Choosing a market research company is a decision that shapes every business decision that follows. Good research gives you evidence you can act on; poor research gives you confident-looking numbers that point the wrong way. Here are seven questions we recommend every client ask before hiring an agency in India.
1. Who actually does the fieldwork?
Many agencies win the project and then sub-contract interviews to another vendor. Ask whether the field team is the agency’s own, and who supervises it. At ARS, our directors are personally present in the field on every study.
2. Can they interview in your customers’ language?
India’s markets speak dozens of languages. A survey in Chennai needs Tamil; a study across South India needs Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam too. Responses given in a respondent’s own language are more honest and more complete.
3. How will the sample be chosen?
Ask how respondents are selected, what quotas are used (age, income, city tier, gender) and how the sample size was calculated. A clear sampling plan is the difference between findings you can generalise and anecdotes.
4. What quality checks are built in?
Look for back-checks (re-contacting a share of respondents), GPS or time-stamp verification for field interviews, and data validation before analysis.
5. Can they scale when you need it?
Some projects need 200 interviews; others need tens of thousands in a few weeks. Ask about the agency’s largest recent study and its field capacity. ARS can complete over 1,00,000 interviews in 15 days across India.
6. Will you get insight, or just tables?
Data tables alone rarely change a decision. Ask to see a sample report: does it explain what the findings mean and what you should do next?
7. Is the pricing clear?
A good agency gives a written quotation that shows what is included — questionnaire design, fieldwork, analysis, report — and how payment is staged. Smaller needs, like a single questionnaire, should be available too.
Talk to ARS
ARS Market Research Services is a Chennai-based research company working across India. To discuss your study, send us your requirement, call or WhatsApp +91 97899 76662, or email admin@arsmrs.in.