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What is marketing intelligence?
Market intelligence reflects and refines the company's understanding of the relationship to that of the external environment in which it is situated. Furthermore it can be said that market intelligence is the information about the external markets that is relevant to the company's market. This information is generally used in aiding the company to make a confident and informed decision regarding the feasibility of opportunities in the market.
Market intelligence can be defined as the step-by-step process of accumulating, evaluating, supplying and applying of information (qualitative and quantitative) about the external market environment. This process also includes the analysis of competitors, to give you competitive advantage, this process is more a case of putting a structure in place than a once-off data collection as competitors are constantly evolving. With market intelligence not only do you improve you planning, decision-making, operations and performance, you will also increase the volume of the voice of your consumer from a tiny whisper to a loud roar.
Why is market intelligence important?
- Market and customer orientation – this promotes external focus
- Identification of new opportunities – helps identify new trends before the competitor
- Early warning of competitor's moves – enables counter moves to be put in place
- Minimizes investment risks – detect threats and trends early on
- Better customer interaction – gain an intensified customer view of the market
- Better market selection and positioning – discover your company's unused or under-used potential
- Quicker, efficient and cost-effective information – saves costs on unnecessary consultants
There are two spheres when it comes to market intelligence; internal market intelligence and external market intelligence which is generally gathered by means of desk research. The ability to track down sources of information is essential to desk research. The Internet, being as extensive as it is, makes it far easier to obtain market intelligence about about other companies as you can open any company's website and pull information about their expected trends and market predictions.
Very often there is a lot of untapped information that can be analyzed from the internal market intelligence within your company. This means that existing information can be analyzed, such as database analysis to determine what type of clients are the most profitable and so on.
Who can aid you with market intelligence?
Any company that does market research would be able to compile an extensive market intelligence portfolio for you. Always ensure that you are employing the services of a reputable company such as the services of George Klein and Associates. George Klein and Associates have been in the market research business since 1980. The company is a registered corporate member of the South African Market Research Association (SAMRA). Each member of the staff is also registered as individuals of SAMRA.
GK&A offers professional service; the directors personally oversee the market studies and conduct the analysis, interpretation and report back personally. The variety of services provided by GK&A are listed as follows:
Market qualification, Market Information, market segmentation studies and market intelligence
- Communication strategy and programmes
- Usage of and attitudes towards products and services
- Customer needs
- Supplier performance
- New product and service acceptance
- Buyer and specifier acceptance
- Locating business partners and representation
- Corporate image
- Communication audit
- Pricing and distribution
- Forecasting
- Feasibility studies
Market intelligence is but a small percentage of the services the company provide but integral none the less.
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