1. What is a market research 2. Of what importance is market research? 3. Under what conditions do you think market research will be useful What is a market research? Market research involves analysing the feasibility of a new product or service using research carried out directly with potential consumers. Through market research, businesses discover their target market and get consumer opinions to inform decisions within the organisation. Market research gives insights into what customers may like or dislike and they come in quantitative and qualitative forms. Market research can be carried out using surveys, face-to-face or phone interviews, collecting sample data, and similar processes. Data collected during market research requires the skills of a marketer for interpretation and analysis keeping results rational. Results from a market research are useful for targeted marketing, advertising activities and predicting priorities of consumers of a product. Importance of a market research Completing a market research is the best approach towards fulfilling customer needs and ensuring retainment. Some importances of market research are : Advantage over competition: Effective market research is a key advantage in a competitive market. Market research carries out comparative studies helping a business innovate when needed to stay ahead of competition. Customer-centric: Because market research is mostly about the customers, it represents the best approach to looking at the customers and gaining information. Valuable Information: Since market research is consumer-centric, information about each consumer is peculiar to the consumer hence the dataset is genuine and gives valuable information Forecasts: Being able to predict consumers' reaction towards a particular product is one of the most importanct features of the market research. Market research further helps the organisation make informed decision about the need for funds when expansion is required and more sales have been predicted. Conditions that make a market research useful. Some of the conditions that make a market research useful are: When Performance monitoring is required When there is need to identify new customers Identifying how to expand business offerings Setting realistic business targets Investigating expansion opportunities