the right research and can bring the right results. Thats systematic collection of information.

2) Existing and potential markets –  There are various reasons for carrying out market research. Market research can be connected to existing marketes or potential markets. In an existing market, research can find out the brand equity, brand recall, market potential etc. Market research can also help find out strategies which can be implemented by the company in an existing market.

On the other hand, market research can be used to find a potential market as well as a potential product which the market needs. This is why the top companies have continuous market research activities going on so that they can know where their company is headed and what new potential markets can open up for them.

3) For analysis and subsequent action –  Once you have a systematic collection of data, you need to analyze the same and find out what actions need to be implemented. If your market research shows that the customer is price sensitive, then you may lower the price, or bring a lower priced variant in the market. On the other hand, if brand equity of the product is low, then you need to invest in advertising and brand building activities to increase brand equity and thereby get higher margins.

Thus overall, Market research is a must for a small or large organization. It can pave ways to enter a new market or it can make inroads in an existing and saturated market.