Types of Market Research Reports: Cost & Content Expectations

Business_intelligence, featured on www.blog.marketresearch.comThey say that you can't judge a book by its cover. Likewise, you can’t always judge what sort of content you are going to get out of a market research report just based on pricing or size. However, there are some general guidelines that you can follow that will give you a good idea of what you can typically expect from a report listed on the website. Here are a few general categorizations of reports, what you can expect to get from them, and why you would typically use them. Please note that all prices are estimates of single user license costs.

Top-Level Reports

Cost: A top level report is typically under 60 pages and tends to be priced between $100 and $1,000. 

Content: These reports are intended to give you a broad overview of a market or industry that you are focused on. They will often have an overall size of the market and some information on the very top players as well as a brief introduction to the essentials of the industry. Some will even have a limited analysis of the broad strengths and weaknesses of the market as well.

Use: These reports are perfect for someone who needs to acquaint themselves with a market quickly without diving in too deep. Job seekers looking to understand the industry for a company they are serious about working for, executives that want to brush up on a new market so they can more fully utilize the information being provided to them by their market experts, and financial institutions looking to do an initial vetting of a market’s potential are examples of who may want a report like this.

Full-Market Reports

Cost: These reports are often 90-500 pages and are priced in the $1,500 to $6,000 range with a few of the larger reports stretching to 1,000 pages and $8,000 to $10,000 price range. 

Content: Full-market reports are the reports that contain a much higher level of detail about any given market or industry. You can typically expect the reports to have market sizing broken down by one or more sub category (technology, end use or region), industry trends and developments, future market projections, and a detailed list of market participants. 

Use: These reports are used by industry experts looking to keep up-to-date on how the industry is shifting and where their company stands compared to the market as a whole. Financial institutions that have already committed to a project will also use these reports to provide a broader and deeper understanding of the markets they are investing in. On the flip side of this, entrepreneurs and start-ups will also use this type of report to provide the independent facts needed to support their efforts to secure funding.

Product Detail Market Reports

Cost: These reports tend to be 400 or more pages and are priced at $10,000 and up. 

Content: Product Detail reports cover not only the performance of the market and its subcategories as a whole, but they also cover the specific market values and trends of specific products in the industry within specific countries.

Use: Many of these reports are pharmaceutical and biomarker reports covering the details on the performance of specific drug formulations or biomarkers. These reports are intended solely for industry experts that need the highest level of detail about very specific market factors.

It is important to note that these guidelines are very general and are not 100% accurate to every report or publisher in the database. However, using this set of parameters as a measuring stick can set your expectations in the right place and help you to ask the right questions about what is actually in the report before you consider a purchase.

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Topics: Market Research Strategy