Blog Research

Gauge the Importance of your Study

2008-09-07T15:47:00.000-07:00

So you have finally made up your mind. You have the greatest idea of all time. You have a topic for your research. You then became excited and started the research. You finished gathering data and analyzing it. You then presented it to another person. You are ecstatic. But you are broken into pieces when the person asked “So what?”

This is perhaps the question every researcher must have in mind. So what if you find out that women live longer than men? So what if you know what blogging platforms people use? So what if you discover that having your own domain is better than just a subdomain? It all boils down to that question – so what?
This is where significance comes in. The significance of the study is usually a short paragraph that declares the purpose of the study. You can easily come up with the significance using the following steps:

1. Reread your research problem and objectives. Then ask yourself, for what are you doing all this?
2. Get out of the box and think of society in general. Think about who will be influenced by your study.
3. Formulate the significance by having the study or the target audience (the people you will help with your study) as a subject.

Simple right? That’s all there is to it. At first glance, the significance may seem like a very small part of your study. But without it, your study will have no meaning at all. After all, It is the significance that tells people what your study is for.

Researcher's Etiquette

2008-09-05T23:25:00.000-07:00

The growth of new information is unstoppable. This phenomenon is mainly because of researches that have been created almost every year. With each year come a lot of issues in the academic community. Replicated researches, misquoted replies from respondents and careless research have been common.

With this in mind, I figured the importance of etiquette in the process of conducting research. Here are some basic rules that can be taken into consideration.

Don’t copy other people’s work

This rule is easier said than done. Sometimes, some researchers tend to copy others unintentionally. The best way to solve this problem is to always do a background study before you research. It is always good to know the existing information first, rather than conducting research now and finding out that it’s replicated content later.

Replicated content had always been a source of tension on the internet. Copying other people’s work (most commonly known as plagiarism) is a venue for being sued. It is a violation of Intellectual Property Rights. To avoid this, you can follow two simple rules: (1) Put quotation marks around the words you have taken from another source and indicate the source (author or website) in a parenthesis or (2) paraphrase the idea of the author but still indicate his name or website in a parenthesis.

Don’t copy other people’s ideas

Another bad news is that ideas can also be copied. So it does not reside merely on the text or work. The bad thing is that sometimes a researcher fails to notice it. Copying ideas is prevalent especially when researchers are making claims. Sometimes, they think that certain ideas are common knowledge when in reality, it is an idea of another person

Let your subject know what your research is about

Transparency is very important when it comes to approaching your subjects. You should be open to them. You can do this by telling them about your topic, the methods you are going to implement and how you will interpret the results.

Be honest in delivering results

This is the most important rule. Never ever alter the data especially if it does not coincide with your hypothesis. A lot of researchers have fallen into this trap. They undergo selective data collection where they only get the data that reflect their hypothesis. Data can be interpreted but must be reflected as is.

Formulating your Objectives

2008-09-05T06:04:00.000-07:00

The second thing you need to know when conducting research is how to formulate objectives. Objectives are basically your goals in your research. There are some things that must be considered to be able to craft effective research objectives.

Objectives are basically your goals in your research.

First, you have to know that there are two kinds of objectives: general objectives and specific objectives. These objectives are obviously different when it comes to scope and goals.

The general objective encompass what you need to achieve on the study overall. This directly reflects your research problem. Review your research problem and think about how you can answer it. The answer you’re looking for is the objective you must pursue.

You can see this better in an example. Let’s imagine you are researching about the experiences of bloggers in their everyday lives. So you have the problem: What is the daily experience of an average blogger? You can then transform this into an objective. I will do this by making a statement: To find out the daily routine of bloggers. So there, we have a general objective.

As for specific objectives, these will comprise the little things you need to do to achieve the general objective. Imagine your general objective being broken down into parts and you can come up with specific objectives easily. As for our example, we can come up with the following specific objectives:

* To discover the number of hours a blogger writes a post
* To explore the blogging-related activities of bloggers
* To determine the consistency of bloggers in their everyday activities
* To compare the activity of bloggers

Not that hard right? Be sure to give some time but don’t spend the whole day thinking about it. After all, they are pretty easy to make, well, once you get used to it.

