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• What is Secondary Research? | Definition, Types, & Examples

What is Secondary Research? | Definition, Types, & Examples

Published on January 20, 2023 by Tegan George . Revised on January 12, 2024.

Secondary research is a research method that uses data that was collected by someone else. In other words, whenever you conduct research using data that already exists, you are conducting secondary research. On the other hand, any type of research that you undertake yourself is called primary research .

Secondary research can be qualitative or quantitative in nature. It often uses data gathered from published peer-reviewed papers, meta-analyses, or government or private sector databases and datasets.

Table of contents

When to use secondary research, types of secondary research, examples of secondary research, advantages and disadvantages of secondary research, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions.

Secondary research is a very common research method, used in lieu of collecting your own primary data. It is often used in research designs or as a way to start your research process if you plan to conduct primary research later on.

Since it is often inexpensive or free to access, secondary research is a low-stakes way to determine if further primary research is needed, as gaps in secondary research are a strong indication that primary research is necessary. For this reason, while secondary research can theoretically be exploratory or explanatory in nature, it is usually explanatory: aiming to explain the causes and consequences of a well-defined problem.

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Secondary research can take many forms, but the most common types are:

Statistical analysis

Literature reviews, case studies, content analysis.

There is ample data available online from a variety of sources, often in the form of datasets. These datasets are often open-source or downloadable at a low cost, and are ideal for conducting statistical analyses such as hypothesis testing or regression analysis .

Credible sources for existing data include:

• The government
• Government agencies
• Non-governmental organizations
• Educational institutions
• Businesses or consultancies
• Libraries or archives
• Newspapers, academic journals, or magazines

A literature review is a survey of preexisting scholarly sources on your topic. It provides an overview of current knowledge, allowing you to identify relevant themes, debates, and gaps in the research you analyze. You can later apply these to your own work, or use them as a jumping-off point to conduct primary research of your own.

Structured much like a regular academic paper (with a clear introduction, body, and conclusion), a literature review is a great way to evaluate the current state of research and demonstrate your knowledge of the scholarly debates around your topic.

A case study is a detailed study of a specific subject. It is usually qualitative in nature and can focus on  a person, group, place, event, organization, or phenomenon. A case study is a great way to utilize existing research to gain concrete, contextual, and in-depth knowledge about your real-world subject.

You can choose to focus on just one complex case, exploring a single subject in great detail, or examine multiple cases if you’d prefer to compare different aspects of your topic. Preexisting interviews , observational studies , or other sources of primary data make for great case studies.

Content analysis is a research method that studies patterns in recorded communication by utilizing existing texts. It can be either quantitative or qualitative in nature, depending on whether you choose to analyze countable or measurable patterns, or more interpretive ones. Content analysis is popular in communication studies, but it is also widely used in historical analysis, anthropology, and psychology to make more semantic qualitative inferences.

Secondary research is a broad research approach that can be pursued any way you’d like. Here are a few examples of different ways you can use secondary research to explore your research topic .

Secondary research is a very common research approach, but has distinct advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages of secondary research

Advantages include:

• Secondary data is very easy to source and readily available .
• It is also often free or accessible through your educational institution’s library or network, making it much cheaper to conduct than primary research .
• As you are relying on research that already exists, conducting secondary research is much less time consuming than primary research. Since your timeline is so much shorter, your research can be ready to publish sooner.
• Using data from others allows you to show reproducibility and replicability , bolstering prior research and situating your own work within your field.

Disadvantages of secondary research

Disadvantages include:

• Ease of access does not signify credibility . It’s important to be aware that secondary research is not always reliable , and can often be out of date. It’s critical to analyze any data you’re thinking of using prior to getting started, using a method like the CRAAP test .
• Secondary research often relies on primary research already conducted. If this original research is biased in any way, those research biases could creep into the secondary results.

Many researchers using the same secondary research to form similar conclusions can also take away from the uniqueness and reliability of your research. Many datasets become “kitchen-sink” models, where too many variables are added in an attempt to draw increasingly niche conclusions from overused data . Data cleansing may be necessary to test the quality of the research.

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If you want to know more about statistics , methodology , or research bias , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

• Normal distribution
• Degrees of freedom
• Null hypothesis
• Discourse analysis
• Control groups
• Mixed methods research
• Non-probability sampling
• Quantitative research
• Inclusion and exclusion criteria

Research bias

• Rosenthal effect
• Implicit bias
• Cognitive bias
• Selection bias
• Negativity bias
• Status quo bias

A systematic review is secondary research because it uses existing research. You don’t collect new data yourself.

The research methods you use depend on the type of data you need to answer your research question .

• If you want to measure something or test a hypothesis , use quantitative methods . If you want to explore ideas, thoughts and meanings, use qualitative methods .
• If you want to analyze a large amount of readily-available data, use secondary data. If you want data specific to your purposes with control over how it is generated, collect primary data.
• If you want to establish cause-and-effect relationships between variables , use experimental methods. If you want to understand the characteristics of a research subject, use descriptive methods.

