Primary and Secondary Research

Primary research is research conducted on your own using focus groups, surveys, interviews, and observations. Primary research gives you more specific results, which is best if you want to cater towards a specific demographic. An example of this is if you wanted to find out how many people in your class like the colour yellow, you could use a questionnaire to get this information.

There are two basic forms of primary research:

1. Exploratory – This is open-ended research without a target for a specific result or data point. It benefits in identifying problems and includes interviews or focus groups with extensive input from participants.

2. Specific – This research is incredibly targeted in its scope. It is used to solve anomalies that you discovered through exploratory research. Usually achieved through interviews, specific primary research usually involves interviews and is very precise.

Compared to secondary research, primary data may be expensive since there is a great deal of marketer involvement and the expense in preparing and carrying out research can be high. To be achieved in the right manner, collecting primary data requires the development and execution of a research plan.

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