There is no industry or field these days that does not include healthy competition. This is true of retail, food service, medicine, and real estate. There are usually businesses or companies that offer customers something similar to you. This doesn’t mean that they are the obvious subject matter experts even if they’ve operated longer than you. With the right information, you … [Read more...] about Tips and Techniques for Researching the Competition
Market Research
How to Gather Marketing Intelligence with Web Scraping Tools
Web scraping is also known as web crawling. It refers to the data extraction or collection of large amounts of data from the web. With the right web scraping tools in place, your company benefits from advanced marketing intelligence to develop key strategies. Between proxies and captchas, the data extraction process is extremely technical and time-consuming. That’s why using … [Read more...] about How to Gather Marketing Intelligence with Web Scraping Tools
Strategies for Finding Information on Private Companies
It's Monday afternoon and you have just returned from an enjoyable lunch, thinking that you will continue working on the task you started in the morning. As you sit down to your keyboard, you notice a photocopied article from a well-known industry magazine taped to your screen with a post-it note tagged onto it. The note reads: "Who are they and where did they did come … [Read more...] about Strategies for Finding Information on Private Companies
How to Get to Know Your Customers
If you know your customer, you’ll know what they want from you and from the products they buy. You need to know who you’re talking to in your marketing materials so that you know how to connect with them, not just talk at them. You’ll have greater success the better you know your customers. So, how do you get to know your customers? Follow these guidelines and ideas to hop … [Read more...] about How to Get to Know Your Customers
How to Use Customer Information to Increase Sales
Customers are not created equal: some are more valuable than others. Businesses that have the ability to determine the value of the customers have the edge in today’s highly competitive business environment. Customers fall into different categories, such as: Customers who are profitable; Customers who increase your competence . Customers who build up the image and … [Read more...] about How to Use Customer Information to Increase Sales
Affordable Market Research for Your Small Business
Until recently, limited budgets kept most types of market research out of reach for entrepreneurs and other small- budget businesses. Today, through the Internet, small-budget businesses have more research options. Secondary research sources are easier to find. More affordable primary research methods - both qualitative and quantitative - are available online as … [Read more...] about Affordable Market Research for Your Small Business
Benefits of Getting Information About Your Customers
Excellent customer service is key to the success of a small and home-based business. In fact, a superior customer service is your primary weapon against giant retailers and big businesses like Wal-Mart. To be able to offer excellent customer service, however, you first need to know and anticipate what your customers want. You should know how to reach, satisfy and track your … [Read more...] about Benefits of Getting Information About Your Customers
How Market Research Can Help Your Small Business
I have always been a firm believer that there is never one correct answer to a question. Some call that argumentative, I call it Independent and Creative Thought. I have also come to the conclusion over the years that by feeding answers to a student, they will ultimately starve. On the other hand by posing a question, you teach them to think and in turn feed their own thought … [Read more...] about How Market Research Can Help Your Small Business
How to Research Your Market on a Tight Budget
Market analysis is the foundation of your sales and financial plans. However, a good analysis of the market entails comprehensive market survey whose costs may be beyond the reach of small business owners. If you do not have thousands of dollars needed to hire marketing research firms, here are some methods of market research home based businesses can do on your own for only … [Read more...] about How to Research Your Market on a Tight Budget
How to Use Market Research for Your Small Business
Is there anything you can do to make sure that your business idea is the right one? This is a common question raised by many start-up entrepreneurs. It is hard to determine at the onset whether your entrepreneurial path leads to success or downright failure. One thing is true, though: there is nothing certain about business. To identify the unknowns, you can only do two … [Read more...] about How to Use Market Research for Your Small Business
