Why Marketing Research Is Important

When you sell a product, you want everyone to buy it.  Unfortunately, we live in the “real world” and you know that every person on Earth will not be interested in your product.  To find exactly who is interested and if the market you are exploring is viable, do a little research.

Market research involves studying the market and your website traffic to determine who your customers are.  You can spend money to market to everyone and find maybe twenty percent of your customer base, or you can do a little market research and concentrate your advertising efforts.  Unless you have a zillion dollars in the bank, I’m betting you are going to opt for the second choice.

So, what kind of knowledge can you gain from doing some market research?

1.  Learn who is interested in your products.  It is nice to think that everyone will be jumping at the chance to buy your wares, but the reality is that not everyone will be your customer.  What you want to determine is what type of person needs or wants your products.  Are they housewives, working professionals, or techno junkies?  Knowing the type will help you find the people.

2.  Learn about the competition.  You might not be the only game in town.  What are your competitors selling?  How are they doing?  You won’t know unless you do some research.  Find out about their marketing strategies, advertising campaigns, past and recent sales, and customers.

3.  What price should you charge?  That is another bit of information you can glean from market research.  Whatever the going rate of a product like yours, you can offer a competitive rate, cost-cutting promotional and other incentives to buy your product.

4.  Improve existing products.  Poll your customers and other visitors to the site.  What do they think of your products? While they may like using them, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for improvement.  Work on building a better mouse trap and gain some more customers.

5.  Improve your marketing strategy.  How do your customers respond to offers?  Some people like virtual coupons to shop online.  Others like to receive referral bonuses because they know a lot of people.  Some are into free giveaways and contests.  Know what interests your customers and improve those services.

You can conduct the research yourself, hire a firm, or pay for someone else’s research.  The bottom line is that market research holds valuable information that can make or break your business.  Without customers you have no business.  Research tools allow you to gain access to information and build a broader customer base.