Learning about the right marketing research process is a vital part of any business. The process involves collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data about the marketplace and customers to determine marketing strategies. This process helps them identify who their target market is, what type of people are interested in the product, how much money should be spent on advertising, make informed decisions about your product or service, and more. It also helps companies determine how well their products are performing in the market, which allows them to modify or improve these products as needed.
It can be challenging, but it doesn’t have to be! However, the problem is, that many businesses don’t have a clear understanding of why it’s so important or what they should be researching.
The marketing research process can be broken down into 5 general steps. These are problem identification, information search, data collection and analysis, decision making, and implementation.
If you want to increase your conversion rates or generate more revenue for your business, then this blog post is a must-read!
Planning the Research Design or Designing the Research Study
Before you start narrowing down the strategies, it is crucial that you plan the research design. This is where you are going to decide about the type of research that needs to be done. You need to take into consideration the resources available, the cost involved in conducting each technique, the time required for collecting information, and finally, whether it will provide accurate results or not.
You should also consider what kind of study will suit your requirements best – experimental, descriptive, correlational? What sample size do you want? Will this survey work on a national level or only locally? These are some questions that would help make your marketing research project successful.
– Experimental Study: An experimental study is all about studying the effect of a certain variable on another. For example, we want to study what happens to sales when we increase or decrease prices?
– Correlational Study: Correlational studies provide information about how two variables are related and do not prove causation. It is important because it helps in identifying patterns that can be used for future purposes.
– Descriptive Study: Finally, descriptive studies involve collecting information about the present situation. For example, if we want to know how many people in a particular locality own cars, then this study would be conducted using a descriptive research technique.
You need to consider all these factors before you start implementing the marketing research process because each has its pros and cons, which can make or break your business!
How to Find Information for Your Marketing Research?
Most people think that the process of market research starts after they have collected all the necessary data through surveys or questionnaires, but this isn’t true! You should start looking for sources even before you start designing the research project. Information is available everywhere. If you want it to be accurate and up-to-date, then searching for data online would work best!
You can find information about your target audience by reading blogs or articles related to their industry – What’s trending? Is there something new that we could introduce in our product/service? Which topics are people most interested in? Where do they hang out (online)? These questions will help determine who your market is. You should also check Facebook groups and LinkedIn communities – what kind of discussions are taking place on these platforms? Who is talking about particular topics more often than others? While doing this research, try staying away from paid advertisements because those may not provide authentic results.
Qualitative and quantitative techniques also come in handy in this regard.
- Qualitative techniques can help you understand your target audience better – their problems, struggles, and what they want.
- Quantitative techniques provide more detailed information about the larger market that will be helpful in preparing a marketing plan to meet its needs.
In addition to this, it is also important that you find out the existing competition for each of your products/services because understanding them gives valuable insights into how well prepared we are as compared to our competitors! This research process helps determine if there’s any gap between consumer expectations and product features (or price). It also provides an insight into other markets like digital platforms or email marketing campaigns where we could promote these products. Finally, analyzing sources related to competitive intelligence would reveal customer preferences within different demographics – age groups, location, income levels, etc.
Finding these sources is an important step in market research because it helps us determine the areas that need improvement and where we stand compared to our competitors! This information will be useful while designing a marketing plan based on product features or price disparities. It also helps us understand how well prepared we are for upcoming changes within our industry, which can have far-reaching consequences if not taken care of! So keep your eyes open at all times during this process, so you don’t miss out on any vital data points.
Data analyzation
After decoding people’s thoughts by analyzing their behavior towards certain product/s using qualitative techniques like focus groups and one-on-one interview sessions with customers, it is now time to collect data through quantitative methods such as surveys, structured interviews, or secondary data.
Once you have the results in front of you, they need to be interpreted and checked for validity/reliability. This is where many research studies fail because only after collecting the information do people realize that it will not provide them with enough insights into their consumers’ minds! So make sure your study design goes all the way through before implementing any strategies; else it will go waste!
Marketing research process isn’t just about finding details about different subtopics but also understanding their effects – positive or negative ones? You should carry out tests before releasing products/services into the market, so you know what’s working and what’s not. For example, if a product has been advertised on Facebook, but it is not generating enough interest from the target audience, then you should make changes before promoting it again!
Finally, once your research is complete, and strategies are implemented – try coming up with creative ways of sharing your results/findings with people who could benefit from them – whether they’re customers or investors looking for good ROI!
Steps Involved in the Marketing Research Process
As said earlier, there are five steps involved in marketing research, they are:
- Identifying and Defining the Problem
- Designing and Developing the Marketing Research Process Plan
- Gathering problem-specific Data
- Interpreting Research Data,
- Taking Actions and Solving Problems
Identifying and Defining the Problem
The first thing you need to do is identify and define the problem(s). That is, what exactly do you want to find out about your customers? And if the problem is not clear, then it’s time to dig deeper and figure out what information you need. For example, let’s say that your business offers organic baby food, but according to research studies conducted – people are hesitant to buy them because they’re too expensive!
As a result of this finding, the organization decides on changing its advertising strategy so as to promote these products more aggressively since there seems like an unmet demand for them within specific demographics (age groups, etc.)
So based on this scenario – here we have identified the problem(s) which can be restated as: “People aren’t willing/interested in buying our baby food because of its price!”
It is not always necessary that the problem revolves around the customer. Sometimes, companies are the ones who need to be convinced about their own products because they might not understand how well it is performing or what changes can make them more successful.
