🔥 The #1 Mistake Marketers Make with Research

5 Steps to Conduct Useful Market Research with Jillian Hoefer

Whether you like it or not, Marketers are mad scientists. And what do scientists do?

They conduct research. 

Market research is the unsung hero of Marketing. We get to learn more about our audience, what our next steps should be, and what we might be doing wrong. 

But, it can be a lot. Where should you start? What do you do with alllll of that info?

On Episode 328 of The Marketing Millennials, I sat down with Jillian Hoefer, Senior Content Marketing Manager at UserEvidence, to break down how she takes data and gets content + insights out of it.

Here are her 5 steps to conducting useful market research and turning it into content, in her own lightly-edited words. ⤵️

1️⃣. START WITH A HYPOTHESIS + GOAL.

Jillian’s Take: “We came in with a really strong hypothesis. So that’s where we started. Before we even crafted the survey and sent it out, we said, what message do we wanna get out to market? What point of view do we want to get out to market? And what do we need? What data do we need to back up that point of view?”

To do research, you need to know what you want to get out of it and what you’re trying to prove. 

If you’re trying to prove something ➡️ look at past occurrences (things you’ve observed on your own, past data, etc.) and make an educated guess.  

• Example A: If users complete onboarding within 24 hours of registering, they will be 3x more likely to remain active. 
• Example B: Younger audiences (under 35) are 4x more likely to discover our product through social media than traditional search.
• Example C: Ads emphasizing “save 10+ hours per week” will outperform ads focused on “save $500/month” by at least 25% in CTR.

It helps to be specific. Broad statements are harder to get answers out of.

Takeaway: The best research starts with conviction, not curiosity. Pick a POV your brand wants to own. Use the data to prove it. Then turn that into a campaign that feeds every channel.  One strong hypothesis can power a full year of content. But only if you treat it like a strategic asset, not just a PDF.

2️⃣. GOOD SURVEY DESIGN IS A MUST.

Jillian’s Take: “So you have to start with really great survey design.You have to make sure you’re sending the survey and distributing it to the right audiences. You’ve gotta make sure that your hypothesis is gonna land, or this data that you’re gathering from the survey is gonna support that hypothesis.”

Effective market research starts with intentional design: who will be seeing this? Where are they located? What software should you even use? Here are some steps to keep in mind:

Start with your hypothesis. (Duh.)

Design every survey question to support or challenge that hypothesis. 

• Avoid collecting data that isn’t relevant to your hypothesis. That’s a lot of stuff you’ll have to clean up later. 

Be intentional with your audience targeting. 

• Distribute your survey to the specific segment most relevant to your research goal (like current users, prospects, niche personas).

Pressure-test the alignment between hypothesis and survey. 

• Make sure your hypothesis can be proved by the type of data your survey will generate.

Quality > Quantity.

• It’s better to get fewer responses from the right people than large volumes from a generic audience.

Takeaway: Don’t just send surveys, create good ones. A strong survey has the right questions and the right audience, so you’re getting answers that matter.

3️⃣. GET A DATA ANALYST.

Jillian’s Take: “You have to have some sort of data analyst that you’re working with if you have one on your team. If you have someone who is phenomenal at digging into the numbers and the raw data and pulling out the stories, that’s great. You should get them in early and often on this project. But if you don’t, you’ve gotta go out and find someone who’s gonna be able to do this in either a freelance or a contracted capacity.”

Good data is useless without good interpretation. Analysts help shape raw survey results into real, story-worthy insights that drive marketing, product, or strategy decisions.

Good surveys collect a TON of data. And if you don’t have someone who’s ready to eat, sleep, and breathe numbers, it’ll get overwhelming (and messy) very quickly.

Don’t wait until the data is collected. Loop them in during survey design so they can help you ask better questions and plan for the analysis. 

You don’t just want someone who can run a regression, you want someone who can spot trends and any outliers.

Takeaway: Get a data analyst right off the bat. If not, it’s time to shop around for a freelance or contractor. You can do this through LinkedIn and other job boards, or even just asking your network if they recommend someone.

4️⃣. INTEGRATE AI TO MULTIPLY THE IMPACT OF RESEARCH.

Jillian’s Take: “If you have, you know, 6,000+ data points from a 600 person, 10 question survey that you then can put into an AI bot and say, ‘Hey, you are an expert on this information, now help me create this email that has this goal.’”

Jillian emphasizes that AI isn’t just for analysis, but also for activation. 

AI tools can go through lots of survey responses, find common themes, and help you create campaigns, messages, and content based on what your audience actually said.

Want to see common themes or any patterns? Run raw data into ChatGPT to help summarize things. 

Want help with email copy? Prompt Claude with your tone and goals to get some copy ideas.

Takeaway: Use AI to help you whittle your data down. Start experimenting with ChatGPT and/or Claude and see what comes up. You never know what takeaways, summaries, etc. you can find.

5️⃣. TURN RESEARCH DATA INTO CONTENT.

Jillian’s Take: “ As a content marketer, if this is a project that you can own, this gets you a seat at the bigger table at the company, like you are the owner of this incredible gold mine of data….but you also are the holder of all this really great information that typically is about your ICP.”

The insights you can get from research can help you become a better storyteller, guide your positioning and CX, and help with content overall. 

You become the keeper of original data about your ICP, giving you access to insights that no one else has. Not even your competitors.

So, that’s why Jillian framed it as the ultimate opportunity and career-level change. 

With one strong survey or data set, you can spin up an entire ecosystem of content: blog posts, newsletters, infographics, webinars, the list goes on. 

Social posts? The meat is there.

Social proof? You can showcase it on your website, if that’s something you tested. 

Did the research show you some insights that led to a rebrand? Get ready for a re-launch.

Pair that with the previous takeaway about AI and you have a goldmine.

Takeaway: Look at the story your research told and share it with your audience. Owning research turns content into a strategic opportunity, and you into a strategic player.

IN A MEME