Quantitative research deals with numbers and statistics, while qualitative research deals with words and meanings.

Quantitative methods allow you to systematically measure variables and test hypotheses . Qualitative methods allow you to explore concepts and experiences in more detail.

Sources in this article

We strongly encourage students to use sources in their work. You can cite our article (APA Style) or take a deep dive into the articles below.

George, T. (2024, January 12). What is Secondary Research? | Definition, Types, & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved August 12, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/secondary-research/

Largan, C., & Morris, T. M. (2019). Qualitative Secondary Research: A Step-By-Step Guide (1st ed.). SAGE Publications Ltd.

Peloquin, D., DiMaio, M., Bierer, B., & Barnes, M. (2020). Disruptive and avoidable: GDPR challenges to secondary research uses of data. European Journal of Human Genetics , 28 (6), 697–705. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41431-020-0596-x

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Secondary research: definition, methods, & examples.

19 min read This ultimate guide to secondary research helps you understand changes in market trends, customers buying patterns and your competition using existing data sources.

In situations where you’re not involved in the data gathering process ( primary research ), you have to rely on existing information and data to arrive at specific research conclusions or outcomes. This approach is known as secondary research.

In this article, we’re going to explain what secondary research is, how it works, and share some examples of it in practice.

Free eBook: The ultimate guide to conducting market research

What is secondary research?

Secondary research, also known as desk research, is a research method that involves compiling existing data sourced from a variety of channels . This includes internal sources (e.g.in-house research) or, more commonly, external sources (such as government statistics, organizational bodies, and the internet).

Secondary research comes in several formats, such as published datasets, reports, and survey responses , and can also be sourced from websites, libraries, and museums.

The information is usually free — or available at a limited access cost — and gathered using surveys , telephone interviews, observation, face-to-face interviews, and more.

When using secondary research, researchers collect, verify, analyze and incorporate it to help them confirm research goals for the research period.

As well as the above, it can be used to review previous research into an area of interest. Researchers can look for patterns across data spanning several years and identify trends — or use it to verify early hypothesis statements and establish whether it’s worth continuing research into a prospective area.

How to conduct secondary research

There are five key steps to conducting secondary research effectively and efficiently:

1.    Identify and define the research topic

First, understand what you will be researching and define the topic by thinking about the research questions you want to be answered.

Ask yourself: What is the point of conducting this research? Then, ask: What do we want to achieve?

This may indicate an exploratory reason (why something happened) or confirm a hypothesis. The answers may indicate ideas that need primary or secondary research (or a combination) to investigate them.

2.    Find research and existing data sources

If secondary research is needed, think about where you might find the information. This helps you narrow down your secondary sources to those that help you answer your questions. What keywords do you need to use?

Which organizations are closely working on this topic already? Are there any competitors that you need to be aware of?

Create a list of the data sources, information, and people that could help you with your work.

3.    Begin searching and collecting the existing data

Now that you have the list of data sources, start accessing the data and collect the information into an organized system. This may mean you start setting up research journal accounts or making telephone calls to book meetings with third-party research teams to verify the details around data results.

As you search and access information, remember to check the data’s date, the credibility of the source, the relevance of the material to your research topic, and the methodology used by the third-party researchers. Start small and as you gain results, investigate further in the areas that help your research’s aims.

4.    Combine the data and compare the results

When you have your data in one place, you need to understand, filter, order, and combine it intelligently. Data may come in different formats where some data could be unusable, while other information may need to be deleted.

After this, you can start to look at different data sets to see what they tell you. You may find that you need to compare the same datasets over different periods for changes over time or compare different datasets to notice overlaps or trends. Ask yourself: What does this data mean to my research? Does it help or hinder my research?

5.    Analyze your data and explore further

In this last stage of the process, look at the information you have and ask yourself if this answers your original questions for your research. Are there any gaps? Do you understand the information you’ve found? If you feel there is more to cover, repeat the steps and delve deeper into the topic so that you can get all the information you need.

If secondary research can’t provide these answers, consider supplementing your results with data gained from primary research. As you explore further, add to your knowledge and update your findings. This will help you present clear, credible information.

Primary vs secondary research

Unlike secondary research, primary research involves creating data first-hand by directly working with interviewees, target users, or a target market. Primary research focuses on the method for carrying out research, asking questions, and collecting data using approaches such as:

• Interviews (panel, face-to-face or over the phone)
• Questionnaires or surveys
• Focus groups

Using these methods, researchers can get in-depth, targeted responses to questions, making results more accurate and specific to their research goals. However, it does take time to do and administer.

Unlike primary research, secondary research uses existing data, which also includes published results from primary research. Researchers summarize the existing research and use the results to support their research goals.

Both primary and secondary research have their places. Primary research can support the findings found through secondary research (and fill knowledge gaps), while secondary research can be a starting point for further primary research. Because of this, these research methods are often combined for optimal research results that are accurate at both the micro and macro level.

Sources of Secondary Research

There are two types of secondary research sources: internal and external. Internal data refers to in-house data that can be gathered from the researcher’s organization. External data refers to data published outside of and not owned by the researcher’s organization.

