No matter what you’re selling, your success depends a great deal on the quality of your market research. Knowing your customers is the first step before contemplating a new business, product, or service, creating a business plan or running an advertising campaign for an existing business. What really sets an exceptional business apart is its ability to deliver exactly what people need and want. This takes research every step of the way. In this guide, we’ll be looking at what you need to do in 2019 and beyond to ensure you understand your customers and are meeting their needs.
How Market Research is Evolving
Market research has always been crucial to businesses. Long before the Internet age, business owners, as well as people in market research and consumer insights departments, spent countless hours compiling data about their target markets. In some ways, it’s much easier today as you have faster access to the information you need. At the same time, the age of Big Data has also made things more complicated. Your goal, after all, isn’t to compile statistics but to gain valuable insights into your audience. Here are some of the most important ways that market research is transforming.
More Sources of Data
You no longer have to rely on one or two sources of data. There are now many ways to accumulate data. You still have access to traditional methods such as focus groups and demographic information. You can add methods such as social media listening, online polls and surveys, and, increasingly, by tracking customers online using cookies. Location-based data is another field that’s really expanded in the last few years.
Faster Data
It’s exponentially faster to acquire information today than ever before. This makes a big difference in the quality of market research. Of course, the internet itself made data collection exponentially fast. However, we are now entering an age of fast data where it’s possible to see analytics in real time (or close to that).
The Growth of Mobile
Mobile technology is another factor that’s changing market research. More and more people are browsing and shopping using smartphones and tablets. People carry their mobile devices with them everywhere, giving marketers a useful way to track their movements and behavior. For example, when a customer downloads an app for a business, it’s possible to learn quite a bit about him or her. Businesses are also creating polls and surveys aimed at mobile users.
AI and Voice Search
Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and voice search are also transforming market research. Amazon is probably the best example of a company that’s connecting voice search to market research. Voice assistants actually have the potential to gather more information about consumers than they want to reveal. In fact, many people are worried that Alexa is listening to their conversations to collect data and that it retains data even after it’s been deleted. Privacy concerns aside, voice assistants and voice search technology is providing companies with fast and accurate data about consumer behavior.
Market Research Techniques That Work Today
Here are some of the best market research strategies to use in 2019 and beyond:
Use Short Questionnaires and Surveys
Polls, surveys, and questionnaires have always been a staple of market research. While getting customer feedback using such tools is as valuable as ever, today’s consumers have short attention spans. If you want to maximize your response rates as well as get the most honest answers, it’s best to create short surveys. People are more likely to abandon a survey that takes more than a few minutes. Additionally, boredom may cause them to provide less reliable answers.
Make the Most of Social Listening
Social listening goes beyond marketing from your own Facebook pages and other social media pages. It means looking at the bigger picture and scanning the wider social media landscape for insights. This includes:
- Monitor your own brand name to find out what people are saying about you. Sometimes customers will make public comments that differ from what they say to you directly. Online reviews are a big part of this strategy. However, it also includes more casual mentions on social media sites, discussion forums, and elsewhere.
- Learn about your customers and clients. Knowing your clients is really the whole purpose of doing market research. Social media can help you refine your buyer personas by learning all about your customers. People reveal a great deal by what they post and how they engage on sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
- Track what people are saying about competitors. You can learn what the competition is and isn’t doing well. Take note of which platforms they use the most and provide them with the most engagement. Knowing what customers are saying about your competitors provides you with insights into what you can be doing differently. You can also watch their social media advertising campaigns.
- Keep up with the latest developments in your industry. Social media helps you track the latest trends that are important to your customers and prospects. While news stories and industry journals tell you what’s happening, social media reveals how people feel about what’s happening, which is just as important.
While social media listening isn’t anything new, some of the latest features help you get even more about it. Stories (on Facebook, Instagram, and SnapChat), Facebook Live (and other live streaming platforms), and geolocation (in which you can track exactly where your followers are shopping and visiting in real-time), all help you gather more comprehensive, timely, and accurate data about your audience.
