LibGuides: Business Entrepreneurship Assignment Guide: Conducting Market Research

Marketing Research

Market Research
Traditionally, market research has been understood as the process of gathering, analyzing, and interpreting data about a particular market—and the products, brands, or services within that market—to help organizations make better business decisions. Finding out what the customer (current, past, or potential) wants lies at the heart of market research. | from The SAGE Encyclopedia of Qualitative Research Methods | Credo Reference (Library Database)
What Is Marketing Research?
Marketing research allows marketers to listen and assess the needs of the market, to understand what’s missing and how to reduce those gaps from their customers, target markets, and prospective clients. Managers need marketing information in order to make data-driven decisions rather than make assumptions about consumers. | OER Textbook | Principles of Marketing (OpenStax)
The American Marketing Association (AMA)
The American Marketing Association strives to be the most relevant force and voice shaping marketing around the world, an essential community for marketers. No other organization provides more ways for marketers and academics to connect with the people and resources they need to be successful. (Organization Website)

Marketing Research Resources

This vast accumulation of data can be collected through various methods, such as point-of-sale databases, connected devices through the Internet of Things (IoT), third-party marketing research firms, social media, location data from mobile devices, or surveys. Tapping into the resource generators is helpful for companies to understand their customers, employees, or others.

Most marketing research resources are not freely available to the public. Companies subscribe to or create market research tool for their exclusive use. Western Library subscribes to the databases ReferenceSolutions and RAB for students to experiment with the market research process. The basis of most market research tools is census information. The census, which is conducted every 10 years provides a wealth of information about how Americans live. It tells us how many people live in a specific area, describes their living arrangements, ages, income, education levels,and occupations. It also describes the kinds of homes people live in - age of home, number of rooms, value, whether it has complete kitchen and plumbing facilities, the availability of telephones and automobiles and the type of home-heating fuel used.

Watch the short video below to learn how to Business Builder at the federal government website, Census.gov can be used to conduct Market Research.

Census Business Builder (CBB)
A suite of services that provide selected demographic and economic data from the Census Bureau tailored to specific types of users in a simple to access and use format. | Federal Government Website

Western Library Databases for Market Research

ReferenceSolutions This link opens in a new window
A premier source for business and consumer research data. Contains detailed information on over 15 million companies and over 260 million consumers. Every record can be exported to spreadsheets. A great source for entrepreneurship activities, marketing projects, demographics research, and students seeking employment.
RAB Instant Background This link opens in a new window
Use the RAB (Radio Advertising Bureau) tools to track down marketing statistics for a variety of companies in business and industry. Find out how to access our subscription here or you can contact a librarian for access information (chat, phone, or email).