Market Research FAQs

FAQs

Demographic Targeting - Who We Recruit

Reach specific, pre-determined demographics and ensure your study is fully representative of your audience.

MRFGR have been targeting specific demographics for years. In fact, nearly every project requires some form of demographic targeting - whether to ensure a good representation throughout the fieldwork, or to maintain relevancy in demographic-based research studies.

First things first - what is meant by demographics?

Simply put, demography refers to the way our society is structured. It imagines the population as a jigsaw where lifestyles, characteristics and personal circumstance form pieces of a much larger region, totalling the overall representation. In market research, demographics are an ideal and effective method of pre-defining any audience to ensurer a clearer, narrowed focus on the people who matter most to your particular study.

Our sophisticated targeting tools allow us to reach people of specific demographics quickly. When respondents sign up to our user database, we ask them a set of demographic questions, which allows us to later target certain users based upon our client requirements.

So who can we target?

Mind the (generational) gap

Alongside gender, age is one of the more frequently specified demographics in a market research project. While most demographic requirements for age settle on seeking individuals within standard harmonised-3 brackets (please see below), we are able to target specific ages - so if, for example, you wanted to speak with only 21 year olds, we can recruit them!

- 0-15
- 16-24
- 25-34
- 35-44
- 45-54
- 55-64
- 65-74
- 75-84
- 85+

Using this information, we are also able to determine the exact generational-criteria for each individual. While we're always happy to take our client's lead and follow their definitions when requested, we tend to apply the following rules for each generation:

Baby Boomer Generation - Born between 1946-1964
Generation X (Baby Bust) - Born between 1965-1979
Xennials - Born between 1975-1985
Millennials, Generation Y, Gen Next - Born between 1980-1994
iGen / Gen Z - Born between 1995-2012
Gen Alpha - Born between 2013-2025

As a small aside, targeting individuals under the age of 16 is possible but we always reach this audience through parents or legal guardians, allowing us to collect necessary consent where required and abide by the MRS guidelines.

Gender Identity

We target individuals based upon the gender they identify as - while many of our participants identify as either male or female, there is a third, "Other" option which allows them to manually enter an identity if they so chose.

Academics, Apprentices, and Straight-To-Work individuals

Our education level targeting is based upon the highest level of achieved qualification, as per the 2011 UK census:

- No formal qualifications
- 1-4 GCSEs, Scottish Standard Grade or equivalent qualifications
- 5 or more GCSEs, Scottish Higher, Scottish Advanced Higher or equivalent qualifications
- Apprenticeships (England, Wales and Northern Ireland only)
- 2 or more A-levels, HNC, HND, SVQ level 4 or equivalent qualifications
- First or higher degree, professional qualifications or other equivalent higher education qualifications.
- Other vocational / work related qualifications and non-UK / foreign qualifications (England, Wales and Northern Ireland only)

The rich and the not-so rich

Income can give an extremely important view of your consumers - it indicates what they're likely to spend, the type of lifestyle they're likely to live, and ultimately, whether your product or service is a viable interest to them.

Whether you're looking at household income, personal income, pre-tax, or disposable - each one has a significant amount to say.

JAM
Coined by the UK government, the JAMs - the Just About Managing - are families who, regardless of earnings, have low savings or disposable incomes. They are typically not degree education (although this doesn't rule them out completely if they are), and while able to stay on top of their bills and finances, they worry about keeping up with the costs of living.

HENRYS
The High Earners Not Rich Yet's or, 'the rich but broke' are individuals who are usually younger (within the millennial generation), that tend to be earning a 6-figure salary and living an expensive lifestyle to boot. Despite this, they are living paycheque to paycheque with relatively low savings. They differ from JAMs because while both have low savings, HENRY's have larger disposable incomes and aren't concerned about financial difficulties.

HNWI
The HNWI's have a HH income of £100,000+ with substantial savings and disposable income, along with investable assets.

The BAME

It's imperative that customers don't narrow their focus when it comes to ethnicities - skew your research sample too much towards White British, and you risk alienating ethnic minorities who make a large and impact on your business.

The BAME refers to Black, Asian, or other Ethnic Minorities. We are able to target the following ethnic groups:

White or White British
Asian or Asian British: Indian
Asian or Asian British: Pakistani
Asian or Asian British: Bangladeshi
Asian or Asian British: Chinese
Asian or Asian British: Other Asian
Black or Black British
Mixed or Multiple:
Other (please state)

Living Situation
In demography, when we look at a person's living situation, we're actually looking at several things: who they live with, what type of set-up they have, whether that property is owned, rented, part-owned, and the length of time they're expected to live in that situation.

Using this information, we are able to target a multitude of demographics:

- Single Occupiers
- Empty nesters (parents who's child(ren) have 'flown the coop')
- Nesters or pre-family (couples who are looking to have children)
- Married and settled
- Families (of various sizes)
- Living with parents

We can then drill down further to target demographics from the above who are also living in a:

- Owned property
- Mortgaged property
- Rented property
- Social rented property
- Within another arrangement - sofa surfing, not a bill payer, no permanent residence, etc.

Demographics are a perfect tool for making sure that you're speaking to the right audience. Using MRFGR's demographic targeting system, we're able to put our client's in touch with their desired demographic, fast. Get in touch today and discuss your requirements with the team further.

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