Marketing Research in Small Businesses and Nonprofit Organizations
Marketing research does not only occur in huge corporations with many employees and a large budget. Marketing information can be derived by observing the environment of their location and the competitions location. Small scale surveys and focus groups are low cost ways to gather information from potential and existing customers. Most secondary data (statistics, demographics, etc.) is available to the public in libraries or on the internet and can be easily accessed by a small business owner.
Below are some steps that could be done by SME (Small Medium Entreprise) to analyze the market:
- Provide secondary and or primary data (if necessary);
- Analyze Macro & Micro Economic data (e.g. Supply & Demand, GDP,Price change, Economic growth, Sales by sector/industries,interest rate, number of investment/ divestment, I/O, CPI, Social anlysis,etc.);
- Implement the marketing mix concept, which is consist of: Place, Price, Product,Promotion, People, Process, Physical Evidence and also Political & social situation to analyze global market situation);
- Analyze market trends, growth, market size, market share, market competition (e.g. SWOT analysis, B/C Analysis,channel mapping identities of key channels, drivers of customers loyalty and satisfaction, brand perception, satisfaction levels, current competitor-channel relationship analysis, etc.),etc.;
- Determine market segment, market target, market forecast and market position;
- Formulating market strategy & also investigating the possibility of partnership/ collaboration (e.g. Profiling & SWOT analysis of potential partners, evaluating business partnership.)
- Combine those analysis with the SME's business plan/ business model analysis (e.g. Business description, Business process, Business strategy, Revenue model, Business expansion, Return of Investment, Financial analysis (Company History, Financial assumption, Cost/Benefit Analysis, Projected profit & Loss, Cashflow, Balance sheet & business Ratio,etc.).
- Note as important : Overall analysis should be based on 6W+1H (What, When, Where, Which, Who, Why and How) question.
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