| Detail | For this role |
|---|---|
| Department | Marketing |
| Level | Manager |
| Reports to | Marketing Director |
| Direct reports | Market Research Analyst |
| Experience | 6 to 10 years in market research at a client company or research agency, including 2 years managing studies end to end |
Market Research Manager job description template
Copy this job description, replace the text in square brackets and post it on your careers page or a job portal.
Job title: Market Research Manager
Department: Marketing
Reports to: Marketing Director
Location: [City], [office, branch or site]
About the role
A Market Research Manager finds and explains the facts behind marketing and business decisions. They design studies such as usage and attitude surveys, concept and product tests, brand health tracking and pricing research, manage research agencies and fieldwork, and turn data into clear recommendations for brand, product and sales teams. The role sits in the insights or marketing team of FMCG, durables, auto, pharma, BFSI and media companies, and is judged on the quality of its evidence and how often decisions use it.
Key responsibilities
- Take research requests from brand, product and sales teams, and turn each one into a clear business question and study design.
- Choose the method, such as quantitative surveys, focus groups, in-home interviews, retail audits or online panels, based on the decision to be made.
- Write research briefs, compare agency proposals and costs, and recommend the agency for each study.
- Approve questionnaires, discussion guides, sample plans and quotas, including city tiers, socio-economic groups and languages.
- Attend or audit fieldwork and focus groups in person, and check the agency's back-checks and data quality reports.
- Analyse the data or review the agency's analysis, including significance tests and cross-tabulations.
- Write and present insight reports that end in specific recommendations rather than only charts.
- Run continuous studies such as brand health trackers and customer satisfaction surveys so that every wave stays comparable.
- Maintain a searchable library of past research so teams check existing evidence before commissioning new work.
- Manage the research budget and agency contracts, and track costs by study and by requesting team.
Requirements
- MBA in Marketing, or a master's degree in statistics, economics or psychology
- Graduate degree in any discipline
- Training in advanced analytics or qualitative research is an advantage
- 6 to 10 years in market research at a client company or research agency, including 2 years managing studies end to end
KRAs and KPIs for a Market Research Manager
Key result areas for the appraisal form, each with a KPI you can measure every month or quarter.
| Key result area | How to measure it |
|---|---|
| Study delivery | At least 90 percent of studies delivered by the agreed debrief date |
| Research budget | Annual research spend within budget, with cost per completed interview at the rates agreed in contracts |
| Data quality | Back-check failure rate in fieldwork below the limit set in the agency contract |
| Insight adoption | A documented business decision linked to at least 80 percent of completed studies |
| Tracker continuity | Brand and satisfaction trackers run on schedule with no break in wave comparability |
Skills and tools
Tools used day to day: SPSS, Q Research Software or similar, MS Excel, MS PowerPoint, Online survey platform, Tableau or Power BI.
Reporting line and career path
Next roles: Head of Marketing, Marketing Director, Head of Strategy
Interview questions for a Market Research Manager
- A brand team wants to know why sales dropped in Tier 2 towns. How would you design the study?
- How do you decide between focus groups and a quantitative survey?
- What checks do you run to make sure fieldwork data is genuine?
- Tell me about research that changed a decision. How did you present it?
- Two tracker waves show a large drop that sales data does not support. What do you check?
- How do you handle a business head who wants research to prove a decision already taken?
Managing a Market Research Manager in ZeniaHR
Hire and manage your marketing team in one place
Post the role, onboard the new hire, and track attendance, leave and KRAs in ZeniaHR. Free for your first 50 employees.
Book a free demoSee pricingFrequently asked questions
What does a market research manager do?
A market research manager designs and manages studies that answer marketing and business questions. They write briefs, choose methods and agencies, approve questionnaires and samples, check fieldwork quality, analyse data and present recommendations to brand, product and sales teams.
What is the difference between a market research manager and a market research analyst?
A market research analyst works on questionnaires, data cleaning, tables, charts and first drafts of reports. The market research manager owns each study from brief to recommendation, chooses the method and agency, controls quality and budget, and presents findings to senior managers.
Is market research a good career in India?
Market research offers steady work in India because FMCG, auto, media, healthcare and financial companies commission studies every year. Careers often start at research agencies and move to client-side insights roles, which give a direct view of how evidence shapes business decisions.