How marketing researches market changes during the crisis

Volume of the world marketing researches market increases constantly. According to the data of the European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research (ESOMAR), in 2014 the market increased by 26% compared to 2010 having reached 43 billion dollars. At the same time Russian market of marketing researches was growing even faster and amounted to 430 mln. dollars in 2013. However, the last two year stagnation was marked in the marketing researches field, when strengthened in 2015: the market volume in dollar terms decreased by 38% compared to 2014, having decreased to 236 mln. dollars.

There were several reasons for the marketing researches market decrease. Firstly, in the crisis conditions companies cut down the expenses on marketing. Moreover, the marketing expenses structure itself changes: companies stopped to allocate budget for some expenditure items including marketing researches. Secondly due to the decrease of entrepreneurial and investment activity enterprises suspend the project of new market entries and respectively do not want to order marketing researches. Thirdly, according to the geopolitical reasons the Russian market lost its strategic importance for several large foreign countries which were the main customers for marketing researches. They either leave the Russian market or decrease their activity significantly that affects the budgets decrease for the researches.

However, according to the experts, the decline of the Russian market could be more significant if the competition on the goods market was not so strong. As a result, producing companies and retailers need analytic researches for their assortment policy optimization. Besides, foreign customers continue to pay for the researches in their currency that is the positive moment in the ruble devaluation conditions.

Due to the market stagnation the structure of demand for marketing researches changed. The share of ad hoc researches decreases (specialized researches for the certain needs of the customer) and as a result the field works are carried out less frequently. Due to the decrease of marketing budgets companies more often refer to less expensive online researches and in-house researches performed by the customer without the marketing agency participation. Besides, during the crisis the time factor began to play a great role: the customers need the researches results not in 1-2 months but in 1-2 weeks so express-methods are used more often in the projects.

Customers show greater demand to the syndicate (routine) researches carried out at the initiative of marketing agencies and offered for sale to all interested persons. They also include ready-made reviews and different markets monitoring, panels and polls. Lower cost, availability, short terms of the research delivery and possibility to receive the current information about the global market trends and dynamic changes on the market. The most demanded types of researches include also forecasts – economic and social. In the changing crisis conditions it must be expected that two types of companies will remain on the market. The first one includes the largest market players – subsidiaries of the western transactional companies, having significant assets and technological resources, the second one – domestic representatives of large and medium-sized business, which are more flexible and will adapt to new conditions not only due to the expenditures structure optimization, but due to the improved methodical and industrial inspection.

Experts believe that the situation improvement on the market researches market is not expected by the end of 2016 because there is no any sign of economic rebound. At the same time potential for the market development is really great. Thus, due to the ruble devaluation Russia is one of the cheapest markets by the price parameter, and by the per capita expenses for marketing researches amount Russia lags behind the world leader – Great Britain (2,7 dollars and 81 dollars respectively).