Market Assessment : Macro and Micro Level Considerations

Finally, the break from blogging is over and now I am back with my normal Blogging schedule .Normally, when we have an idea , the first thing that comes to our mind is "If we execute the idea, than what real life problem would it solve" and "Is there a need for the product/service, which than leads to How much market would the product/service capture".

While reading the book "The New Business Road Test" came across an interesting topic "The 7 Domains of attractive opportunities", which are mentioned below:

1. Market attractiveness.
2. Industry attractiveness.
3. Target segment benefits and attractiveness.
4. Sustainable advantage.
5. Mission, Aspirations and Prosperity for risk.
6. Connectedness up, down and across the value chain.
7. Ability to execute the tasks.

The initial study does come from the existing market and the existing players in the market and what More we an add to the existing products in the market termed as "Macro Level market Assessment".But than the study goes one step further termed as "Micro Level market Assessment"......Let's look into both, more in detail :

Macro-Level Assessment:
This assessment usually comes from gathering the existing data from magazines, Internet and various other sources.Some of the measures include:

• Number of customers already existing in the market.
• The aggregate money spent by these customers on the relevant class of goods or services.
• The number of units of relevant products or usage occasions, bought annually.

This level of assessment is very important for any entrepreneur since (s)he invests years into the product development but due to the market dynamics , that effort may not give the expected returns !!! Another question to be answered is "Is the opportunity a substantial one, serving a large and attractive market, or a Niche opportunity with a limited potential. This leads us to another level of assessment , given below.

Micro-Level Assessment:
The micro-level assessment involves asking four key questions relevant to the TARGET market:

• Is there a target market segment where we might enter the market in which we offer the customer clear and compelling benefits or resolve their pain at a price that (s)he is willing to pay [If there is no answer to the pain, there is no market at all !!!!].
• Are these benefits, in the customer's minds, different from and superior in some way[better, faster or cheaper...] to what's currently offered by the other solutions. [Differentiation is the key !!!]
  
• How large is the segment and at what rate is it growing.
• Is it likely that our entry into This segment would gives us entry into other segments, that we may wish to target in the future.

A combination of the Macro and Micro level assessment would definitely help to filter out our own needs and also help in better understanding of the Target Market Segment.Many times, when we start thinking like Entrepreneurs , we forget the business case since, there might not be any , just like what Rich Dad says "A SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS IS CREATED BEFORE THERE IS A BUSINESS"