Entrepreneurs recognize the value of market research relevant to their products and industry. Even more high-level overviews of consumer behavior and general trends can significantly impact companies’ plans. What is more, custom market research is one of the most influential factors in strategy planning. Yet, such studies are expensive and quite complex to implement. 

With the debut of AI, opportunities for conducting market research have become more flexible and accessible. After all, market research is all about analyzing data and drawing conclusions and findings from it. And AI is the perfect candidate for gathering, investigating, and interpreting information. 

Market research: the root of it all

Market research is the bread of all marketers, consisting of various components. While it can work at different levels, whether it’s old-school focus groups or more modern in-app surveys, the goal is the same. All market research aims to understand consumers in a particular industry, particularly what attracts them or pushes them away. 

For example, an online retail store focused on gym clothing, protein-based diets, and other active-lifestyle products will need to understand one consumer type. Their priorities for buying differ, likely focusing on ingredients and calories rather than price (quality over quantity).

On the other hand, an online earning platform that allows people to earn money from their unused internet time will likely target different consumers. These people are likely practical consumers, always on the lookout for novel earning opportunities. 

So, a service like Honeygain will collaborate with creators who focus on novel ways to make money. At the same time, a store like Gymshark will promote its products through collaborations with various trainers or healthy-living ambassadors. 

Of course, without proper market research in both cases, these are just assumptions.

Why AI pairs so well with market research

AI is excellent at analyzing information and can quickly adapt your research material based on the provided criteria. Let’s start discussing the impact of AI from this point.

More custom surveys 

You can achieve much more if you ask the right questions. With AI, carefully crafted prompts can help create questions that hit the bullseye and provide answers that shape your future strategies. So, if you’re trying to motivate your potential consumers to answer questionnaires, don’t let it go to waste by extracting useless data. And AI is here to help you get the answers that align with your overall goals. 

Reap all the benefits from secondary research

Primary research is the dream (such as collecting data from consumers yourself). However, many marketers, especially those working in smaller companies, rely on secondary research. Analyzing statistics, trends, and overviews in hundreds of market research reports can take days or weeks. Luckily, AI can do it in seconds, giving you summaries, synopses, or extracting answers to particular questions. 

So, not only does secondary research become cost-effective and easier to obtain, but it also requires less labour to process and draw conclusions from. 

Get insights from reviews and ratings 

With so many AI tools and use cases available, you can use AI to keep tabs on your users’ ratings and reviews. So, you manage to keep an eye on your current customers and predict any burning questions or increasing concerns. 

Zendesk has already investigated how AI can be used to analyze feedback. For one, companies use a variety of sources, such as internal/external tickets, surveys, and customer comments online. Then, the AI power turns to a blend of machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP) to interpret what is truly being said. For example, it can distinguish the positive and negative aspects that consumers tend to highlight/mention in their feedback.

Easier to extract public information

Speaking of conducting research and gathering details, AI can also assist with information retrieval. For example, some tools automatically extract information from popular sources where discussions on the market status and patterns occur. That could relate to social media platforms like Twitter, LinkedIn, or Pinterest. 

Other tools, such as Crayon, that are interested in your competitors will efficiently gather data on them. As a result, you can stay up-to-date with your competitors without having to manually keep track of their public announcements or social media posts.

Predicting consumer desires 

With the right approach to AI integration, your product recommendations likely lead to that additional item being added to the cart. Of course, this advice is more relevant to stores selling multiple goods. Essentially, you use AI to analyze users’ behavior and determine which products best suit their tastes and needs.

Using AI successfully to conduct and support market research

If you’re starting to consider market research and haven’t done it before, don’t entirely rely on AI to complete it. It’s crucial to understand the process in the traditional sense before moving on to full automation. 

• For example, doing otherwise could lead to improper use of AI, such as uploading consumer data without proper anonymization. In some industries, using user data can even lead to more severe legal repercussions.
• Another standard error involves bias (even without realizing it). Many AI tools tend to agree or twist the truth to align with people. Thus, it’s crucial to keep your questions and prompts free of any assumptions.
• Additionally, AI is excellent at looking at things and situations as they currently are. In other words, it can observe trends relevant to your business, but it may not make accurate or plausible predictions. 
• Hence, don’t solely rely on AI to discover new demand for products or features. 
• Furthermore, AI will perform well in industries and markets with abundant information. In less developed and less popular markets, AI might struggle to identify trends or patterns. Or the conclusions drawn will be based on too little data gathered.

Conclusion

All in all, AI is already making market research more achievable for businesses of all sizes and budgets. Companies can quickly analyze data and use AI to shape surveys and other research material for their needs. However, AI does have its issues, such as providing biased answers or excluding specific consumers from making an impact. So, while AI can ease your journey and automate most of your tasks, accurate, actually practical market research will require some human intervention.