Marketing Research
Marketing research is a systematic process for identifying marketing opportunities and solving marketing problems, using customer insights derived from the collection and analysis of marketing information. Marketing research identifies the problem to be solved or the opportunity to be explored, as well as the information required to address research questions. It also involves processes for collecting the information, analyzing it, identifying insights, and reporting findings and recommendations to those who will take action based on the results.[3]
Marketing research may cover a full spectrum of topics related to customers, products, and market dynamics, and it can use a variety of research methods (which will be discussed later in this module). In general, marketing research requires some additional information beyond what marketers have at their fingertips (like, say, internal data). Sometimes it is necessary to collect new primary data directly from target audiences, such as current or prospective customers. In other situations, marketing research uses secondary data captured previously by another organization. Marketing research may incorporate internal data and/or competitive intelligence in order to provide a more complete answer to a marketing problem or question.
Common subjects for marketing research include:
- Environmental factors and how they affect consumer behavior. These include factors such as the health of the economy, the legal environment, market trends and other social factors, technology and its influence, and cultural factors that make doing business different in one region or country compared to others.
- Customer attitudes, behaviors, and perceptions. Marketing research can be essential in understanding customer needs, how their needs are or aren’t being met by the market, views about various products and companies, satisfaction levels, preferences for product features and pricing, the consumer decision-making process, and factors that influence it.
- Product research. Product research explores where opportunities and gaps exist for improving existing products or introducing new ones, concept testing, sizing the market for a product, market penetration, prioritizing product features and preferences, testing product effectiveness and customer receptivity, user testing, pricing strategies, product naming and branding, and gauging how to position a product relative to competitors.
- Marketing, advertising, and promotion research. This area of research seeks to improve the effectiveness and reach of marketing activities such as market segmentation, messaging and communications, advertising and media testing, events and sponsorships, packaging and display testing.
- Corporate research. Corporate research investigates corporate reputation and opportunities for strengthening an organization’s position in the market through brand building, research and development, mergers and acquisitions, strategic partnerships, corporate planning and profitability.
Marketing research is usually a wise investment when it’s undertaken to inform decisions involving a significant shift in direction, whether that shift is associated with a product, brand, message, tone, corporate image or other area linked to a major change and related investment. Marketing research projects may be large or small in terms of time, scope, cost, and resources involved. With a simple project, it could take an in-house marketer just a few hours to formulate research questions and analyze a data set from internal or secondary data sources, with no external costs. Complex marketing research projects may take longer than a year to complete and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars paid to research firms that specialize in particular markets or types of research.
As organizations grow, they may employ a marketing research director to oversee and coordinate research activities to ensure that they are getting accurate data and useful results. Smaller organizations without this internal capacity may hire a marketing research company or consultant to conduct the project, lead data collection, provide analysis, and advise on the best methods for interpreting and acting on research findings.