A market survey is done to gain information for an upcoming marketing plan, or to get feedback on some aspect of the company’s operations. A good market survey is set up to collect data that can quantify opinions and be used to generate numbers that can be analyzed. A market survey is normally the first step used to answer a corporate question or launch a campaign to improve the company’s brand recognition.
Focus
A market survey should never be a generalized process. The first step to creating a market survey is to have a specific question that needs to be answered. That question can ask consumers their opinions on the most recent product upgrade, or it can inquire as to the effect of the company’s latest marketing campaign. But a market survey must start with a specific question that needs to be answered.
Create The Framework
As we mentioned earlier, a market survey must deliver numbers that can be compared and analyzed. Once the question to be answered has been established, the next step is to create the quantifying criteria that will be used to assign numbers to opinions. This can be done on a per question basis, or it can be a scale that is used to create every question.
Determine What Information You Need About Your Respondents
It is rarely necessary to get the names of your respondents, but that does not mean that you do not need any of their personal information. You need to determine what it is about each respondent that is important to your survey. This is the information that will help you to categorize your results into sets of data you can compare with each other.
Make Sure Each Question Has Value
If a question cannot yield results that bring value to your survey, then it should not be included. Each question should be designed to reveal a small part of the information you are trying to obtain. When all of the questions are put together, their results will yield valuable marketing information you can use to grow your business.
Get Everyone On Board
Your first draft of your market survey should be circulated throughout all of your managers to get their input. You might be getting the information that research and development needs, but sales still needs further information to create a plan to sell the product or service in question. Be sure to get plenty of input from the rest of the company that will be affected by the results of the survey, and use that input to create your final survey draft.
The only way to gauge the opinion of a target audience is to use a focused market survey. Whether your audience is inside or outside of the company, you can develop a market survey that will give you quantifiable information you can use to make the proper adjustments to your marketing plans. Without a market survey, your marketing strategy will have no basis in fact or reality.
Jim Treebold is a North Carolina based writer. He lives by the mantra of “Learn 1 new thing each day”! Jim loves to write, read, pedal around on his electric bike and dream of big things. Drop him a line if you like his writing, he loves hearing from his readers!