Understanding your customers is one of the keys to operating a successful business. And market research is an important way to understand how your customers think and feel.

Some market research deals with behavior — what percentage of consumers have done a certain thing, like visited a dentist or seen a movie or ordered an item online. Some market research deals with spending — how much consumers have spent on a particular product or service, like medical care or children’s clothing or pet food.

Some market research deals with attitudes and opinions — what consumers think or feel about certain topics. The term used for this type of market research is psychographics.

As this Hubspot article explains, psychographics capture subjective attributes of your customers, rather than objective data such as age or marital status.

One of the numerous market research resources ASBTDC has access to includes a wide range of psychographic attributes, such as:

• buy based on quality not price
• will pay more for environmentally safe products
• more likely to buy brand that supports a charity
• like to live a lifestyle that impresses others
• prefer travel in U.S. vs foreign
• personal/household finances next 12 months

The chart here shows Arkansans’ response to these statements.

Making Business Choices Based on Psychographic Insights

As with other market research, psychographics present business owners with actionable information.

• If you knew that the majority of consumers in your local market area think it’s important for businesses to support a charity, how might that influence your business strategy?
• How useful would it be to know what percentage of local consumers are willing to sacrifice quality for price or spend more for higher quality?
• What difference might knowing whether consumers in your area will pay more for environmentally safe products make in the types or products you sell or how you promote your business?
• In what ways would knowing how optimistic local consumers are about their financial future influence your business planning (sales forecasting, for example)?

For ASBTDC clients, data for these and other psychographic attributes are available not only for the state or county, but also for custom geographic areas such as a radius or drive-time around a specific address – your business, for instance.

Especially when combined with behavior and spending data, psychographic insights can help small business owners better understand the attitudes and preferences of local consumers. ASBTDC’s business consultants and market research experts can help you be more successful by knowing more about your prospective customers.