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Before you startup your business, there will be need for you to put up information about target market and potential customers. The organized effort through which this is done is a crucial component of business strategy called " Market research". Market research is used interchangeably with marketing research but the main difference between the two is that former reasearch deals mainly with the market while the latter talks about the marketing process.
As a business person, you will always face competitions from others and one of the factors that will help you maintain and effectively manage the competitiveness over your competitors is market research. With market research, the identification and the analysis of the competition you will be facing, the market need and the size of the market as well. Qualitative and quantitative method are the methods uses in carrying out market research. The qualitative method of market research include but not limited to thorough interviews, focus groups and descriptive anthropology while the quantitative method makes use of techniques such as customers surveys, and analysis of secondary data.
The formal use of market research came into existence as far back as the 1920s, when advertisers began to notice an undisclosed importance of demographics after the Golden Age of radio in the United States recorded a known worldwide advertisement success from it.
In the next paragraphs, I will be discussing the functions of market research for business/planning, market research functions for the film industry; the influence of market research from the internet; the relation between research and social media applications; and finally the relation between research and market sectors. Let's start by talking about the functions of market research for business/planning.
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### **Functions of Market research for business**
<br>Just as I said earlier, market research is a research carried out by business owners to collect or gather information and have a prior knowledge of what their customers want, what they need and what they believe in. Just as they say "information is power" believe me if you want your business to flourish among your competitors, you must know what your customer's want and need at the right time because this is what will serve as a guide for you to dance to the tune of their wants and needs. Knowing the actions of your customers towards one thing or the other is also not a bad idea.
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Having a prior knowledge of your customers give you an upper hand among your competitors, as this will help you in formulating a strategy in marketing your products. The German, Peter Ferdinand Drucker is a management consultant who believed that the most perfect embodiment of marketing is market research. Market research can be carried out by the producers and the marketplace in order to understand and get adequate information about the consumers and their needs respectively. There are a lot of factors that can be examined or investigated through market research. They include the following:
* **Market Trends**
Sometimes in our businesses or even in any financial market, we have upward market trend and sometimes we have downward market trend (which is the bull market and the bear market respecticely). The characteristic of the financial market moving upward or downward overtime is known as market trend. In the introduction of something new into the market system, we might find it more difficult for market sizes to be determined. As a remedy to that, knowing the number of potential customers or customer segments will help in the derivation of the figures.
* **Market Information**
[Heinz V. Bergen](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://blog.bilowzassociates.com/2011/02/%3Fm%3D1&ved=2ahUKEwi8menu-r_fAhULyxoKHelPDqQQFjALegQIAxAB&usg=AOvVaw3pBXwSlN3EIZcj_4j_tiOD) once said "Information is the seed for an idea, and only grows when it's watered". In my personal opinion, I would say "having the necessary information at hand helps you to make the right decision at every point in time without much ado". What I am saying in essence is that; It becomes easier for you to have a good knowledge of the prices of various market commodities, as well as the rate of market supply and demand. You as a business person must be ready to be a market researcher with some important roles to play to your clients such as helping them fathom out the technical, social and also the legal aspect of the market.
* **Market Segmentation**
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This is one very important factor as the joy of going into a business is to make a fortune out of that business. You can be regarded as a successful business person only when you make the highest possible profit out of any business you venture into and this is why you need to segment your market. Now, let's not hesitate to talk about market segmentation and its importance. Let me continue by saying; market segmentation is the act by which a large number of consumers (including both existing and potential customers) or mass market are segmented or divided into sub-groups of consumers with like minds and similar goals. This is done mainly to know the sub-groups or segments that their performance rate will bring in more profit, so that such segment can be selected to become target market.
* **SWOT Analysis**
SWOT analysis is an analysis which is carried to help business individuals or organizations to have a thorough knowledge and understanding of the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and strengths that are in relation to project planning and business competition. As a business person or project planner, SWOT analysis helps you to state explicitly the objectives of your business venture or project planning respectively. It also help you to establish the identity of those factors that are of advantage and disadvantage to you both internally and externally.
Apart from the factors stated above, there are still a lot of factors that can be investigated through market research. They include the followings: Competitor analysis, Customer analysis, Risk analysis, Choice modelling, Marketing mix modeling, Product research, Simulated test marketing and Advertisement research. I will put a pause to this at this point and continue from here in the next part. But before I close this chapter, I will say, let's do our market research right for any of our businesses for it to flourish.
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<hr>REFERENCE<hr>
* <sub>[Market research](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_research)</sub>
<br><center>***Thanks for reading!!!***</center>
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Crossposted from [here](https://whaleshares.io/met/@dtwo/market-research-helping-you-find-customers-for-your-business-part-1)