Internal data

Internal data is a good first port of call for insights and knowledge, as you may already have relevant information stored in your systems. Because you own this information — and it won’t be available to other researchers — it can give you a competitive edge . Examples of internal data include:

• Database information on sales history and business goal conversions
• Information from website applications and mobile site data
• Customer-generated data on product and service efficiency and use
• Previous research results or supplemental research areas
• Previous campaign results

External data

External data is useful when you: 1) need information on a new topic, 2) want to fill in gaps in your knowledge, or 3) want data that breaks down a population or market for trend and pattern analysis. Examples of external data include:

• Government, non-government agencies, and trade body statistics
• Company reports and research
• Competitor research
• Public library collections
• Textbooks and research journals
• Media stories in newspapers
• Online journals and research sites

Three examples of secondary research methods in action

How and why might you conduct secondary research? Let’s look at a few examples:

1.    Collecting factual information from the internet on a specific topic or market

There are plenty of sites that hold data for people to view and use in their research. For example, Google Scholar, ResearchGate, or Wiley Online Library all provide previous research on a particular topic. Researchers can create free accounts and use the search facilities to look into a topic by keyword, before following the instructions to download or export results for further analysis.

This can be useful for exploring a new market that your organization wants to consider entering. For instance, by viewing the U.S Census Bureau demographic data for that area, you can see what the demographics of your target audience are , and create compelling marketing campaigns accordingly.

2.    Finding out the views of your target audience on a particular topic

If you’re interested in seeing the historical views on a particular topic, for example, attitudes to women’s rights in the US, you can turn to secondary sources.

Textbooks, news articles, reviews, and journal entries can all provide qualitative reports and interviews covering how people discussed women’s rights. There may be multimedia elements like video or documented posters of propaganda showing biased language usage.

By gathering this information, synthesizing it, and evaluating the language, who created it and when it was shared, you can create a timeline of how a topic was discussed over time.

3.    When you want to know the latest thinking on a topic

Educational institutions, such as schools and colleges, create a lot of research-based reports on younger audiences or their academic specialisms. Dissertations from students also can be submitted to research journals, making these places useful places to see the latest insights from a new generation of academics.

Information can be requested — and sometimes academic institutions may want to collaborate and conduct research on your behalf. This can provide key primary data in areas that you want to research, as well as secondary data sources for your research.

Advantages of secondary research

There are several benefits of using secondary research, which we’ve outlined below:

• Easily and readily available data – There is an abundance of readily accessible data sources that have been pre-collected for use, in person at local libraries and online using the internet. This data is usually sorted by filters or can be exported into spreadsheet format, meaning that little technical expertise is needed to access and use the data.
• Faster research speeds – Since the data is already published and in the public arena, you don’t need to collect this information through primary research. This can make the research easier to do and faster, as you can get started with the data quickly.
• Low financial and time costs – Most secondary data sources can be accessed for free or at a small cost to the researcher, so the overall research costs are kept low. In addition, by saving on preliminary research, the time costs for the researcher are kept down as well.
• Secondary data can drive additional research actions – The insights gained can support future research activities (like conducting a follow-up survey or specifying future detailed research topics) or help add value to these activities.
• Secondary data can be useful pre-research insights – Secondary source data can provide pre-research insights and information on effects that can help resolve whether research should be conducted. It can also help highlight knowledge gaps, so subsequent research can consider this.
• Ability to scale up results – Secondary sources can include large datasets (like Census data results across several states) so research results can be scaled up quickly using large secondary data sources.

Disadvantages of secondary research

The disadvantages of secondary research are worth considering in advance of conducting research :

• Secondary research data can be out of date – Secondary sources can be updated regularly, but if you’re exploring the data between two updates, the data can be out of date. Researchers will need to consider whether the data available provides the right research coverage dates, so that insights are accurate and timely, or if the data needs to be updated. Also, fast-moving markets may find secondary data expires very quickly.
• Secondary research needs to be verified and interpreted – Where there’s a lot of data from one source, a researcher needs to review and analyze it. The data may need to be verified against other data sets or your hypotheses for accuracy and to ensure you’re using the right data for your research.
• The researcher has had no control over the secondary research – As the researcher has not been involved in the secondary research, invalid data can affect the results. It’s therefore vital that the methodology and controls are closely reviewed so that the data is collected in a systematic and error-free way.
• Secondary research data is not exclusive – As data sets are commonly available, there is no exclusivity and many researchers can use the same data. This can be problematic where researchers want to have exclusive rights over the research results and risk duplication of research in the future.

When do we conduct secondary research?

Now that you know the basics of secondary research, when do researchers normally conduct secondary research?

It’s often used at the beginning of research, when the researcher is trying to understand the current landscape . In addition, if the research area is new to the researcher, it can form crucial background context to help them understand what information exists already. This can plug knowledge gaps, supplement the researcher’s own learning or add to the research.

Secondary research can also be used in conjunction with primary research. Secondary research can become the formative research that helps pinpoint where further primary research is needed to find out specific information. It can also support or verify the findings from primary research.

