Market research: what to know

What the job involves, what changes the price, and what to ask a pro.

What market research is

A market researcher gathers and analyzes information about your customers, competitors and demand through surveys, interviews and data, then reports the findings to guide your decisions. Businesses hire researchers before a launch, before a price or product change or when they need to know who their customers really are.

Signs you need it

  • You are launching a product, service or location and do not know whether there is enough demand
  • Your sales are changing, and you cannot say whether the cause is your customers, your competitors or the market
  • You want to know what your customers value most before you change your offer
  • You are entering a new area or customer group and have no data about it
  • You need to test a message, a name or a concept with real people before you spend on it

What the pro does

  • Define the questions the research must answer and the decisions it will inform
  • Choose the methods, such as a survey, interviews, a focus group or a review of existing data
  • Build the survey or interview guide, and test it before it is used
  • Recruit the right people, and collect the responses or the interview notes
  • Analyze the results, checking for patterns, weak points and the limits of the sample
  • Report the findings with the methods, the limits and the recommendations in plain language

What changes the price

Every job is different, so we do not publish prices. These are the things that move the quote up or down.

  • The number of questions, the length of the survey or interview and the number of people reached
  • The method chosen, such as an online survey, phone interviews or in person research
  • Whether the researcher must recruit participants, and how hard they are to find
  • How much existing data must be gathered, cleaned and analyzed
  • Whether the work includes a formal written report, a presentation or both
  • How many rounds of revision are included in the report

What a written quote should spell out

  • The research questions, the methods and the sample size planned
  • How participants are recruited, and whether incentives are included
  • The analysis and the report format, with the due dates
  • How participant data is kept private and when it is deleted
  • The limits of the research that the report will state

Questions to ask before you hire

  • How many people will you reach, and how do you choose them?
  • How will you make sure the results represent my customers and not just the people who respond?
  • What is the margin of error for the sample, and how will you explain it?
  • Who owns the data and the raw responses?
  • Will you show me the questions before the research starts?
  • How do you protect participants' personal information?

Red flags

  • Asks leading questions that push the respondent to a specific answer
  • Promises results that match what you want to hear
  • Will not show the questions or the method before the research starts
  • Cannot explain the limits of the sample or the method

What you can do yourself

You can ask your existing customers a short set of questions by email or at the counter, read reviews of your competitors and track which questions customers ask most often. Hire a market researcher when you need reliable answers from people who are not yet your customers, when the decision carries large risk or when the data needs careful analysis.

Licenses and permits

No license is usually required for market research. Ask instead for examples of past reports with the details removed, references and a written description of how participants are protected; check with your state or local business licensing office if the researcher operates as a registered business, and check the rules for surveys and data collection that apply where the participants live.

Market research questions

How many people do I need to survey?

It depends on the question and how precise the answer must be. Ask the researcher to explain the sample size and what the result can tell you.

Can a survey tell me what customers will buy?

A survey shows what people say, which can differ from what they do. Ask the researcher how they will account for that gap, and test important decisions with real behavior where possible.

Who sees the individual answers?

Ask the researcher to report results in groups, not by person, and to store the raw data securely with access limited to the research team.

Pro reviewers

Pros who offer market research remotely can improve this guide, like Wikipedia. We check every edit before it goes live. Every approved edit is credited in the edit history and on the pro's profile.

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  2. 2. Pick the pros you want

    See pros who serve your ZIP and choose who you want to hear from.

  3. 3. They reach out

    They contact you the way you chose: phone, email or in-app messages.

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