What Do I Have to Do to get on Technorati Top 100?

2008-09-04T01:23:00.000-07:00

You are probably laughing at me now. A complete beginner in the blogosphere is asking how to get to Technorati's Top 100. Very amusing.

But before you laugh your sides off. Let me tell you that I do not need your answers. I'm going to find out the answer for myself. That is why this September, my first ever monthly study for Web Researchoo will be no other than "The Secrets of Technorati Top 100".

Are you going to teach us blackhat methods?

Of course not! What I'm going to show you are cold, hard facts on what the Top 100 are currently doing that you may have forgotten.

Yeah right! Like a newbie can do that.

Yes. Any ordinary researcher can do that. It takes some time and effort. But anyone can do it. I'm going to prove to you that blog research is something more and should not be belittled. It can move blogs to greater heights if utilized properly.

How are you going to do that?

I will conduct content analyses on the Top 100 websites on Technorati. This a usual qualitative method that lists and tallies repetitive elements in a particular medium. There is usually four facets to this method namely visual mode, content mode, personality mode and audio mode. However, since blogs are the media. I'm not going to include the audio mode.

Can I see the results?

Of course! But you have to wait. Research, after all, cannot be rushed. I will be making several small articles regarding the research when it's done. So watch out for it.

It All Starts With A Problem......

2008-09-04T01:20:00.001-07:00

A research problem in simple terms is what you would like to achieve. As much as the problem does not take much sweat, it is a process that must be taken seriously by all researchers. But defining the problem should not be hard. Let me give you some tips on how to define a research problem.

Find a problem

When you approach a situation, try to critique it. Try to find loopholes. Think about the situation in different perspectives. Subdivide the situation to parts and then look at it as a whole. This will give you your research problem.

For example, let’s approach the situation of avatar forum sites. These websites are characterized by a forum with playable avatars that can be dressed and games where members can participate. These websites earn its money through donations. They have high traffic so the chances of receiving donations are also high. Or is it?

You can find this out by studying the factors that influences the donation rates of a website. You can conduct a study on the people participating in avatar forum sites. So your problem will be “What factors influence the donation rates in your chosen avatar forum site?”

Generate further questions on the problem

So you have defined your research problem. Next thing you need to do is ask further questions. We can understand this better by going back to our example. We can see through the situation better by subdividing it into segments. These factors that may influence donation rates can be age distribution, gender, occupations of members and the rate of donation. From here you can ask the following question: How many of them are teens? How many men and women? How many of them have jobs? How many of them donate? These are your specific problems. As you may have noticed, this is just your main research problem broken down.

Define your problem’s value

Now that you are done in defining your general and specific problems, you now have to analyze your problems. Do they have value? By value, I mean its contribution to the world of research.

Relating back to our example, try to think about who will benefit in the study on avatar forum websites? This may be the avatar forum website owners or those online marketers who are planning to enter the avatar forum business. If your research will cater to a particular audience and will help change their lives, then it is safe to say your research is valuable.

An indicator of your research problem’s value is its relevance to a lot of people. The problem must come from the experience of everyone and not just your own. If you are the only one having a problem, then the problem may not lie on the situation but on you. A background research may be necessary which you will conduct in the following step.

Consider time and financial constraints

Last, but not the least, consider time and financial constraints. Don’t be overly ambitious and formulate a research question that is impossible to solve. Your research must be realistic. If you can’t go through with the research because of time or money, you can switch to a more specific research problem or change perspectives.

These are just some tips for you to quickly come up with your research problem. Remember, the research problem is the root of your research. This is where all other parts of your research will be built upon. So choose your problem well.

7 Characteristics of a Good Online Marketing Researcher

2008-09-04T01:03:00.000-07:00

Are you researcher material? If you have not thought about it, you can take a look at the following characteristics to see if you possess them.