You can use secondary research where high levels of control aren’t needed by the researcher, but a lot of knowledge on a topic is required from different angles.

Secondary research should not be used in place of primary research as both are very different and are used for various circumstances.

Questions to ask before conducting secondary research

Before you start your secondary research, ask yourself these questions:

• Is there similar internal data that we have created for a similar area in the past?

If your organization has past research, it’s best to review this work before starting a new project. The older work may provide you with the answers, and give you a starting dataset and context of how your organization approached the research before. However, be mindful that the work is probably out of date and view it with that note in mind. Read through and look for where this helps your research goals or where more work is needed.

• What am I trying to achieve with this research?

When you have clear goals, and understand what you need to achieve, you can look for the perfect type of secondary or primary research to support the aims. Different secondary research data will provide you with different information – for example, looking at news stories to tell you a breakdown of your market’s buying patterns won’t be as useful as internal or external data e-commerce and sales data sources.

• How credible will my research be?

If you are looking for credibility, you want to consider how accurate the research results will need to be, and if you can sacrifice credibility for speed by using secondary sources to get you started. Bear in mind which sources you choose — low-credibility data sites, like political party websites that are highly biased to favor their own party, would skew your results.

• What is the date of the secondary research?

When you’re looking to conduct research, you want the results to be as useful as possible , so using data that is 10 years old won’t be as accurate as using data that was created a year ago. Since a lot can change in a few years, note the date of your research and look for earlier data sets that can tell you a more recent picture of results. One caveat to this is using data collected over a long-term period for comparisons with earlier periods, which can tell you about the rate and direction of change.

• Can the data sources be verified? Does the information you have check out?

If you can’t verify the data by looking at the research methodology, speaking to the original team or cross-checking the facts with other research, it could be hard to be sure that the data is accurate. Think about whether you can use another source, or if it’s worth doing some supplementary primary research to replicate and verify results to help with this issue.

We created a front-to-back guide on conducting market research, The ultimate guide to conducting market research , so you can understand the research journey with confidence.

In it, you’ll learn more about:

• What effective market research looks like
• The use cases for market research
• The most important steps to conducting market research
• And how to take action on your research findings

Download the free guide for a clearer view on secondary research and other key research types for your business.

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Secondary Research Guide: Definition, Methods, Examples

Apr 3, 2024

8 min. read

The internet has vastly expanded our access to information, allowing us to learn almost anything about everything. But not all market research is created equal , and this secondary research guide explains why.

There are two key ways to do research. One is to test your own ideas, make your own observations, and collect your own data to derive conclusions. The other is to use secondary research — where someone else has done most of the heavy lifting for you. 

Here’s an overview of secondary research and the value it brings to data-driven businesses.

Secondary Research Definition: What Is Secondary Research?

Primary vs Secondary Market Research

What Are Secondary Research Methods?

Advantages of secondary research, disadvantages of secondary research, best practices for secondary research, how to conduct secondary research with meltwater.

Secondary research definition: The process of collecting information from existing sources and data that have already been analyzed by others.

Secondary research (aka desk research or complementary research ) provides a foundation to help you understand a topic, with the goal of building on existing knowledge. They often cover the same information as primary sources, but they add a layer of analysis and explanation to them.

Users can choose from several secondary research types and sources, including:

• Journal articles
• Research papers

With secondary sources, users can draw insights, detect trends , and validate findings to jumpstart their research efforts.

Primary vs. Secondary Market Research

We’ve touched a little on primary research , but it’s essential to understand exactly how primary and secondary research are unique.

Think of primary research as the “thing” itself, and secondary research as the analysis of the “thing,” like these primary and secondary research examples:

• An expert gives an interview (primary research) and a marketer uses that interview to write an article (secondary research).
• A company conducts a consumer satisfaction survey (primary research) and a business analyst uses the survey data to write a market trend report (secondary research).
• A marketing team launches a new advertising campaign across various platforms (primary research) and a marketing research firm, like Meltwater for market research , compiles the campaign performance data to benchmark against industry standards (secondary research).

In other words, primary sources make original contributions to a topic or issue, while secondary sources analyze, synthesize, or interpret primary sources.

Both are necessary when optimizing a business, gaining a competitive edge , improving marketing, or understanding consumer trends that may impact your business.

Secondary research methods focus on analyzing existing data rather than collecting primary data . Common examples of secondary research methods include:

• Literature review . Researchers analyze and synthesize existing literature (e.g., white papers, research papers, articles) to find knowledge gaps and build on current findings.
• Content analysis . Researchers review media sources and published content to find meaningful patterns and trends.
• AI-powered secondary research . Platforms like Meltwater for market research analyze vast amounts of complex data and use AI technologies like natural language processing and machine learning to turn data into contextual insights.

Researchers today have access to more secondary research companies and market research tools and technology than ever before, allowing them to streamline their efforts and improve their findings.

Want to see how Meltwater can complement your secondary market research efforts? Simply fill out the form at the bottom of this post, and we'll be in touch.

