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How to conduct a market research in 7 steps

3 years ago

Market research is the process of gathering information that a company conducts on its
target audience and its reference market using a series of methodologies and tools, which
today are mainly digital.

Market research helps companies achieve a number of important objectives, such as

verifying the success of a business proposal, accurately iterating on an existing
product (especially based on data analysis), and having an accurate understanding of how
the brand is perceived. These objectives make it easy to see why the questions around
“how to do a market research“ are firmly at the top of the list of priorities for marketers
and corporate decision makers.

Digital channels have incomparably larger traffic flows by volume than traditional channels,
and they are also much faster. To keep pace with the speed with which customer habits
change, a marketing strategy (and digital marketing in particular) must be built on a solid
foundation: comprehensive, dynamic, and timely market research.

The question of how to conduct market research is by no means insignificant: it’s

about whether a company can effectively communicate its value and benefit in terms of
increased revenue.
The questions to be asked – which we will try to answer in the course of this post – then
become the following: how to do a market research that produces tangible results?
How many and which steps must a company face to access the knowledge (related to
consumers, purchase behaviors, and the market) it really needs?

How to do a market research: perspectives,

typologies, techniques

Market research – and in particular the data-driven form into which it has evolved – traces
a privileged way of accessing a type of knowledge that is above all operational, a
wealth of information that is increasingly in-depth and articulated, which it is essential to
draw from in order to form rational expectations and to organize business activities. These are
not abstract concepts but solid methodologies that have immediate repercussions on
a company’s economy.

According to GlobeNewswire, the market for market research services is growing rapidly.
From the approximately $75 billion recorded in 2021, this is expected to reach $90 billion in
2025, an annual growth rate of 5%.

The pragmatic nature of market research is all the more evident if we consider that it still
consists of practices that are to some extent artisanal, even today. Such techniques require
interventions in the “real” world. The researcher, in order to gain near certainty, must be able
to establish contact – even if only virtually – with potential consumers in order to create
an estimated profile that is as similar as possible to the real one.

Before describing the process of conducting market research, let’s clarify some concepts and
definitions.

Primary, secondary, and lean market research

Depending on your company’s objectives and the industry you plan to investigate, a market
research study can be primary and secondary, or it can contain elements of both.

Primary research consists of gathering first-hand information about the market and
customers in that market. In this type of research, surveys are conducted by the company
according to internally determined criteria. Primary research is successfully used to
segment the audience and determine buyer personas.
Secondary research consists of all public data and documents that are currently available
(e.g., industry trend reports, market statistics, various types of content, and company sales
data). Secondary research is particularly useful for analyzing competitors.

What differentiates primary and secondary research is the source of the data: in secondary
research, surveys and tests that have already been conducted are evaluated and then
processed according to criteria defined by those conducting the research (not by the company
itself).

Lean market research is not about the nature of the source information, but the way that
the entire research process is carried out.

In fact, lean refers to a methodology, widely used in contemporary marketing, that consists of
implementing a cycle of incremental improvements: starting with data, the research
continues with feedback on the product, which serves as fuel for iteration and validation. Put
another way: lean market research studies the outcomes of early test “explorations”, learns
from the results, and evolves from them without waiting for the conclusion of the process to
express an evaluation (which is therefore always open to updates and corrections).

Market research techniques: prioritize interviews and

surveys
There are a number of techniques for how to do a market research. Each focuses on a
particular aspect of the industry or potential customer, and uses specific tools:

Interviews
Surveys
Focus groups
Product/service usage research
Observation-based research
Buyer personas research
Market segmentation research
Price research
Competitive analysis research
Customer satisfaction and loyalty research
Brand awareness research
Campaign analysis

Of particular importance are surveys and interviews, which are used more frequently
because they provide a close-up and therefore privileged view of the system of considerations
and expectations that a person has on a certain subject. In both cases, this is qualitative
market research:

Surveys ask respondents a short series of questions (open or closed), which are
distributed to the recipient in different ways: through screen sharing – and therefore in real
time – via email or (now more rarely) by phone.
Interviews, on the other hand, consist of “face-to-face” conversations (nowadays, often
via video conference) that serve to go deeper on relevant topics (for example by reading
non-verbal signals). Interviews allow precise insights because, better than other forms of
market research, they can foster the creation of an empathetic relationship between
interviewer and interviewee.

Both surveys and interviews can be administered through interactive digital tools, such as
uploading questions to personalized mini-sites that function as both a repository and a
communication tool, or integrating questions into video content and making them
actionable through forms, radio buttons, and multiple-choice forms. In addition to launching
surveys, these capabilities can capture data and information from video recipients,
preconfigure a product or service, or easily measure a company’s Net Promoter Score (NPS).