Keen Sense of Observation

Almost researchers possess a keen sense of observation. As a science, researching is about finding details that may have been forgotten or taken for granted. It is therefore important for you to practice those observation skills. You need not only obseerve the physical attributes of your surroundings. You may also observe the behavior of the people or the placement of certain things. These things may relate to another for all you know. Though it may take some practice, it is not hard. Observation, after all, is innate in all of us.

Good Communication Skills

Good researchers can express themselves well. This is very useful not only in wrting the research paper but also in communicating with subjects and clients. Good researchers know when to use high technical terms and when to avoid it. They know how to construct their paper so they can share their discovery to the world.

But of course, it all depends on whom your research is for. If you are making it for the academic community, then technical terms are okay. But if you are making it for ordinary people, then getting the idea across is more important. Even if you decide to make the research for yourself, communication skills are still required in your communication with your respondents.

Friendly and Approachable

Of course, it does not end with having good communication skills. Good researchers are also friendly and approachable. It is important that researchers do not exhibit an air of arrogance. Researchers must be able to reach out to their respondents so that they can get the full perspective in a situation. This is especially useful if you are going to use focus interviews or focus groups discussions for your study.

Unattached

All researches require some degree of detachment, Though more prevalent in quantitative research, little detachment is still required in the qualitative field. Detachment pertains to your assumption that you are a researcher. You therefore have the role to look at a situation in an unbiased way.

Good researchers know when to engage with their respondents and when to detach themselves. As a researcher, you should not forget this. Depicting a situation with your biases is the last thing you want to do.

High Tolerance to Text or Numbers

Research is written work. It can be made up of text (qualitative) or numbers(quantitative). But all researchers go through writing a research paper.

If you want to be a researcher, you must therefore have if not a high tolerance but a love for text and numbers. You are going to face them all the time once you become a researcher. So you better love them or leave them.

Logical Assessment Skills

This skill is very important. It is the skill that will analyze and generate conclusions from the results of your study. Without it, the accuracy or the overall value of your research may be sacrificed.

It is unique for researchers to have logical assessment skills. It does take practice. You can easily acquire this by reading te analysis section of other researches.

Honest and With Integrity

A good researcher always exercises honesty and integrity. It is very important to avoid copying and pasting other people’s work as well as copying other’s ideas. Tampering the results is also a no-no. Remember, research is for discovery. How can you discover something new if you keep copying? How can you generate new ideas if you tamper the results? I hope you are getting the wisdom behind this characteristic. Good researchers are honest researchers.

So there you have it. Seven characteristics that almost all successful researchers have. All these work hand-in-hand to ensure an accurate and well written research study.

Google Shares Videos

2008-09-02T06:10:00.001-07:00

Google had outdone itself once again. It has currently released a new application on Google Apps: videos. The new video applications in Google Apps has an easy to use functionality like Youtube but it is mostly created for corporations.

The difference of Google video from other video sharing websites is its security. It is specifically designed for corporations where they can upload videos that can be securely viewed by members of their company. There is no risk of videos being scraped or stolen. This feature can come in handy especially in training videos, customer relations, corporate social responsibility presentation and executive communication.

The new feature also includes interactive components such as video search, video tagging, video rating and downloading. Moreover, the design is flexible and can be viewed even on iPhone browsers.

The application is available to all members of the Google Apps Premier Edition. It does not incur any additional cost. Each user will be given a whopping 3GB of video memory.

Further announcements from Google states that they will release an edicational version of the application on September 8. This will allow teachers to easily share videos with their students. However, the application's free trial will only last until March 9, 2009. They said they will charge $10 per year after that time frame.

Marketing Research vs. Market Research

2008-09-01T05:44:00.000-07:00

Marketing research and market research are two important terms that I will be using throughout this blog. It is therefore best for you to not only understand what they mean, but also how they differ from each other. They are related but totally different terms that have always driven people to confusion.

So are you confused? Surely their difference is more than just the extra –ing. Let me help you understand these terms by highlighting their key differences.

