South Korea

Data collection and market research in South Korea

Our data collection services in South Korea are handled by one of our oldest partners, handling many projects in the food and beverage, import, cosmetics and travel and tourism industries to name a few over many years.

These projects have involved focus group and depth interviews, street and mall intercepts, telephone interviews and face to face inteviews throughout South Korea. Our partner has one of the few dedicated focus group facilities in South Korea offering simultaneous translation, dubbed translations direct onto videotape and the highest quality recording facilities.

South Korea is one of the most profitable markets for local and foreign companies, with consumer affordability levels at the highest worldwide. A population fast approaching 100 Million attests to South Korea's feasibility as a targeted geographic market. South Koreans are among the top 5 Internet user countries in the world, with high penetration levels and broad-band high speed connections the norm. Seoul is one of the most densely populated urban areas in the world.

However, South Koreans are a very proud people. There is a often complex love-hate relationship with foreign brands, and very few understand or speak English, or even languages of their geographically closest trading partners - Japan, Taiwan and China. Because of this, careful market, brand and ad testing is imperative before introducing a global brand into the South Korean consumer market. Often, South Korean campaigns require significant rebranding (often quite localised) to account for local perceptions.

Due to the high living costs in South Korea, data collection and market research costs are relatively high compared to many Western cities, and definitely those in South East Asia. They are usually less than Japan, but substantially higher than in Singapore, China, USA, and almost all Europoean cities. Translation accounts for some of these higher costs. As an East Asian country, the local language involves non-Latin characters. To offset some of these disadvantages, research design and development of materials, as well as research analysis and reporting is often carried out from our head office, which has lower overheads. Data collection and advice on the local markets however is conducted on the ground from Seoul and we work together to provide the most cost effective market research solutions for each client.

The high population density of Seoul and other South Korean cities means that face to face interviewing is only around 20 to 25% more expensive than telephone interviewing for most target samples, and is often more cost-effective.

Notwithstanding the above, South Korean consumers are popular targets for both local and international marketers, as the size of the affordibility of the market is high. A presence in South Korea is indispensable for truly global brands. Market research RFPs for Korean consumer markets make up a significant proportion of all RFPs received in our office.