How to do a market research: the steps

Now that we have reviewed the main types of market research and the most used techniques,
let’s get to the heart of the matter and find out how to do a market research, step by
step.

1. Define buyer personas

Buyer personas are fictitious, generalized representations of ideal customers. They

are profiles that possess the distinctive characteristics (expected, desired) of the model client
and report the possible recurring actions. Buyer personas attempt to create a daily
narrative that strives to further understand consumers, the challenges they face, and the
decision making processes they employ to choose products and services.

2. Identify a group of personas to engage

Once you have defined the key characteristics of buyers, this information should be used
to identify the group of real people to whom you want to ask questions. If the
selection has been done accurately, this group should constitute a representative sample of
target customers.

3. Prepare questions for participants

The next step is to prepare the questions in a way that maps out a clear, non-
dispersive path. Make sure that you structure the interview in a sequence that will ensure a
progressive depth of understanding, and that you manage your time so that you’re able to ask
all of the important questions.

4. List your main competitors

At this point, prepare a prospectus that lists and describes all major competitors.
Identify the strengths and weaknesses, financial situation, reputation, etc. for each.

5. Summarize your findings

Here, the objective is to develop a summary document where you can organize the
results of the market research. The tool chosen should facilitate clear communication
and sharing of the knowledge acquired with the rest of the team, with project managers,
CMOs, and executives from other departments, etc.

6. Tell a story

Now, it’s a matter of structuring what our market research has highlighted into a
form that is immediately understandable, comprehensive, and interesting.
Holding the attention of stakeholders (for example, department heads or executives who have
not followed the preparation of the market research but are interested in the results) is not a
trivial matter. For this reason, one solution may be to translate the results into a story
and building out their narrative dimension.

7. Choose technologies that automate and simplify data acquisition,

communication, and sharing processes

Even in the case of market research, data is the most valuable resource. In order to
enhance and optimize it, and make it available to subsequent marketing processes (customer
communications, lead generation, and lead nurturing), it’s necessary to respect the integrity
and security of the documents where the data – embedded in the research results – is
recorded. Document management processes make it possible to exploit information
from heterogeneous sources, returning it in the form of output that is suitable for pagination
and communication. In this way, data also comes into play in the creation of valuable
content that can be used within a customer experience strategy.

In order to communicate the results of research, there are solutions available today that
can create a space for an interactive experience. Specifically, we’re talking about
personalized videos and dynamic and responsive micro-websites. These tools
transform communication into conversations that help brands to get to know their customers
better: to be able to offer truly relevant content, design truly useful products and services, and
build solid, long-lasting relationships.

Market research is a decisive element of a marketing

strategy

To sell to consumers you need to know their needs, desires, and expectations.
While this may seem obvious, even today, it’s not. Or at least not completely. For two reasons.

First of all, it describes a more recent reality than we think. Sales communication – and
marketing in general, of which communication is a main lever – has taken a few decades to
shift the point of view from the product to the customer.

Secondly, mass digitization has made a fully customer-centric approach possible. This is
because it was only when the technological and socio-economic conditions matured to the
point where data-driven marketing could be developed that brands were able to
leverage their information assets to design initiatives tailored to increasingly profiled
targets.

The point is that data-driven marketing, although undoubtedly considered a valuable

approach, has struggled to be perceived as accessible in terms of costs and skills to be
acquired. Yet the ability to extract value from large amounts of data is precisely what
allows companies to mediate with the power that consumers have gained over time:

the power to search for the product or service on different channels, juggling the
endless proposals thanks to digital skills that are more and more developed every day;
the power to make purchasing decisions autonomously or thanks to the
support of reliable sources (reviews and referrals) – external to brands.
On the one hand, therefore, new knowledge and tools make it possible to identify, in the
incessant flow of data, useful insights for the decision-making process, and on the other, by
participating more actively in the conversation with the brand, it’s the users-consumers
who offer information on their habits and preferences.

In this context, where the “truth” of the statement from which we started at the beginning of
this section is subject to a sort of diabolical logical cul-de-sac – “I know my customers if I can
sell them my products, but I sell my products only if I know my customers well” – how can we
create an effective marketing strategy? How can we increase the ROI of individual initiatives?

Through market research, marketers not only learn about who their buyers are and how to
recognize their behaviors, they also gain an in-depth understanding of the market where they
compete and the elements that influence purchasing decisions. That’s why market research
provides a great starting point, and that’s why it’s essential to know how to do a market
research and, more importantly, how to do it well.

Categories: Digital Marketing

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