Analogy - Market Research:Customers, Marketing Research: Marketing Process

If you know the difference of market from marketing, then you are one step ahead in understanding this problematic duo.

Market research is the study of customers. It is taking into account their characteristics such as age, sex, attitudes and beliefs in studying their purchasing behavior. Market research is very useful and should not taken for granted. It has the ability to predict who are the customers who will buy your product as well as when and why they will buy it. And since, you are employing a scientific procedure, you can expect accurate results. Applications of market research in online marketing is in studying visitor conversion, an area of concern to most online marketers because it is the root of all online revenue.

Market research is the study of customers

Marketing research, on the other hand, is the study of the whole marketing process. It does not only entail the customers but also the product, the website, the design and even the seller. Marketing research is very helpful for it studies each aspect of an online marketing business to ensure its success.

Marketing Research Is Broader Than Market Research

As you may have noticed in the definition given in the first point, marketing research is broader. It includes a lot of other elements. It does not focus on one aspect alone like market research does. Again, market research is concerned merely with customers while marketing research is concerned with the whole marketing process which can include more aspects.

Market Research Is An Aspect Of Marketing Research

Customers is the focus of market research. But customers is just part of the whole

Marketing research is the study of the whole marketing process.

marketing process. In the same way that market research is a study of the customers. It is just a part of the whole marketing research process.

So there. I hope I have managed to erase the shadow of confusion residing in your minds. Marketing research and market research are two distinct, but very important terms. So be sure you understand it fully.

What is Online Marketing Research?

2008-09-01T05:26:00.000-07:00

So what is online marketing research? I know you may have been wondering. It is a term that is rarely defined on the internet. That is the reason why I decided to do it here in my blog.

But before I give you my own definition, let me refer you to some resources which gives general, but useful, definitions of the term.

Marketing research is the function that links the consumer, customer, and public to the marketer through information - information used to identify and define marketing opportunities and problems; generate, refine, and evaluate marketing actions; monitor marketing performance; and improve understanding of marketing as a process. Marketing research specifies the information required to address these issues, designs the methods for collecting information, manages and implements the data collection process, analyzes, and communicates the findings and their implications. - American Marketing Association

marketing research is the systematic and objective identification, collection, analysis, and dissemination of information for the purpose of assisting management in decision making related to the identification and solution of problems and opportunities in marketing. - Wikipedia

research that gathers and analyzes information about the moving of good or services from producer to consumer. - Dictionary.com

Those definitions look a bit complicated, aren’t they? Now let me give you my definition.

marketing research is studying an aspect of product selling

For me, marketing research is studying an aspect of product selling. These aspects pertain to the product or service, the customers, the pricing, the distribution of products and much more. In online marketing research, these aspects are different. Other aspects such as keywords, competitors, advertisements, design and traffic are also taken into consideration. To put it simply, marketing research is the process of choosing a specific aspect and employing a method with the goal of discovering new information.

To help you understand this, let me give you an example. Let’s imagine you like to know the effectiveness of your banner advertisement. You chose to experiment by putting your banner in different areas of your website and then systematically recording the results, click-throughs. You then analyze the results and come up with a conclusion.

That is research. It is when you choose a particular aspect of product selling (in this case the banner advertisement) and then employing a method (experiment) with the goal of discovering information (effectiveness). It also entails measuring the results in a particular unit(click-throughs), analyzing them and coming up with a conclusion.

So this is how I define marketing research. I hope I didn’t give you a hard time understanding it. It’s a very simple concept that can be understood better in application.

Are you Quantitative or Qualitative?

2008-09-01T05:15:00.000-07:00

It’s normal for us researchers to be lost when defining which perspective to take in our study. It is not enough to have knowledge on the difference of qualitative from quantitative research. We still have to take an honest look at our research and choose our perspective from there.

the perspective does not come from the research paper, it is from the researcher.

But what a lot of people forget is that the research paper is merely a reflection of the researcher. You may not realize it but you hold the power to choose your perspective. It is important to note that the perspective does not come from the research paper, it is from the researcher. So I think you should shift that focus from your research paper to yourself.

