Tag: Marketing

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Scaling Your Market Research and Staying Ahead of the Curve

Keeping up with the ever-changing needs of your business can be a daunting task, especially in a rapidly evolving market. That’s why it’s important to have a strong market research strategy in place that allows you to stay ahead of the competition and anticipate customer needs before they arise. Here, UNOVA Coworking presents some tips for scaling your market research to ensure that you remain at the top of your game.

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Know Your Audience

The first step in scaling your market research is to identify your target audience and market segments. This will help you better understand who your customer is and what their needs may be. Once you have identified these segments, you can then begin to create strategies for reaching them more effectively. Segmenting your customers will also allow you to customize marketing messages based on their characteristics and preferences.

Build a Research Framework

A robust framework for conducting market research is crucial to ensure that no essential steps are missed when making crucial decisions or launching new products or services. It must cater to various scenarios, including emerging trends, customer feedback surveys, and new product launches, ensuring that data can quickly be gathered on demand.

Implementing such a structure will not only save time and resources but will also furnish top-quality, reliable information that can serve as a solid foundation for making informed decisions.

Monitor Trends and the Competition

It’s important to research competitors within the same industry as well as relevant trends that could influence customer behavior or decisions. Studying competitors helps you gain insight into how others approach similar challenges or opportunities, which could inform or inspire ideas of your own. Understanding current trends also allows companies to anticipate changes before they occur, which gives them an edge over other competitors who may still be playing catch-up.

Focus on Qualitative and Quantitative Research

Making crucial decisions about product or service development, pricing models, marketing strategies, and customer service tactics demands having access to both qualitative and quantitative data. Relying on these two types of data ensures that decisions are not based on assumptions but on hard facts. It ultimately leads to a smarter, better-informed decision-making process, reducing the risks involved in making uncalculated decisions based on insufficient data.

For example, launching a product without adequate customer feedback can be a risky gamble that may result in adverse outcomes, but having well-structured qualitative and quantitative data at hand can mitigate such risks.

Tap Into Digital Tools

Digital tools such as online surveys provide an efficient way for gathering feedback from customers without having them fill out long paper surveys or come into a physical location, which can often lead people to drop out from answering survey questions halfway through.

Surveys can be sent directly via email or SMS message, which makes it easy for customers to respond quickly without having too much effort involved from their end. They also offer insights into consumer behavior based on responses given, which is helpful when trying to uncover potential consumer trends before they become mainstream.

You can even incentivize your surveys to get a wider sample. A gift card API is a quick solution that automatically distributes a small e-card once the survey has been completed.

Invest in a Customer Data Platform

Maximizing profitability while fulfilling customer needs requires the use of a customer data platform (CDP). By consolidating data from numerous sources, such as websites, applications, and social media channels, companies can gain extensive insights into consumer behavior, preferences, and trends. With access to detailed customer information, businesses can make informed decisions when developing new products or services.

Moreover, they can refine pricing models to ensure maximum profitability. These tools enable companies to deliver exceptional customer value while sustainably growing their businesses.

Invest in a Customer Data Platform

To remain competitive and proactively meet customer demands, businesses must implement an effective market research strategy. Utilizing digital tools and both qualitative and quantitative research methods empowers businesses with high-quality decision-making information while ensuring uninterrupted operations even during turbulent times of rapid change. Organizations that fail to prioritize this strategic investment risk chaos resulting from poor decisions that could impede success during times of transition. With a robust market research strategy, businesses can minimize disruption and smoothly navigate any obstacles that come their way, moving efficiently towards growth and greater market share.

UNOVA Coworking offers flexible workspaces that can give you the room you need to be productive. Check out our options and consider joining today!

Questions or comments? Have any additional tips or resources to share? Reply below or reach out to Courtney Rosenfeld.

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How to Nail Your Reopening Marketing Campaign

When the pandemic struck, businesses everywhere asked themselves – how do we adapt? For some companies, transitioning was a simple matter. Others, however, had to take some time to figure out the best route forward. Closing up shop temporarily is a wise move. It gives you the chance to wait and watch the market, see what’s working (and not working) for other companies, and craft a solid plan for your company’s future.

serious ethnic woman at rural shop doorway
Photo by Ketut Subiyanto on Pexels.com

Now that you have your plan, it’s time to reopen. Letting customers know you’re back in business can be a serious challenge. With a careful strategy to manage your day-to-day tasks so you can dedicate your full attention to this process, you can eliminate some of the overwhelm. Here’s a look at how to create and launch an effective reopening campaign:

Make Sure You’re Prepared

Your business can’t afford a misstep right now. Before you reopen, make sure you’re truly ready. Not only will faltering on your reopen cost you money, but it will also leave a bad impression with clients. You have to inspire confidence with this campaign, and being fully prepared will help ensure that.

If you’ve moved your company to fully remote, are you certain your employees are ready? Security risks are different (and sometimes unpredictable) when employees work from home. Make sure your employees know good digital security practices, such as not sharing their work device with family members. Never assume your employees already know, or that these practices are obvious – it’s better to give them redundant information than to miss something. 

You should also evaluate your budget before you reopen. Most companies took a pretty major hit at the start of the pandemic, and you need to make sure you have the funds you need to succeed. If you don’t, don’t panic: There are a ton of public and private resources out there for businesses affected by the pandemic. See what kind of aid you can get to keep your company going.

Focus on Digital Connection

Right now, one of the most cost-effective forms of outreach businesses can use is digital marketing. The great thing about this marketing avenue is it’s so flexible. You can invest in highly targeted ads and capture a specific audience; you can put in SEO groundwork and build a social presence; and you can combine these efforts to incredible effect.

If you have money to spare on advertising, look into targeted ad services. These are extremely effective because they go directly to the audience that needs your product. You’re not casting a wide net and hoping you’ll catch the right eyes – you’re money goes straight to ads that reach potential customers.

Low budget? You can still make a big impact on your company’s success through content marketing. If you don’t already have a blog, now is the time to start running one. Don’t just go in blind, however. Take some time to research your competitors, pay attention to industry trends, and craft a content marketing plan that will work for your business. High-quality content marketing can make a huge impact, without spending a ton of money.

Communicate With Clients Directly

Finally, spend some time connecting directly with clients and customers to let them know you’re reopening. This could mean making use of your email or mailing lists, or making phone calls to connect out loud. There are benefits to either approach – you can reach more people with a mailer or newsletter, and you’ll save yourself time. That said, you can never be confident that people are actually reading what you send them.

When you make a phone call, you get the chance to make a more personal connection with clients. Plus, you get information back this way. Phone calls can help you get a sense for whether or not clients have moved on, what they’re looking for in the current market, and how you can stand out in your field. However, there are only so many hours in a day, so you should prioritize the most lucrative clients, or the ones you think will give you the best information.

Running a reopening campaign can be a major challenge, but it’s well worth it. An effective campaign will bring back old clients, attract new ones, and show the world you’re ready to take on today’s challenges. And the best part is, it will set you up for a bright future.

Questions or comments? Have any additional tips or stories to share? Reply below or reach out to Naomi Johnson at Lifebasedbusiness.net.

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