If you are running a business, your number one priority must be the happiness of your customers. You must satisfy the needs of your
customers and one way of doing so is by studying consumer behaviour.
This blog will tell you why it is important for you to study consumer behaviour, what are the relevant questions you must ask while studying consumer behaviour and what are some key steps you can follow to study consumer behaviour.
Why should you study consumer behaviour?
● When you are running a business, you must know exactly what your customers want and what it is that they like. Depending on their preferences, you must make small changes to your product or service so that you can retain them.
● Doing business mindlessly will eventually cause a disaster. You may be getting customers today, but if you do not conduct research on what they want and how their preferences are changing, your business will start losing customers.
● In whatever business you are in, you have other competitors. If you do not cater to your customers well, your competitors will gain market share. To cater to your customers, it is important for you to first understand their needs and this is why you must
start focusing on gaining information on consumer behaviour.
● Studying consumer behaviour will also allow you to design ad campaigns which contain elements that may catch the attention of potential customers.
What are the questions you must think about while studying customer behaviour?
● Who is your target customer?
● What do your existing customers like about your product/service?
● How did your customer first find you? (Via social media, posters, word of mouth?)
● What according to you is the price your customer is comfortable paying for your product/service?
● What are some other services or products that your customers use?
● How does the buying pattern of your customers change according to the time of the year? Do they buy more during festivals? Do they buy more on birthdays? Do they buy on New Year’s eve?
● How does inflation affect the spending pattern of your customers?
How can you study consumer behaviour?
● The most basic step for analysing consumer behaviour is to analyse the data of your already existing customers to find out key trends. This will help you in knowing what is working out for you and what you need to focus on more.
● Send surveys to your already existing customers. Ask key questions to your customers via these surveys. This will allow you to gather key insights.
● Use Instagram polls to ask people what they like and how much they will be willing to spend on a particular product.
● Use tools like Power BI (Business Intelligence) by Microsoft. These tools help you in storing all your data in a single place and then it allows you to generate graphs and observe key trends from your business data.
● Tracking your website using Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity can also give you insights into how many consumers spent time on your website, how much time did they spend and what kind of product they read about the most. This will give you insights into what your customers are thinking when they make key spending decisions.
● You can also gather data from other companies which have a similar target customers as yours.
Properly understanding your consumers and knowing how they spend will allow you to improve your business strategies, develop new products and retain old customers.