Designing and Developing the Marketing Research Plan
After identifying the problem(s), you should come up with a marketing research process plan. This includes deciding on what type of data would be required to solve the problem, how it will be collected and analyzed, etc.
For example, if your business wants to sell organic baby food then they need to know who their customers are so that they can target them more effectively through advertisements or promotional campaigns! So, in this case, detailed profiling information about these people is necessary for generating better insights into their behavior patterns, which could help improve sales figures over time!
The next step involves breaking down large objectives into smaller goals that are easy to implement/accomplish within set deadlines. For example, in the previous scenario – if you’re trying to sell organic baby food, then your goal could be “to increase sales by 20%” before a certain date.
Gathering problem-specific Data
After identifying and listing down the goals, you need to come up with a way of gathering data that is relevant to your research objectives. For example, if your goal was “increasing organic baby food sales by 20%,” then it could be helpful for advertising managers to identify subgroups within their target audience who are more likely/unlikely to buy these products!
This involves generating statistical information about specific customer groups (age brackets etc.) based on past records or collected field data. The data helps owners make better decisions in terms of product development as well as for deciding where best to advertise them.
Here, reviewing competitors’ advertising strategies could also provide you with additional insights into the problem areas, customer demographics, and purchasing patterns. This might help business owners get a more complete picture of how they are dealing with problems and performing in comparison to other companies within the same industry!
However, collecting data can be time-consuming and expensive therefore it’s important to plan earlier on.
Interpreting Research Data
You need to come up with a clear interpretation of your research findings. This involves carefully reading through all research reports and making sense of the trends and patterns that are revealed within them!
This can involve identifying how customers responded/reacted to certain promotional campaigns or advertisements before drawing any conclusions. In fact, the collected data could reveal that people from specific age groups buy organic baby food more frequently as opposed to others. This information can help business owners plan their promotional campaigns accordingly. It also suggests better product development initiatives in terms of new flavors or packaging options for these products!
Taking Actions and Solving Problems
In some cases, you might want to outsource your marketing ventures to a third-party specialist like Socialays. By engaging the services of a social media assistant like Socialays, you can take advantage of their knowledge and expertise to help solve challenges within your marketing ventures!
For instance, Socialays is known for its data-driven approach to social media campaigns and is a great addition to your marketing research process plan. This means that they are able to generate high-quality results by using real customer insights gathered with the help of artificial intelligence.
In other scenarios, it could involve working closely with existing staff members. They are more aware of what needs improving within their current roles/responsibilities! The business owner just needs to engage more customers within social media platforms or even offline channels!
Getting To Know Socialays: The Features
Socialays can be highly beneficial for businesses of today. This artificial intelligence or AI-based social media assistant comes with many features. Please check below!
1. Sentiment Investigation
The AI of Socialays will help you understand comments and assist in replying back to the comment. It will read all the messages and comments within seconds and also:
- ‘Sentiment Analyzes’ – auto-categorized under neutral, negative, and positive polarity with the most-highest accuracy in the market.
- ‘Emotion Analyzes’ within 9 different categories, such as surprise, relief, happiness, hate, neutral, sadness, love, worry, and fun.
- It will also detect all the questions and ad or spam content.
2. Get Instantaneous AI Reactions
People cannot react or analyze all their social media comments when they are driving their vehicle or sleeping. This is where Socialays comes as it will get the work on behalf of you. It will auto-hide all the hate speech along with profanity in real-time, auto-hide all the advertisements or spam content, and block all the followers who are using profanity and hate speech.
3. Receive Notification Real-Time
This AI-based assistant can easily identify all the social problems and alert you immediately based on custom settings. You will also:
- receive instant notification for hate speech
- get to track down all your mentions
- receive alerts for ad/spam comments along with profanity
- never get to miss out on crucial questions
- listen well to all your followers
4. Completely Augmented Interface
When compared with various other difficult-to-use and complicated social media management systems, Socialays will offer you a straightforward, easy-to-use, and clean dashboard. You can easily filter and list down all your mentions, comments, and posts by:
- Deleted/Hidden Comments.
- Explicit Time Period.
- Emotion Filter.
- Comments with Ad or Spam Content.
- Comments that contain inquiries or questions.
You will also get to track down all your:
- negative/positive commenting followers
- liked the post
- comment followers
- negative or positive commented post
5. The Customization
Dealing with plenty of notifications and checking them out at the same time is not easy work. It provides adjustable settings that are completely optimized for your commented account and requirements. The things that you can adjust on Socialays are:
- Setting up the auto-hiding option for all the hate speech comments
- Auto-block settings
- Notification settings
- Report Type along with period [Monthly, Weekly, and Daily].
6. Easy Follow-Ups For Who Mentions You
One of the unique features of Socialays is that users can get notifications whenever they’re mentioned as well as when a negative comment is made. You can filter up your mentions by Spam, Positive, Neutral, Question, and Negative categories.
7. Smart, Robust and Powerful Search Engine
When you wish to search for a follower or a phrase across all your social media account, Socialays got your back for it. It has a universal search option that will allow you to search across all your social media accounts without any hassle. Normally, this is not possible, but Socialays makes it possible for you. The search result comes in a semantically ranked list. This keeps all the hierarchical links like the post-comments so that you can navigate easily.
Conclusion
Remember that there are different steps in the marketing research process and it is important to take this into consideration. This will help you achieve your goals or plans ahead of the specified time.
It’s important that you don’t jump into any decisions without having a clear understanding of these changes.
