Customer needs analysis

 When is it used?

When the Ordering Party wants to respond more accurately to the needs of the customer and, as a result, increase natural sales as well as customer satisfaction and loyalty. The needs analysis will also answer the question regarding the significance of the reasons resulting in customers choosing products and services offered by competition. A customer needs analysis is a research suggested before a planned marketing campaign, as it may provide information regarding the content worth communicating in ATL or BTL activities. This is one of the basic types of market research for the company’s operation as it allows for strategic business decisions to be taken.

 How is information obtained?

The needs analyses are most often carried out on the basis of qualitative methods such as IDIs or FGIs. At times, supplementing the research with ethnographic methods is recommended.

 Benefits of the research/analysis

Thanks to knowledge of customer needs, it is possible to adjust the product/offer or quality of the services provided to meet the customer’s expectations more accurately. This, in general, directly translates into increased sales and level of loyalty as well as greater customer satisfaction. Customer needs analysis allows one to react on a current basis to changes on the market connected to the actions of the competition and the changing customer preferences. The research also indicates essential and unessential areas, in other words it answers the question as to what actions are worth concentrating on – as they are important for the client, and which product or service elements or traits are redundant – which may prove to be an opportunity to implement savings in the company.