Why Proprietary Data May Be Right For You

August 24, 2022

Market, or marketing, research is defined as a discipline with roots in psychology and sociology and involves the identification, collection, analysis, and use of information to make business decisions. And making business decisions has never felt quite so complicated because one thing is certain – humanity has no shortage of data. B2B marketers need to be constantly asking themselves how they can best leverage data to differentiate their products, services, and most importantly, their brand. Proprietary data is an essential tool for doing these things successfully.

But what is proprietary data? How do you conduct proprietary research? And how can that data be used to help fuel thought leadership and grow your business? This blog focuses on answering those questions so that you can measure the effectiveness of your organization’s brand, build competitive intelligence, and create sustainable and revenue-generating business strategies.

What is Proprietary Data?

Simply put – proprietary data is your data. That includes data that has been defined and retrieved by you and your teams compared to data that you and your teams have leveraged from a third-party source.

Why Use Proprietary Data?

The major advantage to proprietary data is in your ability to shape the types of data you collect and how you go about that collection. Let’s consider a hypothetical case:

Let’s say you want to publish a series of blog posts that highlight how versatile your products are across the menu and across dayparts emphasizing your consistent fill rates, and ability to deliver products on time. In these posts, you want to include data about the industry, illustrating a real need for your product in an objective way while providing value to your readers.

You would start by searching for reputable sources online (i.e. third-party data) about the need for versatile products stocked in kitchens. You would likely find a reputable source that provides some relevant data that you can cite and use in your example content.

“According to FoodService Director, over 90% of respondents said that they are

experiencing product procurement challenges.”

 

That is a great insight that supports the need for product versatility. But by only using third-party data you are restricted by what data currently exists. One of the best ways to support the “why” in a compelling and differentiated way is to craft your own research. Proprietary research allows you to ask exactly what you want to know and to exactly the audience base that matters most. As an example, imagine you conducted a survey of 100 independent restaurant owners about the state of their business. You could ask multiple-choice questions like, “How concerned are you about sourcing products from various manufacturers are this time?” or “How concerned are you about stock space in your kitchen?” Crafting your own questions to support your hypothesis or intended story could result in a statistic that read:

“In October 2022, 72% of Independent Restaurant owners were ‘deeply concerned’ about ordering

and receiving product from food manufacturers.”

 

Since your team was able to shape the nature of the questions, you were able to better align the value proposition of your brand and your product offerings.

Types of Research

While there is a myriad of ways to slice and dice market research, one must first start with identifying what type of research needs to be done to solve, explore or identify a problem – all of which depends on:

• The focus on the problem at hand: Primary vs. Secondary
• The research design goal: Exploratory vs. Descriptive vs. Causal
• The type of data and collection methods used: Qualitative vs. Quantitative

These categories help to guide the selection of the research design, data collection method, and analysis technique to gather the information needed to help solve the research problem and provide insights to support the business decision that follows.

Primary vs. Secondary 

First, determine if either primary or secondary research is warranted. Primary research is based on data collection designed to address specific problems whereas secondary research is based on data that has already been collected for other purposes but may be related to the topic at hand. It is always best to look at secondary research first and then, if, that data source has been exhausted or yielded minimal returns, it is time to look to primary research.

Exploratory vs. Descriptive vs. Casual

Research often starts with Exploratory research because it is designed to provide insights into problems we don’t fully understand. Descriptive market research is used when we describe characteristics of target markets or segments of interest, frequency of certain behaviors, attitudes, perceptions, market trends, etc.

Then, on the other hand, casual market research tries to find evidence of cause-and-effect relationships to understand which variables are the cause of behaviors, attitudes, or perceptions.

Qualitative vs. Quantitative 

Qualitative research is one type of exploratory market research methodology based on semi-structured or unstructured data collection. Data collection methods used in primary qualitative research can be classified as direct or indirect and often include in-depth interviews, focus groups, online bulletin boards, or shop-alongs. Think of this as more of a one-to-one conversation that allows for follow-up questions or additional discussion.

Primary quantitative data collection methods are the most common type of primary research and include surveys and observational methods. Surveys involve a questionnaire typically deployed online. Observation doesn’t include communicating directly with people and can be conducted through direct and indirect methods performed in both a lab or natural environment.

Ideally, a combination of both qualitative and quantitative methods would be deployed since they provide different types of data and insights.

Conclusion

A result of this world we now live in, a world of subtle, or not-so-subtle value exchange, is that a B2B brand can no longer simply publish a blog post and measure engagement to determine its success. Instead, that brand has to offer up its knowledge, insights, and a peek at its expertise in exchange for engagement and permission to start an ongoing relationship. Understanding the importance of owned data, conducting research, and then implementing that research in meaningful ways helps to successfully guide decisions that make a positive impact on your business.

While research is often time-consuming and can seem complicated, it is an important marketing tool to employ on a regular basis. If you’re interested in learning more about conducting your own research efforts or would like to build your collection of proprietary research data, we’re here to help.