Preparing a Market Study

Other Points

• The information provided in a market study should be based on research collected AND NOT on one’s own perceptions, guesstimates or other unsupported statements. The only exception to this may be within the SWOT analysis, however, even most of this should be supported with some evidence.
• If you are unable to find certain information it is probably a good idea to make this known so the person reading the report would know of this potential limitation of the market study. Obviously you need to collect good research so you do not end up having too many of these statements.
• It is generally a good idea to define important terms and concepts when you first introduce them.  This will benefit those reading the report who may not possess knowledge in this area. Alternatively, you can create a glossary or definition section in the Endnotes area of the report. 
• Where necessary explain how the research was conducted or how data was collected (e.g., explaining how survey was done).
• Make note of any limitations of secondary research (research you obtained from other sources) that you used. Unless there are very significant limitations you can generally include this as an endnote.
• If you are investigating a new/different way of doing something with present customers, then you will need to provide a discussion of the cost/benefit of alternative options. That is, what will customer give up to use something new versus what they will get from using the new product.
• Remember to reference as much as is needed. We recommend using endnotes instead of footnotes. Endnotes appear next to the sentence, word, quote, number, etc. but usually not as a superscript and usually in parenthesis like this (1). The full reference would appear at the back of the report in an Endnotes section.