Spend It Wisely: A Market Research Primer for Designers, by Brianna Sylver
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Introduction
Market research is expensive—not only for the time and money required to execute it, but also for the opportunity cost it represents to the organization sponsoring it. Each dollar or hour given to a project draws on a company’s budget, chipping away at the financial and human resources available to direct to other initiatives. For this reason, organizations must be deliberate in choosing both the projects they pursue and the methods they leverage to solicit customer insight. Data gained is valuable only if it’s used to inform an organization’s development and marketing initiatives.
A quick note about language first. In the title and throughout this article, I’ve used the phrase “market research” versus “design research” for two reasons: First, “Design research,” a term invented by the design community, is not recognized or known outside of this group; the term recognized by other individuals in business (and as an established profession) is “market research.” I’m using this term then, as I believe it has more universal appeal and understanding. Second, when the design community refers to “design research,” traditional methods such as focus groups and surveys are often dismissed, where more emerging methods like ethnographic research and listening labs get all the ink (or pixels). I’d like to help balance that out.
