How to do market research for a startup in 4 steps
If you’re reading this article, you’re probably inspired or interested in starting your own business and have a business idea in mind. However, there are many reasons why startups can fail nowadays. We don’t want you to begin this journey by jumping blindly without any ground knowledge to prepare you for the paths you’ll be taking and the decisions you’ll be making.
Appropriate research for a startup often includes looking into your target market, market trends, target audience, indirect competitors, and many more aspects to evaluate, so you ensure that things will go full swing before launching a startup.
Knowing how to do market research for a startup appropriately will make your life easier by helping you avoid bumps on the road, especially with small businesses.
Study the needs in your market.
Many think that the main reason a startup fails is the lack of capital, but in reality, this isn’t a go big or go home matter. According to statistics, 42% of startups fail because the product or service isn’t needed.
Companies that insist on re-inventing the wheel or creating solutions for problems people do not really have. A couple of episodes of Shark Tank are more than enough to realize this is a common thing.
The main thing you have to do is identify your target market and study it thoroughly.
You may think that this step is pretty much obvious. Still, by doing so, you’ll find out if the idea you came up with is viable because it’s your only way to find out what are the needs within that market and if your product doesn’t fit in it, or isn’t needed, look for another target market that might embrace it better.
Segmentate your public
The term target audience often gets confused with the target market, and although they share similarities, it is crucial to know they’re not the same.
When we talk about the target market, we see potential customers as a whole. A whole group of people that your product will fit like Cinderella’s shoes. Different from a target audience, the target market sees the entire picture without establishing any specific group, unlike the target audience.
The target audience will join subgroups within your target market and organize them by demographics like age gaps, gender, purchasing power, ethnicity, etc.
The more specific you are, the better because this way, you can see your principal concerned group and know who will be your main focus, how to talk through them, and through which channels.
But surely, you can’t just forget about the groups that could be least interested. Precisely, by doing a public segmentation, you’ll know who they are and, therefore, better understand campaigning to increase their interest in the product or service.
Create ideal customer profiles
Did you ever study for a presentation by gathering your family in the living room or lining up some toys to present the topic? At least I did. It helped me prepare for my speech and lessen my nerves when the time came and I had to stand in front of a bigger audience.
Creating an ideal customer profile is something like that.
When you have a clear view of your perfect customer, you can choose methods according to their interests and attract them, and when you carry them out, they will be more likely to succeed and achieve your intended goals.
When creating an ICP, you will group the characteristics you want in your potential customers based on the previous segmentation you already did and obtain specific objectives to target. Within these demographic characteristics, it is essential to include age, gender, ethnicity, income, and residence to compile a collection of data by researching people who might fit that profile to create some kind of biography to work with
Study your competitors to do better
There’s nothing wrong with healthy competition. We usually guide the greats who have already been successful because you can learn from their success and failures.
But of course, you most likely won’t want to do it exactly like them and be called a copy, far from working for you; they could use it to make it seem like, “Hey, we’re better cause others to want to be like us.”
The best approach to studying your competitors should always be how we could learn from them to apply that knowledge to differentiate us from the rest and make our brand stand out. Rather than just doing what they do because it has worked for them.
In addition to market analysis, you will want to delve into the social networks they use, the campaigns they have carried out, and the comments and acceptance the public has had about the product or service. Our main recommendation would be to pay close attention to the negative comments they may have had from different customers because you can take it in favor of improving your brand based on that.
Come up with a plan to launch your brand.
Creating a business and moving it forward is a dream and a source of pride for many, and with the proper research process, everything that goes into promoting it and making it grow can be made much more manageable.
In a world moving around digitally, it is essential to be aware of the new trends in digital marketing and the different techniques, strategies, and social media platforms. Conducting market research gives you the knowledge to use the right tools and strategies and grow a small business into a bigger one, reaching brand awareness and many more benefits along the way.
Now, it’s time for you to take everything you learned through this investigation process and apply your research goals to planning strategies and campaigns to start your business and prepare a launch set to success.
However, we know that it takes a lot of effort, tools, and knowledge in the area you might not be familiar with, so we can give you a hand with that. At Inspiral Growth, we have all of the resources, dedication, and time to provide you with to work for the best outcomes. Knowing how to do market research for a startup appropriately will make your life easier.
Look through our website and explore how we can help you with our different growth hacks.