As you take your time scrutinizing yourself, let me give you ten things to think about so you can decide if you are more fitted in the qualitative or quantitative field.

1. Are you a fully organized person or are you a person who finds a system in chaos?

Researchers are not always organized. There are a lot of researchers that fit in the other category. But the problem is, where do you fit?

Try to examine how you accomplish little tasks. Do you always have a plan? Do you do things systematically, like in a procedure? Do you set deadlines for yourself and follow it? Or are you the other way around? Being unorganized is by no means a negative attribute to have in research. In fact, it can be beneficial for some for these are the people who make revolutionary discoveries. But it’s up to your system. Are you inherently systematic or do you find a system in chaos?

If you are systematic, then perhaps it is best that you take the quantitative perspective. Quantitative research requires a lot of organization and the slightest mistake in the tally of data can cost your accurate results. On the other hand, if you are okay with chaos, perhaps you can take on the qualitative perspective. In here, you can find a lot of new ideas even in the bombardment of information.

2. Do you want to cover a topic in its widest scope or in a small and specific scope?

As much as this depends on what goal you have for your study, you must also take into considerations your attitude about it. Think about it this way. Do you like to cover a topic that you can see everywhere or do you like to cover a topic that occurs every once in a while? Do you want to reflect a phenomenon as it occurs to a lot of people or would you like to focus on a certain experience of a certain number of persons?

The key here is depth and breadth. If you want to cover phenomenon in its broadest sense then you are more qualified to be a quantitative researcher. On the other hand, if you want to depict phenomena in its depth, then the qualitative path may be for you.

3. Do you find yourself detached from the people you are talking to or are you always involved in what they say?

It is time to observe your behavior when talking with others. Are you the active listener type or the detached listener type? Do you find yourself sharing your own experience as someone else shares their story? Do you think of new ideas as you watch a television program? Or are you the critical type which listens, but filters out information?

Active listener types fit in the qualitative category. These people can take in the experiences of others and craft them into a story. On the other hand, detached or critical listeners can take the quantitative field. They can immediately analyze and filter phenomenon like science does.

4. Do you want to explore or describe a phenomenon or would you like to analyze or predict it?

Phenomenon can be treated as an occurrence to describe or an element to predict. You can examine your approach by looking at how you treat a situation that comes your way. Do you view it as merely an experience or something that may lead to other things?

If you own a diary and reflect your experiences everyday, you may not know it but you are already a qualitative researcher. You take things as they come and you reflect on it. But if you are a person who thinks everything leads to another, which means aside from the basic routine, you analyze and predict the behavior of others. Perhaps you are more fitted to be a quantitative researcher.

5. Do you like to make researches from established theories or do you like to make theories yourself?

There are a lot of established theories on any field but do you use them when you research about something? You can but you don’t always have to. You are gifted with a keen sense of observation and you have a mind that can see patterns and trends. Of course, you can make your own theories.

But the question is, where are you most comfortable? Would you be more comfortable in creating your own theories or applying existing ones? Of course, this could depend on your topic and time frame. With a shorter time frame, it is best to apply existing theories.

If you are a creator of theories, then you can find yourself in the qualitative area. But if you are more comfortable applying existing theories, then you are most likely quantitative in nature.

6.Are you more concerned with meanings or are you more concerned with conclusions?

After you finish a particular study, you can depict your results in two ways: as meanings or as conclusions. The qualitative field is more concerned with meanings. It does not matter that a lot of people experience a certain thing. What qualitative research is concerned about is the experience of each person and the meanings which can be derived from them. On the other hand, quantitative research tries to find a pattern and make conclusions. It collects experiences and concludes based on the experiences felt by the majority.

7.Do you view things piece-wise or do you view them as a whole?

This will depend on your eyes. Do you always see the big picture or are your eyes focused on the little picture? By eyes, I mean your mind’s vision and not your literal eyesight. Do you view situations as a whole or do you point out the little elements first?

