Improve your approach by market research

Any market where the consuming unit is an organization requires different market research techniques or at least a change of emphasis. For one thing the decision making process is often complex with different groups in the organizations involved, each with distant concern. Also the structure of the markets is very different with often a few companies accounting for the product or services. at one time all markets made up of organizations were referred to as.

Determine where ad dollars were effective, and where they were wasted. As an example, I advertise in several local Yellow Pages directories. By tracking which ads drew how many customers, over a period of years, I've been able to drastically increase the return on my investment, because if an ad doesn't work, I don't renew it. If I weren't tracking, I could still be paying every month for several directories that I tried but that didn't produce for me.

Get crucial feedback on new product development—testing titles, packaging, price points, and even whether a market even existed for products I was considering—that has saved me many thousands of dollars I could have spent developing the wrong things. The title and cover of my newest book, Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First, are vastly better than the originals as a direct result of soliciting feedback from many, many people. And the price point, high enough to ensure a decent profit and low enough to sell as an impulse item, was also based on research.

Market research will help you better communicate - Your current customers experiences are a valuable information source, not only will they allow you to gauge how well you currently meet their expectations they can also tell you where you are getting things right and more importantly where you are getting things wrong.

Market research helps you identify opportunities – If you are planning to operate a new service and want to know the preconceived attitudes people have then market research can help, not only in evaluating the potential for a new idea, but also by identify the areas where a marketing message needs to honed.