- Today, I'm gonna teach you how to do market research,
AKA how to find out exactly what your customer wants.
If you do this correctly, it'll minimize investment risk,
helping spotting emergent trends,
and identify potential pain points for customers.
Let's get into it.
When it comes to conducting successful market research
according to HubSpot's own market researchers,
there are five steps you need to follow.
One, define your persona.
Personas are fictional generalized representations
of your ideal customers.
Before you jump into solving their problems.
This is what helps you understand who they are.
According to HubSpot's head of market research, Amy Maret,
the best tip when creating a buyer persona
is to put yourself in the shoes of that person,
as much as possible.
- [Amy] You want to understand who they are on a deep level
not just their demographics,
though that can certainly be helpful to know,
but more importantly, how they think,
what they care about, what they struggle with,
and what energizes them.
Then you can more effectively craft experiences, products,
messaging, et cetera, that actually solve their problems,
and resonate with your target customer.
- With a tool like our persona generator
diving deep beyond just demographics is made easy.
Within seven steps you'll cover demographic traits,
what industry they work in, what job they do,
the goals/challenges of that job,
what tools they need to reach those goals,
and their consumption habits.
Where are they gaining the information to perform their job?
With that info, you can start to figure out
what makes them successful,
and what they might need to be worried about.
Use these details to provide solutions
that are catered specifically to them.
Number two, define your research objective.
Always start with your, why.
Ask yourself what the main objective of your research is.
What do you wanna know about your customer,
and let that guide your process.
For example, if your goal is consumer insights,
then you may want to go with more interviews
and customer satisfaction survey research.
If you're looking for something geared more towards
collecting customer reviews after using
your physical product, website, or app,
then you wanna explore usability testing.
In other words, your why will dictate your how.
But even with a clear goal
sometimes misalignment can still take place.
When I asked Amy what her biggest challenge was
when it came to market research,
she said "It was often misalignment between
the resource design and the objectives and needs
of her stakeholders."
- [Amy] I solved this problem
by embedding key touchpoints into my project plans.
Where I get all the stakeholders together
to brainstorm objectives and information needs.
And then I follow it up with a clear plan.
What's in and out of scope for the project,
that we can all align on and point back to
anytime questions come up along the way.
- Number three, research questions.
How did you hear about us?
What features do you like most about our product or service?
Is our product convenient to use?
Whether it's for a focus group, online survey,
or an interview, questions like these serve your purpose
to finding out who your customer is
and what you can immediately solve for them.
According to our own market research analyst Max,
when it comes to preparing those research questions
there are three points you should keep in mind.
The order you ask questions in is very important.
- [Max] Ask the most important questions first.
And remember that previous questions
will always influence answers to later ones.
For example, if you ask
how long a respondent spends on social media every day,
and then follow it up with a question
about how social media affects their mental health.
Having just thought about how they spent
four hours scrolling through TikTok the night before
might bias their answer.
- Test your survey before taking it live,
try to get into the mind frame
of the different personas your survey targets.
Make sure that they're equipped with the knowledge
to answer the questions that you're asking them.
You wouldn't wanna ask someone
who just started in marketing in 2022,
about how marketing changed since COVID began.
- [Max] Read books about sociology, psychology.
Read ethnographies.
These will teach you lessons about human behavior
that you can apply to your survey writing process.
And they'll often reference other research studies
that help you come up with creative questions.
- Lastly, summarize your findings.
After you've run your research, you need to compile
all of that information into an easily digestible form.
We happen to offer a super easy market research kit
that does exactly that.
It comes with focus group and survey templates.
This is where you'll include info
on why you're doing this research,
how you gathered your information,
key findings, and your recommendations.
There you have it, tips and strategies on market research
from our own market researchers.
Remember, market research can help with understanding
your target market, pricing strategies,
and overall strengthens your business.
As always if you like what you heard
and you want to hear more, like, comment, and subscribe
down below to hear more.
'Til next time.
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