Conducting Your Own Market Research

Your customers can guide you to success if you ask the right questions

No matter how small the business, it's important to know your customers, the competition and the marketplace. The American Marketing Association suggests business owners put aside .02 to 1 percent of gross annual sales for market research. Even businesses with virtually nothing to spend can research their market using easily accessible tools available at local libraries, small business development centers and on the Web.

The work can be broken into four areas:

1. Establish your objectives. Analyzing the competition in an area, for example, will require a different approach than introducing a new product or adapting current advertising or marketing strategies.
2. Choose the the research method. Qualitative research relies on subjective information like customer surveys and focus groups. Quantitative builds on existing information like census demographics or industry analysis.
3. Conduct surveys or focus groups.
4. Analyze the information.

Set your objectives

Are you looking to launch a new product or repair a bad public image? You'll need to clarify objectives, create a budget and a timetable for completion.
Small Business Administration's intro to marketing goes through the steps to refine your target and set up your research project. The American Marketing Association covers the same ground with an an emphasis on inexpensive approaches to market research such as providing customers with a feedback form in your store, gathering neighbors to test new products, offering a discount on a product or service in return for an hour of a customer's time for an in-depth interview; or doing a direct mail survey of your customers.

Scope the marketplace

Whether you want to gauge whether your business idea will fly or why a product isn't doing better, it's important to understand your marketplace. Visit your competitions' places of business, if possible, and their Web sites. Check government and trade group information. But stay focused. If you're determining whether there's a market for your consumer product, for example, start by researching local census demographics. But if you're looking at existing competition, you will want census breakdowns that provide businesses by zip code.
FedStats is a good place to start and the SBA Office of Advocacy keeps small business statistics. For a breakdown of businesses by zip code, check out an excellent national database offered by the Missouri Census Data Center or visit the Census Bureau's ZIP business page. For industry information, check Hoovers Online and Bizstats, but only basic information is free.

Survey customers

Surveys give you valuable insight into what consumers want. Keep surveys simple. Ask clear, precise questions and be sure they are not biased or leading.

Hire a pro

If you've got the bucks, marketing firms will package customized research for you.

• The key to finding the right market research is figuring out what you want to know and then methodically gathering the information that will provide the answer.
• Ask for help from small business centers and librarians when initiating a search
• When conducting surveys and focus groups, keep it simple.
• Consider giving a stipend of some sort to those who participate in your surveys.
• Use multiple sources of information when doing your research.

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