Abstract:

Innovation in the early decades of the market research industry was demand and product focussed while in the later stages the innovation was driven by the availability of new techniques and was process focused. It depends on the business model a research firm chooses, but the authors plead to go back to the early days of research and concentrate on demand and product focussed innovation. To increase the value added by market research one should start to enable improved decision-making based on market research. A virtual simulator helps the decision-maker to investigate the future and fine-tune the business question and the research question to be solved by market research.