Conducting secondary research offers benefits in every job function and use case, from marketing to the C-suite. Here are a few advantages you can expect.

Cost and time efficiency

Using existing research saves you time and money compared to conducting primary research. Secondary data is readily available and easily accessible via libraries, free publications, or the Internet. This is particularly advantageous when you face time constraints or when a project requires a large amount of data and research.

Access to large datasets

Secondary data gives you access to larger data sets and sample sizes compared to what primary methods may produce. Larger sample sizes can improve the statistical power of the study and add more credibility to your findings.

Ability to analyze trends and patterns

Using larger sample sizes, researchers have more opportunities to find and analyze trends and patterns. The more data that supports a trend or pattern, the more trustworthy the trend becomes and the more useful for making decisions. 

Historical context

Using a combination of older and recent data allows researchers to gain historical context about patterns and trends. Learning what’s happened before can help decision-makers gain a better current understanding and improve how they approach a problem or project.

Basis for further research

Ideally, you’ll use secondary research to further other efforts . Secondary sources help to identify knowledge gaps, highlight areas for improvement, or conduct deeper investigations.

Tip: Learn how to use Meltwater as a research tool and how Meltwater uses AI.

Secondary research comes with a few drawbacks, though these aren’t necessarily deal breakers when deciding to use secondary sources.

Reliability concerns

Researchers don’t always know where the data comes from or how it’s collected, which can lead to reliability concerns. They don’t control the initial process, nor do they always know the original purpose for collecting the data, both of which can lead to skewed results.

Potential bias

The original data collectors may have a specific agenda when doing their primary research, which may lead to biased findings. Evaluating the credibility and integrity of secondary data sources can prove difficult.

Outdated information

Secondary sources may contain outdated information, especially when dealing with rapidly evolving trends or fields. Using outdated information can lead to inaccurate conclusions and widen knowledge gaps.

Limitations in customization

Relying on secondary data means being at the mercy of what’s already published. It doesn’t consider your specific use cases, which limits you as to how you can customize and use the data.

A lack of relevance

Secondary research rarely holds all the answers you need, at least from a single source. You typically need multiple secondary sources to piece together a narrative, and even then you might not find the specific information you need.

To make secondary market research your new best friend, you’ll need to think critically about its strengths and find ways to overcome its weaknesses. Let’s review some best practices to use secondary research to its fullest potential.

Identify credible sources for secondary research

To overcome the challenges of bias, accuracy, and reliability, choose secondary sources that have a demonstrated history of excellence . For example, an article published in a medical journal naturally has more credibility than a blog post on a little-known website.

Assess credibility based on peer reviews, author expertise, sampling techniques, publication reputation, and data collection methodologies. Cross-reference the data with other sources to gain a general consensus of truth.

The more credibility “factors” a source has, the more confidently you can rely on it. 

Evaluate the quality and relevance of secondary data

You can gauge the quality of the data by asking simple questions:

• How complete is the data? 
• How old is the data? 
• Is this data relevant to my needs?
• Does the data come from a known, trustworthy source?

It’s best to focus on data that aligns with your research objectives. Knowing the questions you want to answer and the outcomes you want to achieve ahead of time helps you focus only on data that offers meaningful insights.

Document your sources 

If you’re sharing secondary data with others, it’s essential to document your sources to gain others’ trust. They don’t have the benefit of being “in the trenches” with you during your research, and sharing your sources can add credibility to your findings and gain instant buy-in.

Secondary market research offers an efficient, cost-effective way to learn more about a topic or trend, providing a comprehensive understanding of the customer journey . Compared to primary research, users can gain broader insights, analyze trends and patterns, and gain a solid foundation for further exploration by using secondary sources.

Meltwater for market research speeds up the time to value in using secondary research with AI-powered insights, enhancing your understanding of the customer journey. Using natural language processing, machine learning, and trusted data science processes, Meltwater helps you find relevant data and automatically surfaces insights to help you understand its significance. Our solution identifies hidden connections between data points you might not know to look for and spells out what the data means, allowing you to make better decisions based on accurate conclusions. Learn more about Meltwater's power as a secondary research solution when you request a demo by filling out the form below:

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Home Market Research

Secondary Research: Definition, Methods and Examples.

In the world of research, there are two main types of data sources: primary and secondary. While primary research involves collecting new data directly from individuals or sources, secondary research involves analyzing existing data already collected by someone else. Today we’ll discuss secondary research.

One common source of this research is published research reports and other documents. These materials can often be found in public libraries, on websites, or even as data extracted from previously conducted surveys. In addition, many government and non-government agencies maintain extensive data repositories that can be accessed for research purposes.

LEARN ABOUT: Research Process Steps

While secondary research may not offer the same level of control as primary research, it can be a highly valuable tool for gaining insights and identifying trends. Researchers can save time and resources by leveraging existing data sources while still uncovering important information.

What is Secondary Research: Definition

Secondary research is a research method that involves using already existing data. Existing data is summarized and collated to increase the overall effectiveness of the research.

