Launching a new product is difficult either because a marketing team does not understand its target market or the target market does not understand the product’s benefits or value. This is why market research is essential for marketing success. It uncovers the gap between what’s important to the business and what’s important to the customer. Often, marketers are confused about market research’s value and are unclear on what type of role it plays in marketing and product development.
What is it?
Market research involves the understanding of your potential and existing market; it helps you identify, anticipate, and satisfy customer needs in order to sell more. Market research uses tools such as surveys, interviews, product testing, and focus groups to tap into the minds of customers and potential customers. It also uses internal databases such as sales records, call center data, and inquiry forms to chart past trends. Many products sink because marketers fail to understand customer purchase trends, likes and dislikes, and competitive influence. It is important for marketing to recognize that producing a product, no matter how good, does not mean that people will buy it. Market research helps you understand your target market and guides product development to fulfill customer needs and product appeal.
Identify Customers
Sometimes marketing creates a product with a certain target market in mind without realizing that the market they chose may not actually like, need, or understand the product. It is important to conduct market research to figure out who will use and buy the product. Market research is used to help understand general demographic, psychographic, and lifestyle overviews of your customers so that you know what a customer “looks like.” This allows you to create more effective and targeted marketing campaigns.
Identify and solve problems
Market research is very useful as an evaluation tool to identify problems that marketing is unknowingly facing. If, for example, sales have decreased significantly in the last quarter, something is wrong. Market research discovers if you have new competitors, if the product no longer fulfills customers’ needs, or if overall brand awareness has decreased. Knowing these things will help in designing a targeted marketing campaign to win over customers.
How to conduct the research
If you decide to conduct market research, you need to know what types of questions to ask and tools to use that clearly identify customer points of view. Additionally, analysis using acceptable statistical methods is important to present your findings as accurate. While there are many people who decide to do market research themselves, it is wise to hire a professional. Hiring professionals ensures significant results; not only are they experts asking the right questions to isolate problems, but they are also objective, enabling you to see the perspective of the customer clearly. It is crucial to find a highly reliable and reputable company to conduct your market research to ensure optimal results and concrete answers to critical issues. Having successful market research conducted will benefit your overall marketing and product development, so be sure to take it in to serious consideration.