If you have a holistic mind’s eye, then you are most likely a qualitative researcher. On the other hand, if you take little details like puzzle pieces to build the big picture, then you can perform better as a quantitative researcher.

8.Do you adopt a particular perspective or you do not choose any perspective to take?

By perspective, I do not mean the qualitative or quantitative perspective. What I mean is perspectives like the Feminist Perspective, Structural Functionalist Perspective, Marxist Perspective and the likes. To put it simply, these perspectives reflects how you view the world. Like how feminists (viewing the world as a conflict between males and females) and marxists (viewing the world as a conflict between classes) do.

All people have their own perspectives about the world. It’s just a matter of when do you use these perspectives in your research. For a quantitative researcher, they usually choose one or two perspective on a certain issue. But for a qualitative researcher, all perspectives are worthy of study. Given this, it’s up to you on which path you would like to take.

9.Do you do research to learn something or do you do it so that you can generate conclusions about a situation or phenomenon?

This is the stage where you can ask yourself this question. “Why are you researching?” Are you researching to gain knowledge on how the world works or are you researching so you can predict how the world works? These are two different things. The first one (researching how the world works) is trying to get an insight or explanation so you can describe or explore the situation. This is prevalent in qualitative research. The other one (predicting how the world works) is generating conclusions on what can happen if a situation happens again. This is prevalent in quantitative research.

10.Would you like to partake in an ever-changing research or a fixed one?

Perhaps you are most familiar with fixed researches where the objectives and framework are clearly defined. You may have encountered these in your experiments in the science lab back in high school. This is quantitative research. But there is such a thing as an ever-changing research. This is found in the qualitative field where your objectives, theories, and framework can change along the way. So it is up to you on which fits your personality better.

I know that there may be lots of questions on your mind after reading this. You may found that your characteristics are mixed with qualitative and quantitative characteristics. Don’t fret! This is fine. After all, there is no completely quantitative or qualitative person. Quantitative characteristics come from our logical instincts while qualitative characteristics come from our being human. Unless you are a robot with no emotions or a blob with no mind, you will exhibit both characteristics every once in a while.

But how can you decide which path to take? Choose the path which you exhibit more. If you have more qualitative characteristics, then you can fare better making qualitative studies. The same way can be derived with quantitative characteristics.

However, I do not hope that this article limits your world. I am not stopping you from making qualitative or quantitative studies. By all means, you should try both to gain a better learning experience. This is just a healthy exercise on how your researcher instincts work when you conduct a study. Hopefully after reading this article, you can clearly see what your research perspective is.

The Path to Easier Blogging: Zemanta

2008-09-01T04:12:00.000-07:00

Crafting a blog post takes more than just typing a series of words. It requires research or background reading as well as coming up with images and tags and of course, building traffic. It's a good thing that technology have created some tools that always makes our lives easier.

Let me introduce Zemanta, a very helpful tool which can be easily integrated into your own browsers (Internet Explorer and Firefox). It generates popular posts which gives you an idea on what topics will tick as well as help you get images and tags that will complement your blog. Most of all, it will help promote your post by linking it to multiple related blog posts. Now what would be better than that?

You can download your Zemanta in here. Don't forget to read the FAQ so you will not get lost.

Of course, Zemanta is just one tool. There are other tools out there. But one can;t deny the amount of work and time Zemanta saves.

10 reasons why you should engage in research

2008-09-01T00:37:00.000-07:00

Why should you engage in research? I will give you ten good reasons.

1. Research guides you to the right niche

There is nothing worse than a website operating with a wrong niche topic. This website is doomed to fail no matter what you try to do. You can observe the following things. Your website has no visitors, it has visitors but they all leave and never come back or you have very useful content but your website has sunk to the bottom of the internet’s archives. Don’t worry. Everything is not in vain. There is a solution for this.

Research can help you discover the right niche for your website. You can conduct studies on the effectiveness of certain niches so you can arrive at your effective niche. By studies, I mean you have to employ certain processes. Keyword analysis, the process where certain topics or keywords are investigated for their search and competition statistics, is considered just an aspect of marketing research. You could also study your website in other ways such as using comparative analysis to compare yourself with your competitors or conducting online surveys to solicit target market feedback. These are just some ways on how marketing research can help you in finding the right niche topic.

