Are you interested in finding out if the market is ready for a product or service you’d like to offer? Are you even wondering where and who your target market should be? Market research is a way to do a study and evaluate a variety of things that can help you do a better job of running your business. Here is an outline of how to conduct Market Research:
1. Start by defining your objectives–decide what exactly it is that you’d like to find out or achieve by your efforts. Do you want to find out how well a new product or service will be received? Do you want to find out who is most interested in the products your business produces or distributes? Do you need to find out whether there is capacity and interest in your community to support a specific enterprise? All of these objectives are examples of what can be tested and discovered using market research.
2. Next, collect your early, preliminary data and research–Find out what you need to in order to further clarify your objectives. What do you need to know in order to formulate a plan? The more research and preparation you do at this stage, the more organized your data collection will likely be.
3. Now, design your official approach–this will be the way you plan to collect your official data. Are you going to do a survey through the mail or online? Are you going to put together a focus group or a collection of people to test and query about a product or service? Will it be a specifically chosen group or people or a cross-section from the population at large? Put some thought into what is the most feasible and effective way to gather your research.
4. After all this preparation, you’re ready to collect the data. Try to keep accurate records of the questions you are asking and what is being said. You’ve put all the preparatory work into setting up your research, you’ll want to make sure that the information you gather is meaningful and useful and that you collect the data in such a way that you can actually use it to guide your business choices and growth.
5. Finally, it is time to analyze all of the data you’ve gathered from your research (data could just mean comments and suggestions from people). It is through the analyzation that you will be able to see whether or not you can proceed with your intended product or service, or whether you will need to adjust or tweak your distribution or marketing plan. Gathering the information is one thing, actually using all this market research productively is another!