Do-it-yourself research - how to conduct customer research - Tutorial

Home Office Computing, Dec, 1993 by Linda Lazier

The former mayor of the nation's largest city, New York's Ed Koch, was always highly visible, but perhaps the most-obvious and most-reported activity was his ongoing do-it-himself research... his famous query to his constituents: "How'm I doin'?"

And Sam Walton, the retailer who remains larger-than-life even after death, reportedly made his multimillion-dollar Wal-Mart fortune through ideas and insights he acquired by walking his stores--and, more important, by talking and listening to his customers via eavesdropping, watching, asking, and noticing what worked and what didn't, what was moving merchandise, and what was missing from the mix.

Okay, so maybe you're not a mayor or a millionaire, but if this ongoing pulse taking worked for these well-knowns, shouldn't it be a perennial part of your business practice?

FIND OUT FEEDBACK

Call it feedback. Call it research. Call it market intelligence. Call it what you will--the moniker or method doesn't matter--it's the out-and-out asking that is critical to calling your shots more profitably, more powerfully, and more professionally.

Feedback is fuel. Insight is an edge. And no matter what you do or sell, it should be the first and most fundamental step in your marketing master plan. Only with information can you master your market; only with inside insights from the outside can you outdo your competition.

Ries & Trout, authors of Positioning:

The Battle for Your Mind and Bottom-Up Marketing (McGraw-Hill), two tomes that have crucially changed the marketing and advertising worlds, offer this advice on information gathering (or the lack thereof): "Don't do your thinking around the conference room table. It's too tempting to do blue-yonder believing. Every marketing plan desperately needs a healthy dose of reality."

Customer answers are the best reality. Research provides that reality. For retail, yes. For services, most definitely. For consulting, absolutely. And--here's the payoff you can research your market easily, efficiently, and economically. No Ph.D. required. No megabucks research agency. No zillion-page, unreadable, uninterpretable report.

In order to know your strengths for future customers, you can monitor satisfaction, service, loyalty, your competitive advantages (as perceived by the customer), an assessment of your costs, potential new markets, and most important, why the customer bought from you. Or you can correct defects or problems.

TALK TO ME

Instead of heating the crowd only cheer your efforts, the real key to do-it-yourself research is to discover your target audience's doubts and dissatisfactions.

Try to engage an evaluation fight after delivery or installation, while the entire transaction is fresh in the client's mind, along with a live sense of your strengths or weaknesses. Follow-up shows him you're interested both in his satisfaction (not just the sale) and in your own stance as a professional who values his perspective and perception.

Not only is the actual collection of data crucial in keeping your business on track, the mere fact of asking provides you another professional, nonpushy way of staying in touch with customers and clients.

Maritz Marketing Research of Fenton, Missouri, a national research company, recently released results of a survey that found customers believe it's important for companies (no matter the size) to stay in touch. Seventy percent of the respondents rated maintaining contact with customers high in importance.

However, most customers never actually receive any communication. Respondents were asked if they had been contacted in the past year to announce new products, check on satisfaction, or seek input about future products; they were also asked if they expect companies to approach them about these subjects.

The findings? Across all industries and product categories, the level of people expecting contact is always greater than the level of those actually receiving it. The percentage of customers who expect announcements regarding new products (57 to 67 percent) is almost equal to those who expect contact about satisfaction (62 to 72 percent). In reality, companies are approximately twice as likely to contact customers about new products (32 to 65 percent) than satisfaction (12 to 36 percent).

The real results? Eighty-seven percent declared they would choose a company that stays in touch and asks about their satisfaction.

QUESTIONS TO ASK

The appropriate format for your research? Simple--whatever it takes to get the answers you need, answers that are enlightening, not just positive platitudes.

Take the case of Held & Diedrich, a small Indianapolis marketing-communications company. It wanted to enhance its presentation to prospective clients. Documentation of good results seemed the best route, but the company had little data.

A simple, one-page questionnaire provided the necessary numbers--along with enough information for results-oriented case studies, usable quotes, and insights.

The survey asked specifically about a completed project along with the following questions.