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Market-research tools are invaluable to business owners and their employees, whether they operate a local store or a large corporation. These tools give businesses the ability to monitor customers' reactions to their products, measure the impact of their marketing decisions and create an open communication loop with their customers. This useful information allows them to make informed decisions on their businesses, such as whether to launch new products or remove product lines and in which marketing activities they should invest the most time and money.
Surveys
Surveys are a commonly used market-research tool used to collect information, ideas and opinions from consumers. They can be distributed in person, by mail or online. When completed in person, respondents generally do not include their names on surveys to preserve anonymity. Surveys questions have a variety of formats, from short answer and multiple choice to true or false. Oftentimes, companies offer incentives like coupons, free products or gift certificates to respondents.
One-on-one Interviews
One-on-one interviews can be held over the phone or through web video conferencing software. A company representative speaks with a customer to get honest feedback about everything from product pricing to product design. One-on-one interviews are an effective research tool for companies looking to get opinions on sensitive topics that respondents may not feel comfortable discussing in a group setting.
Focus Groups
Companies use focus groups to help determine the most effective marketing messages to send to potential customers, select flavors for products, develop pricing, select packaging and even to assist with naming products and services. Focus groups are also formed after a product is released to get feedback from a group of individuals who represent the target market. Focus groups are similar to one-on-one interviews, except that they typically include a group of6 to10 people. Participants are asked a series of questions by a facilitator who moderates the discussion. The information gathered during focus groups is given to key decision makers in a report format and used to help companies solve problems.
Blogs and Social Networks
Blogs and social networks give consumers an opportunity to express their opinions without a survey or interview. Customers are more willing to share their true feelings about brands, products and ideas through these networks, so it's important that businesses use these sites as a tool for market research. Company blogs provide consumers with a way to provide businesses with immediate feedback on the information they post by leaving comments or replying to polls.
Companies can use services such as Technorati and Google Alerts to find out when customers are talking about their brands and what they're saying. Social networks like Twitter offer search features that also allow companies to browse for customers or potential customers that mention their products.
Now a days, the best tools should be used to acquire more reliable results are mostly related the qualities of KNOWLEDGES of the competitors (their technologies, finance markets and power)
Keyword Search
Conduct Online Surveys
Read Blog
Hello Shah Nawaz.It depends upon what (product/industry) is the research about and what one needs to find out from that research.
Sometimes, for certain industries/ fields of work, the the industry leaders, the government and NGOs conduct regular researches and make them available to public. These can be a great resource.Using that as a base research can be narrowed down. This can be done either online, through one-to-one interviews (face to face or by telephone), email questionnaires and/or store audits.
For example if we wanted to find out how are the sales of a certain product are doing in different parts of the country, we could do a stock taking at the start and another at the end of the month in certain key stores in different cities. The difference will give us a very clear idea of number of units sold. This is done when the company (that manufactures or distributes the product) is NOT involved.
Another example is TV Audience Research. In the days of analogue TV the viewership research was done using the Diary Method. In that model a certain percentage of viewers nationally are given diaries and they are asked to note what they were watching and at what times. This was then compiled together at the end of the month.That was later changed by setting up meters (instead of diaries) which would keep a record of all viewership.
However, since the advent of digital TV the landscape has changed completely. ALL of the digital set top boxes are always connect and hence they a) cover every viewer with a set top box and b) it is extremely precise.
