Audience research
Part of Before you commission marketing agencies audience research
Marketing agencies survey tools or an IPA member agency for research
Compare self-run survey tools with commissioning an IPA member agency for audience research, covering data law, costs and due diligence for English buyers.
What to take away
- A Manchester or Leeds team planning a 400-response customer survey for October pays roughly £800 to £2,400 in panel completes, plus a licence such as SmartSurvey from about £29 a month.
- The licence is the cheap part; design, sampling and analysis decide whether the numbers withstand scrutiny.
- Self-serve survey tools such as SurveyMonkey, Typeform, Qualtrics and Prolific cover in-house needs; you stay the data controller under UK GDPR.
- An IPA member agency such as PHD, Wavemaker or the7stars brings an assessed process and senior time; budget from about £8,000.
- Run pulse surveys yourself. Commission an agency for anything a board or client will challenge, and fix data ownership before fieldwork.
Two routes, one brief
A retained client wants evidence a campaign landed. A new business lead wants to know which sectors are buying. Both choose between a survey platform subscription and a specialist brief.
If you are still defining who to ask, our guide to planning audience research across England sets out sample sizes and geography.
Survey tools are software: a question builder, your contact list or rented panel access, cross-tabs and export. SmartSurvey, SurveyMonkey, Typeform and Prolific cover UK fieldwork. An agency sells judgement: sampling frames, questionnaire design, weighting and a senior name on the findings.
What self-serve survey tools actually cost
SmartSurvey's UK plans start around £29 a month, SurveyMonkey Team about £25 per user a month annually, and Typeform about £25 a month with a free plan capped at ten responses. Qualtrics is quote-based, typically thousands a year.
Panel completes drive the bill. A UK consumer study usually costs £2 to £6 per interview; B2B and niche samples often run £30 to £100. Prolific recommends about £9 an hour.
Someone must write the questionnaire, check it does not lead respondents, clean the data and read the crosstabs. That person is usually a marketer, not a researcher. Budget 30 to 40 hours for 400 responses.
The bigger risk is legal: emailing a contact list needs a lawful basis under the UK GDPR, and consent is only one option. The ICO's guidance on lawful basis sets out the alternatives.
What an accredited agency adds
Commissioning research from an IPA member agency buys an externally assessed process. The IPA's case for choosing an accredited agency rests on accreditation as a due-diligence signal, which matters if procurement or a regulated client is watching.
IPA members that field audience research include PHD, Wavemaker, the7stars, VCCP and Havas Media. Ask for a named project lead, recent UK examples and ISO 20252, the research standard.
You also buy speed: a specialist fields a representative study while your team argues about question wording. Agency research is priced in thousands, not hundreds; a 1,000-interview study typically starts near £12,000.
How to choose between them
- Name the decision the research must inform.
- List the readers and how sceptical they are.
- Estimate the internal hours to design, field and analyse it.
- Compare that with two agency quotes for the same brief.
- Check the supplier's registration and trading status on the GOV.UK business hub.
- Decide who owns the raw data, and put it in the contract.
Step three is where teams surprise themselves. If the honest answer is 40 hours of a marketing manager's time, the agency quote often looks cheaper.
Choosing between survey tools and agencies
- Write the decision in one sentence
- List who will read the findings
- Estimate internal design and analysis hours
- Compare against two agency quotes
- Check supplier registration and trading status
- Decide who owns the raw data
When the tool wins
Short pulse surveys, existing customer lists, and questions you will act on within a week.
When the agency wins
Reputation studies, anything quoted publicly, and research a client is paying for. The audit trail matters more than the headline number.
The middle path worth considering
Some agencies buy panel access through Cint or Toluna, then pay a freelance researcher for two days to write the questionnaire. You keep the data and the total stays in the low thousands.
Where competitor data fits
Audience surveys tell you what buyers think, rarely what rivals are doing about it. If your brief includes positioning, pair the survey with desk research on competing claims, as in our piece on competitor research for English agencies.
Common questions
Can a survey tool handle UK GDPR compliance on its own?
No. The platform stores responses; you remain the controller and must document a lawful basis. The ICO guidance above explains how.
Is IPA membership a guarantee of research quality?
It is a due-diligence signal, not a guarantee. Ask for recent examples and the named project lead.
Do I need an agency if I only want 50 responses?
Usually not. At that scale, a tool plus internal time is cheaper, if the sample fits the decision.
