Market Research

Market Research is when you gather information to get an overview of the customer's wants, needs and beliefs. It is done because it is important to know your audience to create a successful product, and it becomes even more essential when the industry becomes more competitive.

It's very important to carry out market research so that you can develop your product/business and make changes that are beneficial to you and your customers. When you think about starting, building, consolidating, diversifying or reducing business activity, you need to be confident that you are making an informed decision so that it works out best for your customers.

Also when you come across a problem in your business, market research can help you determine the problem and also help you figure out how to fix the problem. For example you might find out that you're losing out on profit because of a new competitor or low awareness of the brand.

Primary and Secondary Research

Primary research is new information that is gathered on your own, for example if you were to go out and ask people questions or get people to fill out surveys and questionnaires to answer your questions. This is used because in a way it can be more accurate than secondary research because you can get specific questions you have answered in a questionnaire.

Secondary research is information that you have collected from others, for example if you were to go online or read books about something to find out more about it, then that is secondary research. It is data that you have learnt from the research of other people, and is sometimes used as a way to save time and money.

Primary research can also be split into Qualitative and Quantitative research. Quantitative research is more number based and answers questions like 'how much' whilst Qualitative research is more worded and answers questions like 'why?'.