2. Research helps you think of topics to write about

Being stuck in writer’s block can be pretty frustrating. We all experience this. If you don’t, trust me, you will. This can be a problem especially when your website needs constant updating to sustain its visitors. Nobody wants to visit a website without updated information.

Fortunately, research is a new way of generating relevant and useful content for your website. If you can’t think of anything to write about, simply conduct research on a subniche of your topic and Bam! Instant content. Of course it’s easier said than done because you have to go through the whole research process. But it’s better than just sitting in a corner and wracking your brain for a topic.

3. Research adds credibility to your content

If there is one thing that research, in general, specializes in, it is in adding credibility to your content. For example, a lot of news programs utilize research to back-up their reports. This way, research adds credibility to what they are saying. Another example is when corporations hire researchers to review their product and service. This will then boost the reputation of the certain product or service. With these examples, imagine how marketing research can boost the credibility of your website. It can not only generate a lot of visitors but generate a loyal audience.

To understand this, let me give you a hypothetical situation. Imagine you are looking for information on “search engine optimization strategy”. You visited a website that is making all these claims that its search engine optimization strategy can help your website gain better rankings. The claims are not backed up with research (meaning it does not have a case study or an experiment of a successful website the website owner has done with the strategy) so the claims can be made up. You then become skeptical and do not believe the website owner. You leave the website and the website loses a loyal visitor.

Of course, this does not always happen. There are a lot of visitors who still believe these unsupported claims. However, these are also the people who lose their time, effort and money in the process. This is the result of trial and error. It can also lose you your resources. So save yourself the trouble and learn marketing research. This could help you build your credibility and prevent customers from falling into traps. It could help everyone.

4. Research lets you take control of your business

Are you one of those website owners who are leaving the success of their online business to the Gods? Then get yourself together and start controlling your business. In controlling, I do not mean merely putting up new content, moderating feedbacks and hosting domains. What I mean is controlling every little detail like the effectiveness of your website design, the placing of words, the fonts and colors used, the placement of your advertisements, the size of the pictures, etc…you get the idea.

You may be wondering how impossible that task is but that’s what marketing researchers do. We speculate on little details that may or may not have an effect on your online business and then generate a conclusion on its significance. You may be twitching in your seat saying “Why should I bother?”. The simple answer is this. All these little elements can help you predict the success of your online business.

How? Well, let me give you an example, I conducted a study for my class about the effectiveness of MTV contraceptive advertisements to the youth. Through the study, I have found out a lot of details. I found out that the kind of message, the person who promotes the message and their preliminary beliefs shapes their chance of being convinced by the advertisement. Another thing I found is that the creative design of the commercial does not contribute anything to the goal (convincing the youth to use contraceptives). Now imagine I’m an employee of MTV and I want to make a contraceptive commercial. This study will help me build an effective commercial for the target audience. This is because I know which elements relate and does not relate to my goal. I hope you are seeing the power of marketing research in this situation.

Now imagine you would like to build a website about a diet product. You defined your target audience to be young to middle-aged women. You then conduct a research study on how they respond to another website selling a similar diet product to what you want to sell. You can then ask what are they looking for or expecting in that website through a focus interview or a survey. From there, you can find what the website lacks. You can also find out about the needs of the market. With these in mind, you can create a product that can exactly meet their needs and expectations. Think about it. Wouldn’t this step increase the sell rate of the product you are planning to make? Wouldn’t this automatically beat that website you have tested? This is the power of marketing research. Through taking a few extra steps, you can take control of business outcomes.

5. Research increases your website’s effectiveness

Did I mention that you could measure your website’s effectiveness with marketing research? You can do this by generating and measuring the feedback of your visitors. But don’t go and just put a feedback form in your website. As you may have already discovered, research is always doing more than the usual task. Instead of garnering a set of feedbacks, you can analyze each and every feedback and weigh which ones are relevant to your website. You can use surveys or focus interviews. You may even extend the research project to an experiment where you can test how the visitors will respond to each change on your website.

