Possible questions of an SME leader
I did not choose the subtitle of my recently published book for no reason as the title of the article. The book's undisguised aim is to show (also) to SME leaders and to substantiate with a series of examples that one can only be successful if they know what is around them, what characterizes their environment.
The narrower environment of any business consists of customers and competitors. This trio – the company itself being the third player – must form a triangle where the company and its customers are close to each other, with a strong and well-founded relationship, while the customers and competitors are far apart.
How can this situation be achieved? First of all through information gathering, research, whether it is about understanding the market, the behavior of competitors, their strengths, or the expectations of customers.
Companies belonging to the SME category often do not emphasize this question, partly because they believe it entails too high costs, partly because – and this is the essence! – they do not believe in it. Generally, they know little about research, methodologies, and typically have reservations about political research regarding this issue.
Therefore, from our daily consulting practice, we generally approach this question from two sides. The first – this is often a very „hot point,” the issue of competition. Does the SME leader know, and if so, what do they know about their competitors, and do they even think correctly about who their competitors are?
The other important question – in my opinion, this is the cardinal part of success – approaches from the customers' side. Have they lost any customers in the past few months? Were these important customers? What is the trend, and so on, these questions can bring the issue of research closer to company leaders.
Effective and successful research must be one that not only carries information but also holds novelties for the long term, ideas, and approaches that promote the company's development. Thus, it is an important question what research methodology we apply and in what scope we gather information. Today, online research is the most fashionable, so we will briefly explore its advantages and risks, without claiming completeness.
Online research
In the case of SMEs (not only there), one important issue is the area of costs. Since everyone has the perception that the online space is cheap, the first thought is, „let's have an online questionnaire, we put it on the Facebook page (possibly on our own website as well), and we're done.” Well, I have to disillusion everyone, it's not like that.
Why?
In the case of a questionnaire posted on the Facebook page, we can get information, especially if the survey is related to some kind of lottery or promotion, but to actually gain insight from the market, this is not enough. Because:
- it is difficult to target,
- if we tie the completion to registration, the number of respondents will be low,
- we have no influence over the composition of the respondents, meaning many responses will come from a target group that is not relevant to us,
- we also have no real influence over the number of respondents, and of course
- we cannot influence the honesty of the responses.
A questionnaire posted on our own website is already a bit better, as it is likely that those who visit the site for some reason will fill it out, but how many there will be and in what time frame is quite unpredictable, so this is definitely not effective if we are looking for an answer to a specific question.
One of my dear acquaintances runs a webshop offering special gifts. Three questions are always posted on the site, which pertain to the use of the site, the product being searched for, and suggestions. These three questions change quarterly. Every quarter, he summarizes the answers, posts them on the site, and moves on. With good questions, this is a very useful tool for continuous improvement. By always sharing previous analyses, he presents content that is important to his loyal customers, thus encouraging their return.
When is an online questionnaire a good solution?
My answer to this is: fundamentally, it is a good solution if we have a suitable mailing list, and the online aspect is only about the presentation. That is: for example, a suitable solution in the case of a customer satisfaction survey is to make the questionnaire exclusively available to our own customer base. This way, we can leverage all the advantages that online offers. Respondents can answer at any time before the deadline, the questionnaire can be paused and continued later, so: all the advantages of online can be utilized. Of course, in such cases, everything must be done in accordance with the applicable GDPR regulations.
This, of course, implies that the knowledge and application of a professional cannot be easily saved, and typically, research cannot be solved with internal resources.
In understanding competitors, asking them is not the best method, but rather observation and analysis. If the competitor has a website, we should carefully review it and analyze its content. If we pay attention to the competitor's various appearances at trade shows and conferences, we can also gain a lot of information from that. Many SME leaders perform this activity, but they do not always know what to do with the collected data and information.
We must not forget that domestic SME leaders are more professionals than leaders, and in the rarest cases do they have a marketing degree or interest. Research is the area they tend to neglect the most because they do not feel its significance and usefulness. To illustrate this, here is an example: a domestic company launched a jam on the market that would actually be a new product category, as it has a high fruit content, low - or even no - added sugar, but has a very short shelf life after opening. It is typically a product that today's consumer group, which pays great attention to lifestyle and nutrition, would consume with great enthusiasm. There was no research before the launch. The product was released in various flavors but did not achieve the expected sales. Subsequent research showed that it was because the packaging size was the same as that of the jams already available, while this product must be consumed practically immediately or within a few days after opening. Research conducted before the start of production would have provided this information, thus the market introduction could have been more successful.
The most important thing is to always choose a solution for our research that best fits our goals. It stretches the limits of this article, but alongside the appropriate solution it is at least as important that we can interpret the incoming data.
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