Home topics small-business-resources sales-and-marketing Hot Tips Marketing Hot Tips 5 common market research mistakes to avoid Oddy Tedjasurja September 3, 2012 Market research is crucial to the success of a small business, but in order to implement a successful strategy you need to avoid making these five simple mistakes. In order to implement a successful marketing strategy, small business owners must learn a few key things such as: How are market trends impacting my business? How does our target market make buying decisions? How does customer satisfaction with our products or services measure up to that of the competition? How will our existing customers respond to a new product or service? How can we attract new customer segment? What marketing strategies will work best? However, small business owners tend to make few mistakes when it comes to conducting a market research. Some of the common mistakes are: Using only secondary research: It makes so much sense to use secondary research as a small business owner. Secondary research is easy, time efficient, and mostly free. It’s great to find information about the industry trends but primary research will allow you to specifically target your research and understand the customers’ attitudes. Plus, some primary research is easy to use and free such as social media. Your customers would love to give their opinion on your business too! Not doing it because it’s costly: Small businesses tend to not have the luxurious budget enjoyed by big enterprises, but market research should never be