Marketing research is an essential process you’ll utilize throughout the life of your business. Marketing research can help you answer questions like:
- What is the best go-to market strategy for our brand?
- How can we better reach our target audience?
- What new products are our customers looking for?
- How can we improve our customer experience?
- Which product improvements will drive higher revenues?
To ensure your marketing research answers questions — rather than just creating new ones — you need a plan. Follow these five steps to keep your marketing research on track.
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1. Identify the problem.
The first step in the marketing research process is identifying the problem you’re trying to solve. Put another way, this is the core question you want answered by the time your research is complete. This should be a research problem, not a business problem. That means your problem should focus on answers, not the action steps you’ll take based on those answers (that comes later, in step 5).
For example, instead of asking, “How do we create a marketing campaign to reach demographic X?” (business problem), you might ask, “What types of messaging resonates with demographic X?” or “What marketing campaigns have performed well with demographic X in the past?”
2. Develop your research plan.
Once you’ve landed on your marketing question, your next task is to figure out how to solve it. During this step of the marketing research process, you’ll define your research plan. Namely, what tools will you use to collect, organize, and analyze your research? These may include:
- User interviews
- User surveys
- User testing (A/B testing or heatmaps)
- Spreadsheets
- Secondary research
Also define the details of your research plan. If you conduct user interviews or surveys, how large a sample size will you need? What timeline will you follow, and when can stakeholders expect to see results?
3. Do the research.
At last, it’s time to dig into the research. In this step, you’ll be busy conducting user interviews and surveys and reading up on secondary research.
It can be helpful to start with secondary research and work backwards. You can see what questions have already been asked and answered, which may inform the questions you ask in your own user surveys and interviews — or enable you to avoid re-asking them (saving you time and budget).
4. Analyze your research.
Now you’ve arrived at the hairiest part of marketing research: synthesizing your data and gleaning insights from it. Your main goal here is to find trends and overall patterns. You may consider writing up a research report to share with stakeholders as well. This can include:
- An introduction or summary
- An overview of your research methodology and process
- A discussion of the results
- A conclusion recommending next steps
Remember to stay open-minded throughout this step. It’s totally okay if your original hypothesis was off-base. You sought out to find data to answer your marketing problem, whatever answer it provides.
5. Move forward with the results.
Congratulations! You’ve made it to the best part of the marketing research process. Creating an action plan to move forward with your findings. You may be giving your branding a complete overhaul, or filling a gap in your product line. You may be launching a new channel strategy, or changing your price points. Whatever it is, you’ll be taking action to move your business forward. Does this all sound a bit overwhelming? We get it. Even with just five steps, marketing research is a complex undertaking — and you want to get it right the first time around. For help conceptualizing and executing a successful marketing research plan, contact Your Marketing People. We’ve conducted marketing research that helps our clients improve their brand positioning, reach new customers, and increase sales.
