When businesses already have a general market research plan in place, they often rely on these existing insights rather than conducting new user research to inform design decisions. After all, both market and UX research leverage customer access to incorporate feedback into strategic processes.
However, as impressive as agile MR can be, businesses that don’t implement a separate user research plan are missing out on integral customer insights. From targeted behavioral data to usability, UX research informs product decisions on a deeper, more direct level than general MR. Here are the ways that market and UX research intersect, as well as the key differences that necessitate the inclusion of both in a holistic research plan.
Comparing Market and UX Research
| Agile Market Research | User Experience (UX) Research | |
|---|---|---|
| Objectives | Identify and define marketing/sales opportunities | Eliminate design barriers to streamline product use |
| Means | Predict user’s needs, behaviors, and preferences for external messaging | Understand an individual user’s experience to improve product design |
| Measures | Attitudinal measures | Behavioral measures |
Market research seeks to enhance the messaging and sales of a product. By evaluating the general market that interacts with their product or service, businesses can use agile market research to predict audience attractors. These can then be implemented into a marketing or sales strategy to drive engagement and promote awareness within their target market.
User Experience (UX) research, on the other hand, looks inward to eliminate barriers and streamline product use for the individual. By utilizing behavioral measures to identify not only product attractors, but the reasons why these features streamline usability, UX researchers seek to understand a user’s holistic experience. These findings are implemented to improve the product itself or inform future design initiatives.
The Research Umbrella
Overall, MR can be seen as the umbrella of research initiatives – with UX as one of its subsets. When the right tools are used, market and UX research can be conducted in a similar manner to save time and resources. Both forms of research benefit from agile implementation and intimate user interactions, and both are integral to strategic business decisions. After all, market and UX research are key elements of the research umbrella that develop critical insights for businesses to leverage.
Businesses looking to implement a UX research plan are often unfamiliar with its methodologies. There’s a common misconception that market researchers cannot branch into the UX space because of their differing objectives, but this is far from the truth. Since UX is a subset of general MR, anyone with the right tools and a solid research background can easily implement a UX research plan.
Fuel Cycle’s Solution
Enter communities and panels for research development. With customizable functionalities, templated surveys, and one-off as well as ongoing research capabilities, Fuel Cycle has the research toolkit for your strategic needs. Whether you’re looking to conduct UX research with live product testing or forecast customer behavior using insights from your target market, Ignition can be leveraged to optimize your business’ brand and user experience.
Looking to streamline your digital UX and market research processes? Check out our webinar on the intersection of market and UX research to discover the best practices and solutions for each methodology.
