Market analysis

A Market analysis is a documented investigation of a Market that is used to inform a firm's planning activities particularly around decision of: inventory, purchase, work force expansion/contraction, facility expansion, purchases of capital equipment, promotional activities, and many other aspects of a company.
Not all managers are asked to conduct a market analysis, but all managers must make decisions using market analysis data and understand how the data was derived. So all managers need a reasonable understanding of the tools most used for making sales forecasts and analyzing markets.
A large number of market analysis techniques are related to sales forecasting, others are more general techniques for analyzing markets. The literature defines several areas in which market analysis is important. These include: sales forecasting, market research, and marketing strategy. Sales forecasting and market analysis are complementary skills that any marketing manager should possess.