A guest post by Jason Miller of Zoomerang.
Do you think that “do-it-yourself” market research is impossible on a shoestring budget? Well, think again. Technology is a beautiful thing, especially when it comes to gathering feedback. Online survey and poll tools make it easy and affordable for businesses and organizations to engage with their current customers and find potential new ones.
Here are some quick tips to get you started with your very own market research campaign:
- Monitor trends. Follow influential sites. Search blog directories, such as Technorati and Blog Catalog for influencers. For example, if you are a small business, follow AT&T SmallBusiness InSite, AOL Small Business, Small Business Trends, and Small Biz Daily to stay on top of the latest SMB news and trends.
- Create an objective. Start with a clear objective on why you are conducting the research and what types of decisions you will make as a result.
- Write your questions. Make sure each question is answerable and has a definable objective. If you don’t think you will take action on the information you receive, ask yourself why you should include that question at all.
- Make use of secondary data. This is data that has been collected for a different objective. Look at existing data sources you have, such as customer profiles, purchase patterns, sales data, and customer service calls. You may find the information you are seeking in these reports.
- Begin with current customers. Launch a short and sweet online survey to your existing customer/constituent base. Once you’ve completed this, you can begin to create more complex and broad surveys and send to a larger group of people.
If you have a social media presence, use it like your own built-in research panel. Launching your survey or poll through Twitter and Facebook can offer exceptional insight and often reveal surprising results.
Here are a few tips to help your survey or poll go beyond your initial reach within Twitter:
- Include a short personal message about the survey/poll within the tweet.
- Include an incentive such as “win a gift card,” etc.
- Use popular hashtags related to your survey/poll. Take a look at the third-party site, hashtag.org, to get an idea of popular hashtags used on Twitter.
- Don’t be afraid to Tweet your survey/poll more than once. By simply updating the messaging, you can tweet it again later on that day or over the weekend. Try to send the tweet at peak Twitter times for maximum exposure.
- Use a link-shortening service, such at bit.ly, to shorten your survey/poll link and track the clicks.
- Ask for a retweet from your followers.
- Send a final reminder tweet, such as “survey/poll ends today, results to follow.”
So what are you waiting for? Market research is an essential component to every business strategy. If you do it well, it can help maintain a fruitful relationship with your customers and give you critical insight to make more informed decisions.
Jason Miller is a social media marketing manager at Zoomerang.
Tags: customers, Marketing, Social Media
Another I would add is, to find and talk to influential people with tonnes of experience. Their insights are very valuable.
Hi Dhana,
Great point and nice addition! Thanks for the comment.
Best,
Jason
Some great tips here Jason. I think secondary data is often underutilised by business as a source of good information. I often try to find it first before looking to do any primary research on industries or markets – after all there is no point re-inventing the wheel when it has been done before.
Hi Chris,
Thanks for the comment! Very good point about secondary data, I agree completely.
Best,
Jason
Excellent links to help me get some additional information and traffic to my at http://americascorvette.com as I know there are a lot of Corvette buyers and Corvette restorers looking for things in this niche. I hadn’t given it any thought to some of the other links you provided but thanks.
I’m a strong proponent of market research, but my experience has been that DIY market research is often flawed (technically) and can lead to some really bad decisions. Most small business owners/marketers lead the witness, encourage accommodation, and/or don’t think through how they’ll use the results before they start asking questions.
Market research professionals add a very important contribution to sound decision-making. And, as we all know, bad market research is the most expensive kind. We should be careful about encouraging amateurs to become their own market research consultants. We do them a disservice, and it all but discards our appreciation for the value added by true professionals.
Hi Mixhael,
Thanks for the comment, you have some very valid points indeed. Zoomerang is part of MarketTools, which is a full service market research company, and we do understand how important research professionals can be. We also understand that many SMBs, non-profits, etc. may not have the budget to hire a professional market researcher. In that case we do offer survey tips and best practices on our resources page (http://zoomerang.com/survey-articles/).
Again, thanks for your comment and insights.
All the best,
Jason
While it is true that a novice can’t perform the quality of research as a pro, Zoomerang’s templates make the question design fairly error-proof. Interpretation of results may be a challenge for some. And for secondary research, buddying up with a good business librarian can be a great Work Smarter move that gets you to great findings fast. They know the databases and resources that exist and live to help people leverage good information. Make a friend at the library
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