One of the key advantages of secondary research is that it allows us to gain insights and draw conclusions without having to collect new data ourselves. This can save time and resources and also allow us to build upon existing knowledge and expertise.

When conducting secondary research, it’s important to be thorough and thoughtful in our approach. This means carefully selecting the sources and ensuring that the data we’re analyzing is reliable and relevant to the research question . It also means being critical and analytical in the analysis and recognizing any potential biases or limitations in the data.

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Secondary research is much more cost-effective than primary research , as it uses already existing data, unlike primary research, where data is collected firsthand by organizations or businesses or they can employ a third party to collect data on their behalf.

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Secondary Research Methods with Examples

Secondary research is cost-effective, one of the reasons it is a popular choice among many businesses and organizations. Not every organization is able to pay a huge sum of money to conduct research and gather data. So, rightly secondary research is also termed “ desk research ”, as data can be retrieved from sitting behind a desk.

The following are popularly used secondary research methods and examples:

1. Data Available on The Internet

One of the most popular ways to collect secondary data is the internet. Data is readily available on the internet and can be downloaded at the click of a button.

This data is practically free of cost, or one may have to pay a negligible amount to download the already existing data. Websites have a lot of information that businesses or organizations can use to suit their research needs. However, organizations need to consider only authentic and trusted website to collect information.

2. Government and Non-Government Agencies

Data for secondary research can also be collected from some government and non-government agencies. For example, US Government Printing Office, US Census Bureau, and Small Business Development Centers have valuable and relevant data that businesses or organizations can use.

There is a certain cost applicable to download or use data available with these agencies. Data obtained from these agencies are authentic and trustworthy.

3. Public Libraries

Public libraries are another good source to search for data for this research. Public libraries have copies of important research that were conducted earlier. They are a storehouse of important information and documents from which information can be extracted.

The services provided in these public libraries vary from one library to another. More often, libraries have a huge collection of government publications with market statistics, large collection of business directories and newsletters.

4. Educational Institutions

Importance of collecting data from educational institutions for secondary research is often overlooked. However, more research is conducted in colleges and universities than any other business sector.

The data that is collected by universities is mainly for primary research. However, businesses or organizations can approach educational institutions and request for data from them.

5. Commercial Information Sources

Local newspapers, journals, magazines, radio and TV stations are a great source to obtain data for secondary research. These commercial information sources have first-hand information on economic developments, political agenda, market research, demographic segmentation and similar subjects.

Businesses or organizations can request to obtain data that is most relevant to their study. Businesses not only have the opportunity to identify their prospective clients but can also know about the avenues to promote their products or services through these sources as they have a wider reach.

Learn More: Data Collection Methods: Types & Examples

Key Differences between Primary Research and Secondary Research

Understanding the distinction between primary research and secondary research is essential in determining which research method is best for your project. These are the two main types of research methods, each with advantages and disadvantages. In this section, we will explore the critical differences between the two and when it is appropriate to use them.

How to Conduct Secondary Research?

We have already learned about the differences between primary and secondary research. Now, let’s take a closer look at how to conduct it.

Secondary research is an important tool for gathering information already collected and analyzed by others. It can help us save time and money and allow us to gain insights into the subject we are researching. So, in this section, we will discuss some common methods and tips for conducting it effectively.

Here are the steps involved in conducting secondary research:

1. Identify the topic of research: Before beginning secondary research, identify the topic that needs research. Once that’s done, list down the research attributes and its purpose.

2. Identify research sources: Next, narrow down on the information sources that will provide most relevant data and information applicable to your research.

3. Collect existing data: Once the data collection sources are narrowed down, check for any previous data that is available which is closely related to the topic. Data related to research can be obtained from various sources like newspapers, public libraries, government and non-government agencies etc.

4. Combine and compare: Once data is collected, combine and compare the data for any duplication and assemble data into a usable format. Make sure to collect data from authentic sources. Incorrect data can hamper research severely.

4. Analyze data: Analyze collected data and identify if all questions are answered. If not, repeat the process if there is a need to dwell further into actionable insights.

Advantages of Secondary Research

Secondary research offers a number of advantages to researchers, including efficiency, the ability to build upon existing knowledge, and the ability to conduct research in situations where primary research may not be possible or ethical. By carefully selecting their sources and being thoughtful in their approach, researchers can leverage secondary research to drive impact and advance the field. Some key advantages are the following:

1. Most information in this research is readily available. There are many sources from which relevant data can be collected and used, unlike primary research, where data needs to collect from scratch.

2. This is a less expensive and less time-consuming process as data required is easily available and doesn’t cost much if extracted from authentic sources. A minimum expenditure is associated to obtain data.

3. The data that is collected through secondary research gives organizations or businesses an idea about the effectiveness of primary research. Hence, organizations or businesses can form a hypothesis and evaluate cost of conducting primary research.

4. Secondary research is quicker to conduct because of the availability of data. It can be completed within a few weeks depending on the objective of businesses or scale of data needed.

As we can see, this research is the process of analyzing data already collected by someone else, and it can offer a number of benefits to researchers.

