At Focus Insite, we think about market research recruiting all day, every day. Sometimes we forget that those who don’t work in market research might not understand what market research is and who it helps.
In a nutshell, market research (sometimes called marketing research) is any set of techniques or methodologies used to collect information to gain insights and understanding about a company’s target market. Businesses hire market research firms to conduct studies to help them design better services or products; improve UX designs, position their brand within a competitive landscape, and craft marketing messages that resonate and increase conversion rates.
Why your organization should consider market research
You can’t really understand your users without conducting research. You may have a broad idea of your customers and what they need, but you can’t, and shouldn’t, take their loyalty for granted, or count on it always being there. Qualitative market research studies help your company understand how and why your customers think and behave the way they do with regards to their purchasing decisions. Qualitative studies are an assured way to learn about customers’ motivations, impressions and reasons why they’re drawn to certain brands.
Why does qualitative market research matter?
– Quantitative Research gives you the 30,000 foot view. Qualitative research gives you the close-up view. If you want to understand how many people within a sample population think or behave the way they do, you’d conduct a quantitative study. Dashboards, big data, and surveys are the right tools for telling you what users/customers do at scale, but if you’re wanting to know what they’re thinking and why they behave in certain ways, then a qualitative study is what you’ll need.
– Research always beats suppositions and trends. There are plenty of examples of product launches or new-business ideas that end up in dead-ends. Ideas that fail to gain traction are often the result of assumptions, guesswork, and emotional reasoning. When you spend time with your customers in focus groups or in-depth interviews, you’ll learn about what motivates and compels them and aren’t as likely to get pulled in the wrong direction.
– Market research prevents ‘corporate myopia’. Even ‘A’ teams are susceptible to mis-reading what their customers want. Insiders will never experience a product the way your customers do. It’s easy to become myopic to your service or product and have loads of built-in biases and misconceptions. Market research studies are great ways to learn more about how your customers really use or perceive your product. Features that seem clear to your team might be perplexing or irrelevant to your customer. When you don’t test your assumptions, you run the risk of wasting money, time, and effort. Making changes, or scraping an idea altogether is way more costly than doing the research up front.
Every market research study requires the appropriate and best qualified participants. Focus Insite works closely with market research firms around the world to help recruit the ideal study participants.
