Desk research

Methods

Desk research is gathering and analyzing information from different sources. This method can be used either singly or in combination with other marketing research methods.

Desk research allows to explore the situation on the market, determine its size and volume.
Advantages of this method is saving resources, time and money.

Sources of information for desk research are:

- Official statistics
- Database of the special market (Customs statistics, databases of market participants, etc.)
- Administrative and legislative documents
- Open sources (media, Internet, sites of ministries, departments and other state structures, sites of market participants, associations, etc., branch sites and forums, periodic specialized publications, catalogs, ready analytical reports)

Traditional (classical) analysis of documents.

This type of desk research is a non-formalized method of studying the essence of the material. During traditional (classical) analysis we investigate connections, main thoughts and ideas. To ensure the objectivity of the analysis results a special procedure is developed: the main criteria and characteristics are defined. With this method conclusions become more objective and qualitatively expand the questions of research.

Content analysis.

The main idea of content analysis is to identify certain semantic units (brands, products, companies and other concepts). The advantage of this method is a low level of subjectivism, because the process of gathering and analyzing information is more formalized – we use such quantitative characteristics as total volume and frequency of the occurrence of certain semantic units.