Research that ends in a decision.
Category sizing, competitor mapping, buyer interviews and win-loss analysis, run so that what arrives at the end is a set of decisions you can take.
- Typical length
- Four to six weeks
- Buyer interviews
- Five to fifteen
- Ends with
- Decisions, written down
What market research is here
It is the work of finding out what your buyers actually think, in their words, and setting that against what the category looks like and what your competitors are already saying. Most companies have a confident internal answer to all three. It is usually a few years old and was never checked.
The method is deliberately plain. We speak to your customers and to people who chose somebody else. We read the category the way a buyer would, through search, through review sites, through the material your competitors publish. We sit with your sales team and go through the deals that closed and the deals that did not.
What separates this from a research deck is the last step. Every finding is turned into a decision with an owner: what to say, who to say it to, what to stop spending on. A finding nobody acts on cost you the same as one that changed the plan.
Scope
What is included
Buyer and customer interviews
Thirty to forty-five minutes each, run by us rather than by your account manager, so people say the awkward part. We record, transcribe and quote them directly in the findings.
Win and loss review
The deals you took and the deals you lost, read together with your sales team. Loss reasons in a CRM are written by the person who lost, and they are rarely the real reason.
Competitor and category analysis
What every serious competitor claims, what they charge for, where they are visible and what they leave unsaid. The gap in what nobody claims is usually the position worth taking.
Search and question mapping
The questions your category actually types, at what volume, and which of them nobody has answered well. This is where research meets the demand you can go and capture.
Segment sizing
How many companies fit each segment you could serve, what they are worth, and how hard each is to reach. Enough to sequence the segments rather than chase all of them.
A findings document with the evidence in it
Written, with the quotes, the numbers and the sources attached to each claim, so anybody who was not in the room can check the reasoning instead of trusting it.
How it runs
Week one
We agree the questions this research has to answer and who has to be spoken to. You approve the interview list. Anything we cannot get access to gets named now rather than explained away later.
Weeks two to four
Interviews, the win and loss review, category and competitor work, and search demand mapping. We send a running note of what we are hearing each week, so nothing in the final document is a surprise.
Weeks five and six
Findings written up, turned into decisions, and presented once to the people who have to act on them. Then the whole thing is handed over, sources included.
What you get
- A written findings document with the evidence attached to each claim
- Interview transcripts and the recordings
- A competitor and category map
- Segment sizing with the assumptions shown
- A decision list: what to do, what to stop, and who owns each one
How it is judged
- Whether the decisions were taken, which is the only outcome this work controls
- Whether sales and marketing now describe the buyer the same way
- Win rate in the segments the research told you to prioritise
- Cost per qualified lead once the message changed
Questions we get asked
How many people do you interview?
Do you speak to our customers directly?
What if the research says our current positioning is right?
How is this different from a market report we could buy?
Do we have to buy anything else from you afterwards?
Next
Find out what your buyers actually think
Tell us the decision you are stuck on and who you sell to. We come back with the questions this research would have to answer, who we would need to speak to, and how long it takes.
Related services
The work behind this