Should You Do Market Research In-House or Choose an Agency?

When it comes to advising businesses on whether they should do market research in-house or choose an agency, you may think that our automatic recommendation is going to be the latter. After all, we are a market research agency, and serving clients is what we do.

However, the most important pillar of our agency is integrity. Thus, when the situation is warranted, we will transparently inform a business that they are much better doing some or all of their market research in-house. Does this mean that we are telling them not to hire us? Yes. Do we regret providing this advice? No. On the contrary, we are gratified by it. It is a reminder that our commitment to integrity is as strong today as it was when we launched many years ago.

The reason we are sharing this background, is because you may be wondering whether it makes sense to do your market research in-house, or if choosing an agency (ours or any other credible and experienced firm) is the smarter move. To help you make this decision, here is our honest advice:

It can make sense to do market research in-house when…

• You are working with a very limited budget, and partnering with a market research agency would be cost prohibitive at this time. While you will not be able to conduct comprehensive, professional-grade market research, you will still be able to glean some insights that can be used to achieve improvements and gains.

• You have a very clear research question, have identified the right mix of qualitative data gathering methods to glean the data you need, and have the resources and personnel to carry out the project from beginning to end.

• You want total control over every aspect your market research project, possibly for security reasons.  

It can make sense to partner with a market research agency when…

• You do not have the in-house expertise, technology, resources and/or capacity to conduct rigorous market research.

• You want to ensure that your market research insights are free of bias. As noted by Raconteur Magazine: “Bias is the tombstone of research and it is hard to cover up. Most people are proud of where they work and have seen first-hand the effort going into products and services. It is human nature to want to defend these efforts and a forgivable, if ruinous, instinct.”

• You want to ensure that you do not conduct “market research for the sake of market research,” but rather for the purposes of answering a clear research question that achieves a key business goal.

• You want to free yourself from the substantial time investment of designing and deploying a market research project, which can take anywhere from hundreds to thousands of hours from beginning to end.

The Bottom Line

Deciding whether you should do market research in-house or with an agency is an important decision, and one that you should not make lightly. For an objective assessment of your situation and honest advice on how you may wish to proceed, contact the Qlarity Access team today.

Be assured that if we believe that it is in your best interest to do market research in-house (in whole or in part), we will advise you accordingly. And if we determine that partnering with an experienced and proven agency is a wise next step, you will never be under any obligation to choose us.

For more information on how to communicate the value of market research to your clients, download our FREE eBook: