To pose this question is something like a uchronia (a fictitious present, built on a different past, which never came to pass). Yes, it’s true, but at FOCUS Marketing Research South West Europe we wanted to do this imaginary exercise to highlight the value of market research for both companies that market mass consumer products and their end customers.
Let us imagine for a moment that companies had no choice but to launch products and services on the market blindly, without having the slightest idea about their degree of acceptance, about the competitors’ offer, about the size of the segment of their eventual customers, about their real needs and desires…
In such a scenario, innovation would be unthinkable, because companies would be forced to operate on a trial-and-error basis, committing precious resources to products and services with unpredictable commercialization, and at costs that would be difficult for a large part of the audience to bear.
Companies would operate in total blindness, trying to blindly guess market trends, changing consumer preferences or desires, and in total ignorance of their competitors’ offerings and strategies. Organizations would not be able to understand their potential customers and, therefore, anticipate their needs. We would be witnessing a world of missed opportunities and insurmountable challenges.
Consumers, for their part, would have to swim in a sea of confusion and uncertainty, trying to understand an offer of uncoordinated and unconnected products and services, as each company would launch its proposals on the market without guidance or concert, and which might not meet their needs and/or expectations.
IT’S HARD TO IMAGINE, ISN’T IT?
However, we are fortunate not to live in such a world. Market research is of great benefit to companies, but certainly also to consumers, as it allows them to choose and enjoy products and services that they really need or want, as opposed to the imposition that the ‘obscurity’ of the absence of market research would entail.
For companies, market research is a powerful and revealing beam of light that enables them to understand the needs, preferences, desires and behaviors of their respective audiences and, thus, facilitate informed decision making, making it possible to anticipate future challenges and take advantage of different opportunities.
