TGM RESEARCH: BEST PRACTICES

How to conduct market
research projects in Morocco?

A guideline on best practices how to conduct a successful market research in Morocco.

Why Morocco is an interesting market to conduct research?

Morocco is a large and diversified country in terms of economy, and the fifth largest country by GDP on the continent. About half of the country's GDP comes from the service sector and other important contributors are telecommunications, textiles, and tourism. Services also make up 40% of the workforce. Being a highly urbanized country, Morocco has large urban centers along the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts.

Market research is an important tool for understanding specific conditions in Morocco, such as market size, competition, and local trends. But doing market research in emerging markets has its unique challenges. The availability of reliable sources of information is limited. Also, doing primary research can be much more complicated than in a developed market, because personal connections or other unique local factors can play a big role in reaching subject matter experts. However due to many interesting factors of Morocco, it has become possible to do so.

The capital, Rabat, serves as an important administrative centre with historical landmarks. Casablanca is the country’s largest city and is known for its port, touristic attractions, and as the main commercial hub of the country.

The wealth of culture, its proximity to major markets, its healthy business environment, and friendliness to foreign investment make Morocco an ideal choice to pursue or continue your business in the country.

There still remains some barriers to doing business in Morocco, mainly in the shape of transparency issues and cumbersome government regulations and procedures. The banking system can also be somewhat hard to navigate. Though notable efforts have been made recently in order to align with global practices.

Why choose online research methods for fielding a research project in Morocco?

Until the end of the 1990s, the Moroccan market research market was dominated by 2 or 3 reference players on a national scale. From the beginning of the 2000s, we could see the massive advent of international players, who in their expansion policy, opted for Morocco given its economic attractiveness but also and above all because of its geographical position, which makes it an essential hub for sub-Saharan Africa, especially its French-speaking part. Many of these players have also followed their international clients who have asked them to be present in certain countries considered to be emerging, to support them in their research needs and thus fill the existing void in terms of market or consumer data. These multinational customers being major consumers of studies, the Moroccan market had experienced a very strong expansion during the 1st decade in the 21st century.

The opening of the Moroccan mobile telephony market but also the modernization of the Moroccan administration are also factors that have contributed quite a bit to the increase in demand for market studies, until 10 years ago, it was unimaginable to carry out a full research market study with reasonable prices and good data quality, with this coming transformation, more and more agencies and able to conduct several studies with a high success rate while also focusing on a good representation of the demographics of the country.

How to run a successful online survey in Morocco? Key points.

With that being said, let’s take a look at several important key points to remember when running an online market research in Morocco.

Understand the people. The main language spoken in Morocco is Arabic, however with the country’s diverse dialects, sometimes Arabic won’t be understood by some people, so make sure to have a blend of French and Arabic where people will be able to make the choice of the language, they are most comfortable with understanding as well as answering to.
Focus on the simple things. For an emerging African market such as Morocco, Internet speed is not the best companions, so while drafting the questionnaire, the most important thing to focus on is its length and keeping it as short as possible to ensure engagement and make sure the respondents stay satisfied and don’t feel any hint of repeatability that longer questionnaire seem to have.
Mobile-friendly. Low connectivity is an issue that African countries are still suffering from, and mobiles are the first devise choice in terms of internet usage. to be able to guarantee a large number of engagement and participation, make the people are able to take on the survey on their mobile phone.
Safety of the Data. What people look for first, when taking a survey online or participating in market research study, is the safety of their data, making sure the data is safe and well protected will help you build a trustworthy relationship between the customer and the employees and will also help in getting more customers, this is a crucial point in conducting an online survey and succeeding in it.

As the leading online data collection agency, TGM Research conducted multiple market research projects in Northwest Africa, pioneering online research in this market. To learn more about the recent projects we did in Morocco, please contact us.

We hope you have found this short guide useful

If you have any further questions about how best to set up your online research study in Northwest Africa, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us.

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