Get Started

You’ve finally singled out a great business idea and are now so fired up to launch it. You’re imagining what your store would look like, even down to the detail of what drapes to hang in your windows. You see hordes of people lining up to buy your products and you know for certain that your dream of becoming your own boss will finally come true.

But before you get way ahead of yourself, it would be good to have a bit of reality check. A good way to ensure you’re not just building castles in the air is to take concrete steps to know if there is a market for your business, how big it is, how it regards the product or service you’re going to offer, and the best strategy to reach them. In other words, you have to do market research.

GET IT TOGETHER

While it appears that conducting research is crucial to a business startup, many enterprises have actually flourished without it. Nevertheless, by simply looking into whether or not there exists a market for your product or service could help minimize the risks you will have to take.

“You don’t really need anybody to conduct initial, early stage entrepreneurial style market research that’s effective not only to save on cost but also to understand your market,” says Brad Geiser, director for strategics, creatives, and market research at Geiser-Maclang Marketing Communications Inc., a strategic communications firm that uses the concept of guerrilla marketing to serve clients in the retail, food, service, and other sectors.

What most startups with no resources can do is use guerrilla marketing as a strategy to increase their chances of surviving against the much larger, well-funded, and more established companies. With guerrilla marketing, entrepreneurs can tap their own network to get insights into their business concept and its potential market.

A LONG TERM INVESTMENT

Market research is an investment for the long term. “People look at market research and easily dismiss it as expensive. What they fail to see is that market research is an investment for the entire business,” says Perez. As well, market researches would either be well or poorly executed, says Jos Ortega, president of Brand Lab, a strategic marketing firm that advocates and uses branding as a central operating tool.

“There’s no guarantee. But it allows you some basics of making a sound guess on how to penetrate the market and opportunity areas that are available and not yet occupied by anybody else.”

“If your research comes [back] and says it won’t work, it’s not a death sentence for your idea. A real entrepreneur will figure out a way to make it work. But you need to have a certain fire in the belly for what it is that you do. You have to be will-ing to overcome those kinds of obstacles,” Geiser says.

“What people really look for in market research are new ideas, new beliefs, and new directions — an edge. Not just what is, but what could be,” he adds. Entrepreneurs who really love their concept should also be willing to check things out, says Geiser: “Just because the first group of people you interviewed says no, doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t continue looking because it might be a group of people that you didn’t consider.”