Which Market Research Platform Is Right for You

The digital environment is rich with real-time communication and consumer sentiment across a wide array of topics, industries as well as geographies. However, what if companies were able to cultivate, synthesise, analyse, and draw conclusions from these sentiments in order to improve their marketing communication and CRM efforts?

They can. Over the past number of years a wide range of programmatic market research or advertising platforms have emerged to assist companies make sense of the rich insights which are now so readily accessible in the digital environment.

Traditional market research efforts — such as focus groups and surveys — could take weeks, even months, to produce any significant insights. The costs of conducting such primary research could be prohibitive.

Can Programmatic Insights Occur In Real Time?

Programmatic insights can occur in real time while leveraging significantly higher numbers of data points to which market researchers had access in the past.

In addition, traditional market research efforts have focused on gathering information from consumers about their levels of awareness, perceptions, and opinions about companies and their products and services, and their input on what they might do — e.g., their intent to purchase.

Digital analysis platforms can go beyond this type of speculation, which has rarely provided a direct correlation with actual purchases, to evaluate what consumers have done and to provide this information at a very granular level, both in terms of consumer actions as well as target audience segments.

Here are some of the things to consider when choosing the right market research platform.

What Type of Analysis Software?

Ask yourself how much analysis which your team will be doing internally themselves. This will define if you require analysis tools:

• Do you want straightforward descriptive data, percentages in tables or – alternatively – advanced cross-tabulation and filtering?
• Will you be performing statistical analysis, for example significance testing, regression modelling, correlations or even factor analysis?

These latter methods could indicate that you need a stand-alone stats programme such as SPSS. If it is cross tabulations, then you may be able to forego a standalone tool and look for these features as part of a data collection platform.

Which Method Are You Utilising?

When choosing market research software, you must determine if it can manage the type of research that you wish to perform. Find out which methodology/ies the platform provides and then locate any case studies or testimonials which can attest to its capability to perform effective research.

Is the software compatible with your industry? This is a very crucial question to ask because there are frequently many unique characteristics within different industries that some software which can cater to better than others. Dependent on the complexity of your study, you may also require customisation in your research. In this case, you will need to utilise a platform that allows for custom inputs.

Do You Require Reporting And Visualisation?

It is important that you to make a distinction between analysis and then data visualisation. They need two very different types of system but frequently people utilise words such as ‘Analysis’, ‘Dashboard, ‘Visualisation’ as well as ‘Reporting’ interchangeably. They are quite different and there are platforms which specialise in each.

Really think and question yourself regarding what your business and stakeholders will respond to – and how frequently you need to deliver to them. In addition, think about time. Good data visualisation isn’t quickly achieved.

Data dashboards differ widely, so also think about what you want from one – a true dashboard is made up of charts or graphics that update in real or near-real time. Don’t confuse this with visualisation tools or analysis tools. And don’t forget a lot can be achieved with a good old fashioned PowerPoint presentation!

Get in touch with the Digital School of Marketing

If you would like to learn more about market research then you need to do our Market Research Course. Follow this link for more.