Embrace AI and Other Emerging Technologies
Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), virtual reality (VR), and augmented reality (AR) are transforming many aspects of business, including market research. They provide new ways to engage with your customers and can help make data collection faster and more accurate. AI is already having a disruptive influence on market research. Amazon Web Services recently published an informative paper on How AI Will Reinvent the Market Research Industry. Among the major findings:
- 90% of researchers see AI as having a major impact on the industry. Some of the areas that are expected to have the largest impact include advanced data analysis, text analysis, natural language processing, and automated stats analysis.
- AI’s impact will include many industries, including healthcare, financial services, education, retail and high tech.
- AI will make many market research jobs redundant. This includes jobs such as market research assistant, statistician, research analyst, and data scientist.
- The majority of researchers (93%) see AI as more of an opportunity than a threat for the industry.
- Tasks that AI will take over or help with include data cleaning, programming surveys, and localizing surveys to different countries.
VR and AR also have the ability to change the way market research is conducted. In the healthcare industry, for example, people can test new medical devices and technologies using AR/VR prototypes. These technologies also have the potential to make research more efficient and economical in other industries.
Share Data and Remove Silos
Data silos are a challenging symptom of the digital age. When organizations collect lots of data, it often gets separated into “silos” or different departments. While this is a bigger issue for large organizations, it can afflict midsize businesses as well. At worst, data silos create the proverbial condition where the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing.
Some of the problems associated with data silos include increased costs, data redundancy, and slow or absent communication between individuals and departments. One of the best ways to break down silos is to implement effective automation solutions. The right software can help you centralize data so it’s accessible to everyone. You can also outsource data collection and analysis to a company that already has such automation capabilities in place.
Market Research: Mistakes to Avoid
Some market research changes may require you to acquire new tools and strategies. You may also have to drop or alter techniques that are no longer effective. One thing that never changes, however, is that you have to use reliable methods and discernment when conducting market research. Even with the most advanced tools, it’s easy to fall victim to some common mistakes. Some of the most common market research mistakes are:
Failing to do Adequate Research
Not doing market research (or not doing enough) is the most serious mistake businesses make and it’s a surprisingly common one. This usually comes down to the misconception that they already know who their customers are so they don’t need to do any additional research.
Drawing the Wrong Conclusions
While collecting data is the first step when doing any type of research, what really matters is how you interpret the data. Even accurate information can lead to incorrect assumptions if you’re not careful. This even happens to large companies. A famous example is New Coke, which was one of Coca Cola’s biggest flops. Taste tests revealed that New Coke outperformed the traditional Coke. However, the company failed to consider that its customers embraced the tradition of the old beverage even more than the taste. Hence, no one wanted the new product no matter how good it tasted. The lesson here is that you shouldn’t draw conclusions based on isolated data. You also have to know your customers’ needs, preferences, and values.
Using Questionable Statistics
Not all data is equal. If there are problems with the way data is collected or interpreted, it’s likely that you’ll come to the wrong conclusions. Here are some of the ways you can go wrong with statistics. This includes data you read about, purchase from others, or compile yourself.
- The sample is too small. One of the fundamental rules of statistics is that as sample size increases, the margin of error decreases. While the ideal sample size depends on your needs, you should make sure it’s large enough to yield meaningful results.
- A biased or narrow sample. Polls should be broad and unbiased enough to be meaningful. For example, polls conducted today by telephone are often problematic because they often target landlines. As more and more people switch to cell phones, landline users tend to be older and less representative of the population. Furthermore, calling people at certain times such as working hours means that you’re most likely to reach people who are unemployed or retired.
- Participants are inappropriately incentivized. People are often given rewards to participate in surveys or focus groups. While this doesn’t necessarily cause them to be biased, in certain cases it can skew results. If the reward is related to the product being surveyed, it could cause bias. For example, someone might feel positively disposed towards a food, article of clothing, book, or other items he or she received for free.
- Studies are conducted by someone with a special interest. People are understandably skeptical of studies that are conducted or funded by companies that produce or sell the products they’re testing. A fairly well-known example is pharmaceutical companies funding clinical trials of drugs. While such data might be reliable it still demands extra scrutiny.
Market Research is Always Evolving
It’s crucial for every business to conduct consistent market research. You need to do this at every stage as your customers are always changing along with everything else. It’s equally important to stay current with the latest trends and advancements that are now available. We’ve covered some of the most effective and up-to-date market research methods along with some cautions about what to avoid. It’s also important to identify the tools and methods that work best for your particular business.
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