Introduction To Market Research

Market Research is a vital part of the marketing mix, as well as being just as important as sales. If you don’t know who your target market is how do you expect to get paying customers? To develop a rich customer profile, you must research the behaviours, demographics, psychographics and geographics of your market.

Behaviours:- attitude, loyalty and buying patterns

Demographics:- Age, Ethnicity, Gender, Education

Psychographics:- Personality, lifestyles, social status

Geographics:- City, Region, Country

Have a look to see what other businesses in your field are doing, see what makes them successful, but don’t just copy them. Take notes of the hashtags they use, how often they post and what sort of content they post and see which ones are most popular. After you have this data from a few different companies see what works best, and implement it into your own campaign.

Looking into where your audience hangs out online is essential, as if you’re focusing on the wrong platforms you’re wasting time and sometimes money. A simple google search can say which sectors use which social media platform, Pew Research have some interesting stats on social media useage.

Not only do you need to know who your competitors are and where your audience hangs out, you should also see who your audience actually is. It’s quite often that your audience isn’t who you think it is. As you begin to understand your audience better, ir will help you market directly to them and keep things relevant.

Once you have an idea of where your audience hangs out, find out what sort of people they follow. Sprout Social is great for this, and you can find other like-minded individuals to connect with. This helps you understand what else your audience is interested in.

Always keep track of mentions and comments, even just a simple Google of your business name can help you get an idea of what customers are saying about you. It’s always good to get informal feedback as many people can’t be bothered to directly say to a company what their comments are, whether good or bad. Address any problems that customers have directly where possible and try to improve your business constantly.

Marketing is a great way to not only get to know your audience, but also understand their problems. Have a look through their profile and see what they’re tweeting about, what problems that you may be able to solve and try to implement that into your business plan.