1. Introduction
1.1 Statement of Purpose
The Crink Insighters Company will be a medium size market research agency that will be located in Troy, Michigan. The company will occupy will occupy the back 3600 square feet of 743 Main Street on the Second and Floors. This is a new business in the start-up phase. The company will however establish other centers across the major cities in the country.
The Crink Insighters will be market research agency that will be running a series of surveys for our clients. The company will be offering two types of research services: Branded research, which will entirely be client-commissioned, and the non-branded research, which will entirely be generic data collection across the entire industries semi-annually. The non-branded data will be used to draft proposals to our potentials while soliciting for branded research, which will be the core business of Crink Insighters.
To start the operations of the business, the business will require up to $ 250,000. The owner of the company has agreed to contribute $ 85,000 each thus $ 160,000 the initial capital raised by the owners. Through the owners again, the organization have secured a bank loan of $ 90,000 from a local investment bank. This loan is repayable within the first 18 months from the date it is obtained with the first installment due in the 4 months after the loan is obtained.
The obtained loan will used to hire employees, obtained premises, license the business, and acquire furniture’s, relevant software, and computers facilities for the staffs. This has been estimated to cost up to $160, 000 including employee salaries for the first 3 months. It is expected that business will experience the first Return on Investment (ROI) within the first three months of operations. The company mission statements will be to; to provide our clients with meaningful, timely, accurate research insights that will enable them to formulate the right marketing strategies.
Consumer Insighters will provide market research products and services tailored to meet the specific and ever-changing brand needs and challenges facing our customers. We will build value for our investors through the strength of our customers' satisfaction and by consistently producing superior results.
1.2 Why this business
The decision to venture into market research is attributed to the recent upsurge in demand of market research services. Market research is one of the industries that have not been exploited. Recent data from First Research, one of the players, reported that with over 5000 companies, the American market research industry generates annual revenues of over $ 15 billion combined. Major players in the industry include Forrester Research, Gallup, Gartner, Maritz Research, Millward Brown, and Nielsen. The industry is so concentrated such that at least 50% of the revenues are generated by the top 50 companies. Nevertheless, the industry is equally profitable for even the small scale and the new entrants. Small or new entrant market research companies can compete successfully by specializing in a specific research methodology or in emerging niche knowledge areas.
1.3 Legal Plan
Crink Insight will be registered partnership venture owned by two. The partners will run and manage the day-to-day operations of the business. Capital will be contributed equally and the deficit will be borrowed from a bank. The other term of the partnership will be legal agreement written in the Crink Insighters Partnership Agreement. Being partnership, if a matter is not covered by the Partnership Agreement, then the position as set out in the partnership Act of the state applies. The owners will equally share in the profits or losses from the partnership venture. As stipulated in partnership Act, each of the partners will be held personally liable for the debts of the partnership.
The partnership mode of ownership was considered and chosen by the owners because it makes easier and inexpensive to set up the partnership. The experiences and the skill possessed by each of the partners will be a key asset to the business. The business name should be registered and a separate bank account must be used for the partnership.
2. Market Area
The recent upsurge in the demand of market research services is primarily attributed to the health of the national economy and organizations gaining robust corporate profits that accommodate involvement of market research services. The profitability of individual market research companies depends largely on managing costs and maintaining a steady flow of project from clients. Large market researchers have advantages in providing a wider array of research and supplementary services to large-scale customers, and in utilization of economies of scale in marketing and automated operations.
Most of the players in the industry have successfully specialized in research methodologies and created niches for themselves; by doing this, they are able to compete successfully regardless of their scale. Maritz Research has reported that the industry is labor-intensive and the average annual revenue across the industry per employee is about $140,000.
3. Product/Service:
a) Crink Insighters will be offering primary market research services and public opinion polling. The service portfolio will include other services such as media monitoring, analytic services but within the first year, the company will specialize in customer satisfaction, psychographics, and advertising tracking.
b) Our market research service will help our clients get to know their brand position in the market hence guide them plan accordingly to competitive edge. Crink Insighters will be conducting surveys that will be geared to identifying future consumer trends and test success or failures of innovation products and concepts from our clients; and provide appropriate recommendations.
c) The greatest strength to this business is manifold. There are few players in the researching industry and many companies do not have fully operational Research and Development units. The recent trends confirm the appreciation of market research service. Crink Insighters partnership with International market researchers will open a window for us to enter foreign countries or win international contracts offered by local firms.
d) The greatest challenge in the business will be got and maintained competent staff. With the few players, paying exorbitantly profession in the field it will be difficult to Crink Insighters to offer the market rate to such experts. To solve these problems, the company wills nurture new talents from colleges and universities. In the meantime, the owners, having worked in this filed for some time, will be multitasking as they look out for talents.
4. Human Resource and Organization Chart:
4.1 Positions and personnel in the company
The company CEO will oversee the overall operations of the company. He will be assigning responsibilities clearly to the senior managers and overseeing the establishment of effective service delivery. The Executive director will work closely with the CEO. All the other functional department of the company will report to him. The research director will be responsible for ensuring that quality work is done at the ground. He will scrutinize all the proposals and all the research reports before they are presented to the client or prospective clients.
The field manager will monitor all the data collection and ensure that all the procedures are followed appropriately. He will be supervises the field executives who will be responsible for data collection through questions are or other methods of data collection. The research managers will be overseeing the research executive who will be responsible for drafting proposal that will be used to solicit for projects from clients. He/she will also be in charge of ensuring that accurate reports to be presented to the client reflect the actual findings and report the same t the research director.
The quantitative manager will be ensuring that the data is transcribed and broken down into meaningful information. He will supervise the data analysts in entering the raw data from the field into the computer systems and draft roper reports from the data.
Finance and Administrations department will be support arm of the business with the Human resource. The organizational chart will be as follows:
5. Company Policies:
Since most of the Crink Insighters will be serving corporate clients, the payment policy will reflect such. At the beginning of the project, the client must pay 50% of the total cost and balance paid within thirty days from the date of invoice. The client will be invoiced immediately at the end of a project. The mode of payment will be either cash or check. All contracts will only begin after the client has signed the contract form.
All payment and contact documents must be in triplicate and safely kept for references through. Crink Insighters offices will be operating Monday to Friday from 8.00 am-5.30pm. However, provisions if need arises, this schedule may be altered.
6. Marketing Plan to Create Customers and Profits
The Crink Insighters Company will be conducting several proposals for bidding project from potential corporate organizations. Their target market will be midsize companies both service and commodity oriented organizations. To enter the market faster The Crink Insighters rates per project will be optimally competitive. The company’s marketing mix is comprised of the following approaches to pricing, distribution, advertising and promotion, and customer service.
Pricing: the company’s pricing scheme will be based on the anticipated number of hours per project.
Distribution: research Services will be dependent on the location of the client customers.
Advertising and Promotion: the company will use over the counter brochures and a referral system in which satisfied customers will be incentivized to introduce more clients or continue working Crink Insighters
Customer Service: the company will always strive to meet or exceed expectations.