Disadvantages of Secondary Research

On the other hand, we have some disadvantages that come with doing secondary research. Some of the most notorious are the following:

1. Although data is readily available, credibility evaluation must be performed to understand the authenticity of the information available.

2. Not all secondary data resources offer the latest reports and statistics. Even when the data is accurate, it may not be updated enough to accommodate recent timelines.

3. Secondary research derives its conclusion from collective primary research data. The success of your research will depend, to a greater extent, on the quality of research already conducted by primary research.

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In conclusion, secondary research is an important tool for researchers exploring various topics. By leveraging existing data sources, researchers can save time and resources, build upon existing knowledge, and conduct research in situations where primary research may not be feasible.

There are a variety of methods and examples of secondary research, from analyzing public data sets to reviewing previously published research papers. As students and aspiring researchers, it’s important to understand the benefits and limitations of this research and to approach it thoughtfully and critically. By doing so, we can continue to advance our understanding of the world around us and contribute to meaningful research that positively impacts society.

QuestionPro can be a useful tool for conducting secondary research in a variety of ways. You can create online surveys that target a specific population, collecting data that can be analyzed to gain insights into consumer behavior, attitudes, and preferences; analyze existing data sets that you have obtained through other means or benchmark your organization against others in your industry or against industry standards. The software provides a range of benchmarking tools that can help you compare your performance on key metrics, such as customer satisfaction, with that of your peers.

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Secondary Research: Definition, Methods, Sources, Examples, and More

Table of Contents

What is Secondary Research? Secondary Research Meaning

Secondary research involves the analysis and synthesis of existing data and information that has been previously collected and published by others. This method contrasts with primary research , which entails the direct collection of original data from sources like surveys, interviews, and ethnographic studies.

The essence of secondary research lies in its efficiency and accessibility. Researchers who leverage secondary sources, including books, scholarly articles, government reports, and market analyses, gather valuable insights without the need for time-consuming and costly data collection efforts. This approach is particularly vital in marketing research, where understanding broad market trends and consumer behaviors is essential, yet often constrained by budgets and timelines. Secondary research serves as a fundamental step in the research process, providing a solid foundation upon which additional, targeted research can be built.

Secondary research enables researchers to quickly grasp the landscape of existing knowledge, identify gaps in the literature, and refine their research questions or business strategies accordingly. In marketing research, for instance, secondary research aids in understanding competitive landscapes, identifying market trends, and benchmarking against industry standards, thereby guiding strategic decision-making.

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When to Use Secondary Research

Choosing between secondary and primary research methods depends significantly on the objectives of your study or project. Secondary research is particularly beneficial in the initial stages of research planning and strategy, offering a broad understanding of the topic at hand and helping to pinpoint areas that may require more in-depth investigation through primary methods.

In academic contexts, secondary research is often used to build a theoretical foundation for a study, allowing researchers to position their work within the existing body of knowledge. Professionally, it serves as a cost-effective way to inform business strategies, market analyses, and policy development, providing insights into industry trends, consumer behaviors, and competitive landscapes.

Combining secondary research with primary research methods enhances the comprehensiveness and validity of research findings. For example, secondary research might reveal general trends in consumer behavior, while subsequent primary research could delve into specific consumer motivations and preferences, offering a more nuanced understanding of the market.

Key considerations for integrating secondary research into your research planning and strategy include:

• Research Objectives : Clearly defining what you aim to discover or decide based on your research.
• Availability of Data : Assessing the extent and relevance of existing data related to your research question.
• Budget and Time Constraints : Considering the resources available for conducting research, including time, money, and personnel.
• Research Scope : Determining the breadth and depth of the information needed to meet your research objectives.

Secondary research is a powerful tool when used strategically, providing a cost-effective, efficient way to gather insights and inform decision-making processes across academic and professional contexts.

How to Conduct Secondary Research

Conducting secondary research is a systematic process that involves several key steps to ensure the relevance, accuracy, and utility of the information gathered. Here's a step-by-step guide to effective secondary research:

• Identifying Research Objectives, Topics, and Questions : Begin with a clear understanding of what you aim to achieve with your research. This includes defining your research objectives, topics, and specific questions you seek to answer. This clarity guides the entire research process, ensuring that you remain focused on relevant information.
• Finding Relevant Data Sources : Search for secondary data sources that are likely to contain the information you need. This involves exploring a variety of sources such as academic journals, industry reports, government databases, and news archives. Prioritize sources known for their credibility and authority in the subject matter.
• Collecting and Verifying Existing Data : Once you've identified potential sources, collect the data that pertains to your research questions. Pay close attention to the publication date, authorship, and the methodology used in collecting the original data to ensure its relevance and reliability.
• Data Compilation and Analysis : Compile the collected data in a structured format that allows for analysis. Employ analytical methods suited to your research objectives, such as trend analysis, comparative analysis, or thematic analysis, to draw insights from the data.

The success of secondary research hinges on the critical evaluation of sources for their credibility, relevance, and timeliness. It's essential to approach this process with a discerning eye, acknowledging the limitations of secondary data and the potential need for further investigation through primary research.

