Researchers face most important and typical questions for each stage of the product life cycle. Please see below for most typical tasks at early (pre-launch, launch, growth) and mid-range (maturity) stages of the brand life-cycle as well as research methods available at Business Analytica research portfolio.

Qualitative Research Techniques are more common at the early stages of brand life cycle (Brand introduction and Brand growth) as they help to answer the following questions: What product does the market need? Which characteristics should the product possess? Who is our target audience? How does the target audience perceive the proposed product concept? Methods which are used at these stages include: creative Work-Shops to identify potential market niches for new brand development, to study the target audience (TA) purchase, usage and consumption behavior specifics during assisted shopping and observation; detailed discussion of market situation during focus groups or in-depths interviews with end users as well as with market experts; various ethnographic techniques to gain better understanding of the TA psychographics, motivation and values profile, etc.

Moreover, in order to solve strategic and tactical tasks various quantitative methods are also used at the early stages and product development and launch. Business Analytica can offer a range of instruments to identify product potential in terms of potential sales volumes (BA Volumetric), as well as key elements of the marketing mix:

• Price. Price research is used to determine optimal product price and price elasticity range for a given set of product features.
• Product. Product/service/packaging testing from the TA perception, ergonomics and usability. U&A research is used to identify the most profitable market segment for the studied brand; the research studies purchase and usage specifics within the product category, as well as niches for development for the client’s brand.
• Promotion. Research for the best brand positioning to identify the key functional and emotional attributes to elaborate an efficient creative strategy, to identify the most effective touch points and the TA media preferences for optimal brand media support.
• Place. To study the specifics of various distribution channels and their potential for the Client’s brand, and to study the TA behavior at various distribution channels (Shoppers Surveys).

At the product launch stage Business Analytica recommends to run regular Brand Health Tracking Studies. This could serve as an early warning system for potential problems within the product marketing mix (namely, product quality, advertising efficiency, consumer loyalty, etc.).

At further-on stages of brand development (namely, Brand Development and Brand Maturity) when product reaches maturity the primary task is to maintain the achieved level of sales. Quantitative research which helps to assess the strategy efficiency is used to solve this task. At this stage various tactical research methods help to fine-tune the strategy, determine the deviations and offer solutions. Business Analytica recommends the Client’s management to run regular Brand Health Tracking Studies, to perform regular Ad Testing, to carry out Brand Image Perception Studies, to run various segmentation studies to gain deeper understanding of consumer preferences and determine impactful marketing methods for various target groups. (Usage and Attitude Studies, Consumer Segmentation, Target Group Analysis, etc.).Qualitative research at this stage is used for "Insights" to improve product or service compatibility and identify areas for further improvement.