Why Designers should learn Market Research skills ?

Doing market research is really required for design study. Is it really required being a designer? Marketing people and sales people do this, right? Why should a designer do it? This podcast is going to address these questions and also give you a seven step process how you can really make a robust market research done for your project before you start ideating. Okay, so now let's dive deep into this podcast, guys. This is going to really help you in terms of making a very good problems solved in a more precise and easier and templated way so that you can get a guide and clarity, okay? And also this podcast is going to help you with the creative elements also and the resources also so that you can build on top of it. I always tell do not follow templates, but have it as a guide and reference. From there you can build on top of that. Okay, so with this clarity, let's dive into the market research for product design projects. Guys, welcome. Guys, welcome, welcome. Thank you so much for staying fine tuning with me in Design for Change podcast. So today we're going to understand what is this market research? Okay? Let's say if you're doing a product design, let's say if you're doing a user interface and user experience design, let's say if you're doing a branding design, let's say if you're doing any design, market research is very important. Hey Jagdish, I'm doing an imaginary project, I'm doing a dummy project. Whatever it is, guys, market is definitely there, right? You're not going to design something for your house and you want to keep it even for that. You need to understand certain things in the market, right? How people have did what the other home has did. Something like that, right? So when it comes to product design, it's very vital to understand this awareness first. Many people have the problem in awareness itself. Why should I do? If they get this awareness, they'll find out a way to do it. Because this podcast is going to give you that clarity also because you need to understand the reason behind it, right? Then and only it will become more understanding. And there is another big important part of it. Hey, if I research too much in the market, I'll become biased. I'll not become creative. Let me tell you guys, do not have this kind of an amateur thinking, right? Let me tell you one thing. If you are a creative designer, you need to know when to use your analytical and logical mind very carefully. You need to understand the complete aspect of solving a problem for a audience or a market before showing your supremacy in creativity, right? Did you understand what I said? This is very important. Showing your creative skill is not designed. Solving the exact problem and creating an impact is actually called design. And then use your skills with aligning that. If you switch this perspective, guys, the way in which you start solving problems will be very different from others. You will bring a great output, you will bring a meaningful impact. You will get promoted faster, you will get more projects. You will never be thrown out of any industry. If you are working for a corporate, even if you are startup, your product will have its uniqueness. Some of the big entrepreneurs and billionaires have become like that. It's because of this one trait. Okay, so the first important thing is understanding and defining your target market. That's the first step in market research. Okay, you need to understand who's your target audience. Is it age, from 15 to 30? Is it ethnography? It is relating to a different culture. Like let's say Hindu religion, let's say Muslim religion. People who follow this Shia, Sunni religion and what is their practices and what are the demography, where are they staying, geography and what are the psychographic understanding? See, this is actually called targeting a particular audience, right? You need to be clear on that and you need to know how to position them. Okay, they are very premium people and they pay a lot of money for using their products and services. So we can able to create a premium segment of the product for them. Yeah, you can do that positioning and you can also do segmentation. We can first segment for this particular target and then we can segment it for the other group. And then we can third segment it for a different group. See Facebook ad and Google Ad. If you see, you will know this positioning, targeting and segmentation. They do it for lead generation, other activities. But as a designer you need to understand how these algorithms are working. Not coding algorithm, I'm saying how these algorithms are planned. You need to think about it. See, then and only Facebook and YouTube will be. Google will be sending you ads accordingly, right? You won't get any random ads. You would have understood, you would have searched something and the next day you will get ads. Regarding to that. How this is exactly the algorithm of Facebook and YouTube. As understood, you are needing that particular thing. That is why they are posting their products and services accordingly. Very simple. Same wise, if you retrack it and use it for your own design thinking and you will know what is your target audience really require? What is the product which is used for? What is the real problem you are trying to solve? What are the key features of that product? See, already customer is using some products. You have some competitor there, right? You need to understand what is the real purpose of the product, what it is solving, what is the key benefit and feature. Then and only you can define your particular target market and their needs and wants. Very clear. This is the first step which is defining that Persona. Second step is SWOT analysis. Yes. WOT. Yes for strength. W for weakness. O for opportunities. 3 for threat. Right? You need to understand what is the strength of your audience, of your competitor. Both you can do. Okay, Any competitor will see a little later. First we'll see the target audience. What is the strength? What is their weakness? What is the opportunities and what are the threats they have? See guys, you can map something like X, Y axis like this. Or you can even write it in a linear way. And you can put a tabular column of each SW ot and write it down. Write it down. Do not do anything. Only in digital. Always have a habit of doing analog way also. That's much more better. You get to visualize and sensitize more with that particular thing. Okay, so SW ot, you need to understand. Let's say if your user is an alcoholic guy. Okay, we'll take another example. Let's say if your user is like pet lover. Okay, so what is the strength of your target audience? Their strength is like they're very emotional. What is their weakness? The weakness is they are more emotional. That same strength could be a weakness. Also. What are the opportunities and you? They have a potential to really take care of lot many animals and they have a potential to empathize with more different breeds of same pets also. Okay, so you can see that opportunity and you can try to create a product around it. Why we are finding opportunities to create more product or service which can help them better solve their problem, right? Threat. What is the real threat for them? See, when you understand this, you tend to go much deeper into the market properly. It's a very structured way SWOT analysis. Okay, so third is pastel analysis. This is very interesting, guys. See, when you're lost in the research, when you're lost during your primary or secondary research, or your market researcher, competitor or anything, always remember this. Five words, six words, okay? P stands for political. E stands for economical. S stands for sociology, economic advantage or socio cultural. T