Testing your website’s effectiveness is like testing its success rate. It really won’t hurt you if you take a few extra steps to ensure that your website will succeed. Also, conducting research can help you get a clear picture on your chances against your competitors. It does not only minimize the risks but also help you save time, effort and money.

6. Research helps you meet your audience’s needs

The beauty of research is its flexibility. It can take on various focal points. You can either focus on your website or focus on your audience.

Marketing research on target markets is popular. In fact, a lot of companies want to know what their market want or need before they release a particular product. In the same way, online marketers can make use of marketing research. With this, they can create products that will meet the needs of their target market. It always helps to get the market’s views earlier than deal with a mountain of complaints later.

7. Research increases your customers

After conducting marketing research on your audience, you are now aware of their needs. I think it is safe to assume that your audience can turn into customers. Just look at it this way. You ask a person what they need. You went out and bought it and show it to the person. The person sees it and is interested in it. As a marketer or seller, you tell the person you are willing to sell the item for a very low price for him. Since the person needs the item, the chances that he will buy the item from you is very high don’t you think?

Just imagine how much money you can earn from these potential customers. And imagine how many customers you can get. That’s your reward for taking an extra step to study your market.

8. Research improves your product or service

Believe me. No matter how much you have tried to perfect a product, your customers will always see a tiny flaw. This is where marketing research comes into play.

Here is a sample of how you can employ marketing research on your website. You can try feedback processing. This is the process where you take a closer look on each product feedback and analyze them to see which ideas can contribute to your product’s improvement. You may use methods like focus interviews or experiments if necessary.

The purpose of improving your product or service goes back to addressing your customer’s needs. By improving your product to suit their needs, you can expect your customers to return or even freely promote your product.

9. Research helps you beat your competitor

Since research can help you analyze your own website, it also gives you the power to analyze your competitor’s website. You can then take a look at the process they employ or focus on the little details they do. You can conduct a website effectiveness analysis to find out why your competitor is successful. From there, you can devise a plan to do more than what they are doing so you can beat them.

Competitor analysis is another aspect of marketing research. It does not only limit itself to counting links and beating your competitor in rankings. Marketing research is about beating your competitor’s revenues.

10. Research increases your website’s exposure

If you have studied your market’s needs, you can also expect regular traffic to your website. By continuously satisfying your audience, you can expect them to come back, hungry for more. Just imagine how your website will fare with a regular audience and the power of viral marketing (marketing through word of mouth).

So there, I have provided you some reasons on how research can benefit you. Remember, research is not search engine optimization. It is something more. It requires more effort but reaps better rewards.

Welcome to Web Researchoo

2008-08-31T23:59:00.000-07:00

My name is Aira Bongco. I'm a Filipino researcher living in Manila, Philippines. I'm a 3rd-year student majoring in Communication Research and minoring in Sociology and I have created this blog so I can share my knowledge on research as it applies to the blogosphere. I can say I have considerable experience. I have conducted several researches, as required by my course, and I have studied interpersonal interaction, advertising and corporate communication. My interests in web-related processes such as search engine optimization (SEO), niche analysis and web promotion have encouraged me to come up with this blog.

Why ReSearchoo?

I came up with ReSearchoo with the idea of integrating research with blogging. I realized that there has been an overflow of information on the blogging niche when all of these are just some aspects of the huge world of what blogging is In the eye of a researcher.

My aim is to create an information resource so that bloggers can know, understand and apply marketing research and improve the performance of their blog more than other processes can.

How did you come up with the idea?

While studying, I noticed some gaps in the way our University handled the course. The functions of mainstream media such as television, radio and newspaper, is well covered, while other forms of media such as the internet or cellphones are forgotten. For me, this can be a problem for the usage of these media is steadily increasing. I then began to take it in myself to integrate research with internet-related processes such as online marketing. I think this can provide a fresh way of viewing, studying and improving online marketing.