Marketing research has one primary purpose which is to assist in your credit union decision-making. Marketing research is both primary and secondary research methods to position your strategic goals, marketing goals and strategic intelligence. The knowledge base accumulated through data, ideas and drivers provides you with strategic intelligence to make the right decisions.

Research your own Employees

If your credit union is undergoing process change, a re-organization or considering an amalgamation

• Collect employee perceptions and their assessment of operations, products and services, member needs and employee satisfaction
• Conduct an operations assessment of hours of operation, timelines for service delivery, performance times, turnaround time, red tape, etc.
• Conduct an employee benefits assessment
• Test service delivery and evaluate staff in the process

Research your Members/Customer-Owners

Your credit union members/customer-owners day-to-day activities cover the lifecycle phases, from the first piece of business that they transact with you through the time when they stop purchasing and using your products and services. Between these points members/customer-owners have a wide range of activities which need your credit unions help. There are two critical concerns:

• Members want your credit unions help on every channel through which they interact with you
• Members want and need your help through every interaction within the life cycle phases of planning, exploring, selecting, purchasing, using maintaining and renewing

Your credit union needs to implement processes and applications that support your channels and your customers’ activities. You need to know about your members, what their likes and dislikes are and most of all what their needs are. Some research uses would be:

• Profile your membership to determine their demographics
• Identify and understand customer behaviour towards the credit union, product, service choices and their needs and requirements
• Identify perceptions and knowledge of your credit unions products and services offered.
• Measure member/customer-owners satisfaction and priority areas for improvement – those areas that will impact customer satisfaction the most. Use customer satisfaction as one measure in determining employee bonus.
• Test new product and service development to identify the attribute importance, features, how to communicate/promote, how to introduce to the market and incentive needs. Determine potential demand particularly among various target segments
• Test competitor services/products/advertising to help develop or change existing products and services and to counteract competitor advertising
• Determine what product and service changes are required and how to reduce any “backlash” and to best implement the changes
• Identify what service charges are acceptable and how to best implement and communicate the changes
• Determine how members access their current accounts and what trends are emerging
• Identify how to acquire more business from existing members/customer owners who deal elsewhere for certain products and services

Communications Research

• Identify how consumers/members/customer owners learn about your credit union products, services and activities
• Test marketing strategies, materials and communication initiatives
• Test your website functionality, layout/design, content, ease of use and products and services online usage
• Assess newsletters and other promotional materials layout, content, style, design
• Determine the best customized images, taglines, presentations, and mediums for your credit union

Research if you are undertaking Merger/Amalgamation/closure discussions

• Identify what is acceptable to your members/customer owners to develop the strategy to ensure a positive vote
• Identify how to implement and retain membership

Establishing a “new” Credit Union or taking over an existing credit union

• Conduct a feasibility study
• Match the services and delivery to the needs of the area/targeted groups

Branding Research

• Test your credit union image and branding – what it is presently and how to improve or enhance
• Test your Branch design, colours, amenities, layout
• Develop and test “new” name options and strategy to “roll out” the name.
• Develop and test new or updated logo

Advertising Research

• Test your advertising for clear message delivery, appeal, impact/motivation and message recall
• Determine your advertising strategy and content