At its base level, marketing research assists you in understanding your market. The adage that knowledge is power is never truer than when it comes to making a market-driven business decision. This, however, is a simplistic answer to a complex discussion. Marketing research will assist you in making business decisions that are based on factual data about your marketplace.

Marketing research employs a broad spectrum of techniques designed to answer the questions that every business faces. Examples of questions you might be faced with and the types of marketing research that can help you answer those questions:

• How do I attract more customers? (Market Segmentation, Attitude and Awareness, Market Positioning, Advertising Tracking)
• How do I make my current customers better customers (i.e. more frequent, more profitable, more loyal)? (Customer Satisfaction/Experience Research)
• What will happen when I introduce a new product or service, or change my current product or service mix? (Concept Testing)
• How much can I charge for a particular product or service? (Price Elasticity Studies)
• Who are my competitors and why does some of my target market choose a competitor over my business? (Market Positioning, Win/Loss)
• How do I reach my market efficiently and make the most effective use of my marketing dollars? (Market Segmentation, Advertising Concept Testing and Tracking, Attitude and Awareness)
• What is important to my customers? How do I effectively train my staff to provide service that is in alignment with what my customer is looking for? (Customer Satisfaction/Experience Research)

The first step to a successful marketing research endeavor is to identify the questions you want answered and/or the major business decisions that you are faced with. As a boutique marketing research consulting firm, A Closer Look can work with you to translate your problem questions into data requirements. A Closer Look will take those data requirements and recommend the type of research, methodology, and an analysis and reporting plan that will take you from objectives to answers seamlessly.

Getting you answers is not the end goal, however; although so often the marketing research process stops there. A Closer Look’s goal is to help you take the answers and turn them into action. We will work with you to ensure that the end result of your project is an action plan that results in true measurable return on your research investment, not simply a series of graphs and charts that end up sitting on your desk unused.