Friday, January 18, 2013

Boom Time In Marketing Research Industry

The market research industry has been booming as more and more businesses seek to evaluate their products before launching them in a competitive market. Performing market research has become an integral part of any company’s product development efforts – and it’s easy to see why. Although it often costs thousands of dollars, a well-developed market research plan will identify potential issues with any product or service well before any additional marketing and sales resources are spent. As such, it can often result in significant savings of both time and money by ensuring that the final product better meets the needs and expectations of the target market.

The purpose of conducting market research is to get answers to key questions that will determine the success or failure of a product: who is the target audience, what do they want, does our product meet their needs, what is the best way to reach our target, what are our competitors doing, and what are the barriers for our target to purchase our product.

Market research can be conducted in a number of different ways, with each format having its unique strengths and weaknesses. Desk research is often the easiest to perform, as it involves nothing more than searching through existing research that has been published online. Questionnaires are the most popular, as they enable a tailored set of questions to be asked to an audience that has been pre-selected to match the company’s target.

The most elaborate, and expensive, form of market research is personal interviews – either one on one or through a focus group. This type of qualitative marketing research is most valuable when the company has a wide range of potential options and creative approaches to the product are needed. They also require the most time and effort to carry out.
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