stands for technology. E stands for environmental sustainability and all these things. L stands for legality. Okay? So Pestel analysis is normally used to really understand the wider perspective of the problem. Let's say if you're lost in the research, let's say if you are not having a clarity in what you're doing, or maybe if you feel like you have sufficiently corrected information, you can use pestle analysis to check that. See, normally I use pest P E S T but here also, I mean there is something called EL which adds one more perspective so that you can consider your environment as well as the legality. See guys, when you feel like you're lost, you can use this pestle analysis to make sure what you're doing, market research is in track, is in proper understanding. Is it really going to have a broader perspective covered? Because that is important, not leaving anything out of it, right? Sometimes you will not have a check also whether what I've collected information really covers everything. So Pestel analysis is a beautiful way you can check yourself and do it properly. Guys, okay, and when you do this pastel analysis, you will see the broader perspective of this problem, of this audience, of this ethnography of this particular brand, what you're trying to address it. See guys, this will give you a track where you're leading to. So this is the third aspect. The fourth aspect is competitor analysis. See, now you have to choose who is your competitors, who is the relevant competitors, who is somewhat like a tweaked competitor, who is somewhat like indirect competitors. Maybe they are not exactly doing what you're doing, but a part of it is very similar for you. So that is also you can consider as a competitor. Now try to map a strength. Now try to map a weakness. Now try to map an opportunity. Now try to map a threat. Yes, wot I said right? When you map different, different heat maps and different, different x axis, Y axis scale, putting different different parameters like pricing, like quality, like benefits, like the engagement of the user. More usability in mobile, more usability in website, more usability in tablet they have desktop app, mobile app. When you compare with this kind of 8, 9 parameters with your competitors, you will know where you are going to position yourself properly. What is the need exactly? The market is requiring what is the exact solution which you can offer? Is it a price? Is it a product quality? Is it a usability? Is it aesthetics? You will definitely know if it is a cost, if it's a high speed Internet, if it is a high speed application which you want to deliver, but your target audience is working in a very 2G kind of an area. Your target audience is there in the rural areas. Then you have to shift your entire focus of your project towards making very simpler graphics so that it can load very faster at your user. And right, you don't have to make a cool graphics and very high complex. That's not required. This is why market research is very important, right? And you are doing a competitor analysis. You will know where you can position yourself. This is the fourth thing. The fifth thing is. Okay, let me recap guys. The first is defining your Persona. Second is SWOT analysis. Third is pestered analysis. Fourth is competitor analysis. Fifth is market data and tools. I'll tell you, there is something called Google trend, guys. You can know the past, present and future. Like the trend can be analyzed there. And you can use Semrush. Semrush, It's a beautiful tool. You can use it Statista. Personally I've used Statista. It's a very good information tool where you can collect information and data and statistics and facts about industries and brands and markets and products and services, service. And then you can read about some industry reports, right? You can use Forrester, you can use Nielsen. So these are all some of the statistics of industry which can use and act like a tool and template to analyze your information. What you're doing. This is the fifth aspect. The sixth important step is taking lot of notes and adding additional points. See guys, entire thing, whatever I said till now, even an MBA guy or anybody could do it. Even a third party consultant who is just trained for a certificate program for three to four months will be able to do it. Even he doesn't need any MBA degree. But what way as a designer we are going to bring the uniquenesses, adding our perspectives and adding our analysis and adding our synthesis out of it. That is why you need to take a lot of additional notes after the steps. And you will try to draw a pattern. You will try to see the unseen which people have not seen. You will try to find a underlying pattern which is not detected for so many years. That brings the great thing. Okay, and the seventh important aspect is timeline. See guys, you can do this activity for endless. You can do it for one year also. You can do it for five years also. Yeah, there are some projects which is doing market research for five years. The point is you need to know when to stop it. You need to know what's your timeline of your client and budget and resources. And you need to stop that. Guys. Getting lost is very normal in design field. You need to adhere to the timeline. That's the seventh important thing. Okay, so let me recap guys. The first is defining your personals for the market research. Second is having the. In that definition itself you can choose positioning, targeting, segmenting. What is this Product really solving problem. What is this? Key benefits of this product. Yeah, the second is SWOT Analysis. Third is Pestle Analysis. Fourth is Competitor Analysis. Fifth is market tools and templates. We can use like Google Trainer, SEM Brush or Statistar or something. Sixth is adding more synthesis and informational additional things. Seventh is adhering to the timeline. Okay, so this is the exact steps you can follow to do a market research. Additionally, I will tell some resources. Also you can read a book called Mom Test by Rob Fitzpatrick. You can read a book called Lean Customer Development by Cindy Altravis. You can read Medium blog post, you can read Harvard Business Review, you can read Nielsen blogs on market research and you can use something like Indicators from Planet Money. These are all some of the podcast guys. You can listen to the podcast also. Same like what you're doing when you're traveling, when you're thinking it doesn't take your regular time, you can do it in your own way also. And you can use Masters of Scale. So Masters of Scale and Planet Money is two podcasts which I would suggest you. You can collect huge information for your market research and when you're doing this, you'll be unstoppable and you will be having a differentiation in your market research guys. Okay, thank you so much guys for staying tuning in with me. You wanted my support and mentoring to help you in terms of leading your project and getting into a proper job or internship. Or if you wanted to even get a good freelancing startup on design consulting, please feel free to reach out to me. I'll be more than happy to help and guide you. I'll check whether you're really eligible because you need to be serious to work with me because I take normally few students to help them, not everybody. And if you are selected, you will be one of them to work with me and get your tenure up here. Okay, so hit me a five star rating if you find this podcast useful in Spotify and Apple. And if you find any kind of improvement needs to be done, please feel free to type out in the chat box which I gave you what you think about episode. And you can hit a email also if you feel like adding some more information. Thank you so much guys. Thank you so much. Take care. Bye bye. God bless. 80.