This article will discover the phenomenon of market research and its role in the enterprise’s success. We will consider methods, collection, market analysis, use of information, and business planning decisions in such a brutal and time-consuming competition.
What is Market Research?
In many new enterprises, owners and managers are closely associated with production activities because they are specialists. Some of them know very little about marketing. For many business owners and managers, marketing is deadlocked. Some of them believe that it is the same as sales.
Your market research is a process of:
- finding potential customers
- customer satisfaction
- customer retention
The Purpose of Marketing
Your main task – customer satisfaction: if the buyer is not satisfied with something – goods, seller, price, delivery, etc., it is insufficient on marketing.
Tiny, market-oriented businesses look at things from the buyer’s point of view. They try to let customers leave pleased because they understand that there will be no growth rate if they do not come to them again. This does not mean that these things require learning academic articles about the principles and methods for your research. Of course, such knowledge is helpful, but the basis of a successful marketing strategy is the following rule: it is better to do simple things and consider the buyer’s happiness as the goal.
Is Your Business Market-Oriented?
What do your customers think of you? Would they say that your company is market-oriented?
Ask yourself:
What do I focus on – the product or the market?
1. When focusing on the first:
- You concentrate on in-house activities.
- You concentrate on producing good products at the lowest possible cost.
- You are looking for someone to sell these products to
2. When focusing on the second:
- You focus on the external activities of the firm.
- You focus on identifying target audience needs.
- You will supply a product that meets the target audience’s needs better than any other alternative.
To conduct market research one needs to determine its structure, gather the answers to the questions and needed resources. It feels like business letter writing – you need to be able to peer into the details which may not be visible initially.
Research Structure
This includes four elements on which you must highlight several decisions. This combination of market analysis elements is determined as the “four P”:
- Product – the production of products and services necessary for consumers.
- Place – the choice of channels and sales methods.
- Promotion – informing consumers about the products and services offered, usually based on gathering information and surveys.
- Price – it is how to find the right pricing strategy.
A vast number of decisions you have to make in research of target market relate to these “four P.” Careful elaboration of these elements is the basis for forming a business plan for the business landscape. Also, you can try SWOT analysis software that uses online data from a focus group or target customers.
Product
It would help if you made the following decisions about goods and services:
- What features should the product have?
- What are the instructions for its use?
- How to pack it?
- Which trademark to use?
- How many models to produce, what sizes, modifications, etc.
It would help if you also thought about why people will buy your product. “Some will be forced to do so by their position in society; others will like the colour; others will be interested in the service life,” – noticed Hannah Swan, an expert writer at papersowl.com who specializes in market research. In many cases, the reasons for the purchase may be illogical.
Place
What are the critical decisions regarding product sales? The list below will give you some idea of what to consider here.
- Do you know the buying habits of your focus groups?
- Do you use the same sales channels as your competitors?
- Do you agree to work with wholesalers and retailers?
- Do you go directly to the consumer?
In any case, at some stage, one will have to decide. Have you thought about the scale of sales you would like to anticipate for your products?
- Do you want to start selling your goods in all possible outlets or only a few?
- What do you think your distributors should do for you? How do you choose them?
- What are the best ways to stimulate the right results?
Promotion
- Do you have buildings with bright, well-made signs that show info about your activities? You can do it according to google analytics or through social media.
- Do the employees of your company make a great professional impression on buyers when talking on the phone, during a personal conversation in the office, etc.?
If all is well with you, you can think about what goals should be set to promote products.
Price
Price is the last part of the market structure. Many consider the price to be the most valuable element. But in some cases, for small businesses, there can be pain points. In some cases, the relative importance of price may increase regardless of the industry.
Decisions made in pricing are not simply the result of determining the cost of production and further increasing the surcharge to obtain the retail price. This method does not take into account two fundamental aspects of pricing:
- Is my offer competitive?
- How much do the buyers want to pay?
It would help if you also thought about how flexible your prices should be.
- Do you want to follow a policy of constant prices?
- Which discount system will you use?
- Do you think prices should play any role in promoting your products, and if so, what?
Conclusion
Price, promotion, and distribution are thus the marketing tools that every company has at its disposal. Conducting market research for business is a unique technique – one should spend a lot of time discovering the above-mentioned elements to come up with their own conclusions.
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