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Archive for January, 2008
Associations
January 16, 2008Market Research
January 16, 2008Conducting Market Research
Market research involves finding and analyzing competitor information, demographics, and industry information.
The databases and links available here will lead you to relevant, quality information. Further assistance is available by visiting the Reference Desk of the Management & Economics Library.
Identification and description of the customers
Describe the potential customers
Find statistics and demographic information
Identify a target selling price
Find similar products
Identify a target sales quantity
Determine how much it will cost to run your company and what the potential market will be
Customer and engineering requirements and target values
Review recent research and federal regulations
Descriptions and analysis of competitive products and relevant patents
Seek companies producing similar products
Conduct effective patent research
Other Resources
January 16, 2008These books will be useful in market research and developing surveys:
Government Agencies
January 16, 2008U. S. Patent and Trademark Office – Search the Patent & Trademark database to determine what has been invented by others.
Industry Overviews and Market Research
January 16, 2008These resources will be best for finding information about your Industry and some Market Research:
Bizminer – Market & financial analysis for small and startup companies.
Frost Market Research – Market research reports.
IBIS World – Market research reports
Marketresearch.com Academic - Market research reports.
Company Research
January 16, 2008These databases will be the best resources for starting your company research:
ReferenceUSA (Krannert Only) – Company profile/directory database, brief information is provided.
ThomasNet – directory of companies, products, and services.
CatalogExpress – Access to catalogs or manufacturers for product and component information. Engineering and related disciplines.
Demographics
January 16, 2008The following sources are the best place to start gathering information about the demographics of your market and potential customers:
U.S. Census Bureau – The central source for population, age and ethnicity statistics.
U.S. Statistical Abstract – A compilation of many sources this provides statistics on population, age, ethnicity and more.
STATS Indiana – Indiana demographic and economic statistics.
Articles
January 15, 2008The following databases are the best resources for finding accurate and authoritative information from business publications.
ABI/Inform Global – Strong in general and academic business articles.
ABI/Inform Trade&Industry – Trade and Industry focused publications.
Business Source Premier – Strong in academic and regional business journals.
Full text availability
January 15, 2008How do you know when Purdue has access to something in full text without searching all of our databases? Try E-Journal Finder. It can tell you which of our databases have a journal in full text and what years they cover.
Searching the Internet
January 15, 2008When searching the Internet here are some helpful hints:
- Use the options in Advanced Search
- Limit by domain to .edu
- Limit by format to .pdf files
Use more than one search engine
SearchEngineWatch – provides links, reviews and articles about search engines
Thumbshots – compares results across pairs of search engines