Types of Secondary Research Methods with Examples

Secondary research methods offer a range of approaches for leveraging existing data, each providing value in extracting insights relevant to various business and academic needs. Understanding the unique advantages of each method can guide researchers in choosing the most appropriate approach for their specific objectives.

Literature Reviews

Literature reviews synthesize existing research and publications to identify trends, gaps, and consensus within a field of study. This method provides a comprehensive overview of what is already known about a topic, saving time and resources by building on existing knowledge rather than starting from scratch.

Real-World Example : A marketing firm conducting a literature review on consumer behavior in the digital age might uncover a trend towards increased mobile shopping. This insight leads to a strategic recommendation for a retail client to prioritize mobile app development and optimize their online store for mobile users, directly impacting the client's digital marketing strategy.

Data Mining

Data mining involves analyzing large sets of data to discover patterns, correlations, or trends that are not immediately apparent. This method can uncover hidden insights from the data that businesses can use to inform decision-making, such as identifying new market opportunities or optimizing operational efficiencies.

Real-World Example : Through data mining of customer purchase histories and online behavior data, a retail company identifies a previously unnoticed correlation between the purchase of certain products and the time of year. Utilizing this insight, the company adjusts its inventory levels and marketing campaigns seasonally, significantly boosting sales and customer satisfaction.

Meta-Analysis

Meta-analysis aggregates and systematically analyzes results from multiple studies to draw general conclusions about a research question. This method provides a high level of evidence by combining findings, offering a powerful tool for making informed decisions based on a broader range of data than any single study could provide.

Real-World Example : A pharmaceutical company uses meta-analysis to combine findings from various clinical trials of a new drug. The meta-analysis reveals a statistically significant benefit of the drug that was not conclusive in individual studies. This insight supports the company's application for regulatory approval and guides the development of marketing strategies targeting specific patient demographics.

Data Analysis

Secondary data analysis applies statistical techniques to analyze existing datasets, offering a cost-effective way to gain insights without the need for new data collection. This method can identify trends, patterns, and relationships that inform strategic planning and decision-making.

Real-World Example : An investment firm analyzes historical economic data and stock market trends using secondary data analysis. They identify a recurring pattern preceding market downturns. By applying this insight to their investment strategy, the firm successfully mitigates risk and enhances portfolio performance for their clients.

Content Analysis

Content analysis systematically examines the content of communication mediums to understand messages, themes, or biases . This qualitative method can reveal insights into public opinion, media representation, and communication strategies, offering valuable information for marketing, public relations, and media strategies.

Real-World Example : A technology company employs content analysis to review online customer reviews and social media mentions of its products. The analysis uncovers a common concern among customers about the usability of a product feature. Responding to this insight, the company revises its product design and launches a targeted communication campaign to address the concerns, improving customer satisfaction and brand perception.

Historical Research

Historical research examines past records and documents to understand historical contexts and trends, offering insights that can inform future predictions, strategy development, and understanding of long-term changes. This method is particularly valuable for understanding the evolution of markets, industries, or consumer behaviors over time.

Real-World Example : A consultancy specializing in sustainable business practices conducts historical research into the adoption of green technologies in the automotive industry. The research identifies key drivers and barriers to adoption over the decades. Leveraging these insights, the consultancy advises new green tech startups on strategies to overcome market resistance and capitalize on drivers of adoption, significantly impacting their market entry strategy.

Each of these secondary research methods provides distinct advantages and can yield valuable insights for businesses and researchers. By carefully selecting and applying the most suitable method(s), organizations can enhance their understanding of complex issues, inform strategic decisions, and achieve competitive advantage.

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Examples of Secondary Sources in Research

Secondary sources are crucial for researchers across disciplines, offering a wealth of information that can provide insights, support hypotheses, and inform strategies. Understanding the unique value of different types of secondary sources can help researchers effectively harness this wealth of information. Below, we explore various secondary sources, highlighting their unique contributions and providing real-world examples of how they can yield valuable business insights.

Books provide comprehensive coverage of a topic, offering depth and context that shorter pieces might miss. They are particularly useful for gaining a thorough understanding of a subject's historical background and theoretical framework.

Example : A corporation exploring the feasibility of entering a new international market utilizes books on the country's cultural and economic history. This deep dive helps the company understand market nuances, leading to a tailored market entry strategy that aligns with local consumer preferences and cultural norms.

Scholarly Journals

Scholarly journals offer peer-reviewed, cutting-edge research findings, making them invaluable for staying abreast of the latest developments in a field. They provide detailed methodologies, rigorous data analysis, and discussions of findings in a specific area of study.

Example : An investment firm relies on scholarly articles to understand recent advancements in financial technology. Discovering research on blockchain's impact on transaction security and efficiency, the firm decides to invest in fintech startups specializing in blockchain technology, positioning itself ahead in the market.

Government Reports

Government reports deliver authoritative data on a wide range of topics, including economic indicators, demographic trends, and regulatory guidelines. Their reliability and the breadth of topics covered make them an essential resource for informed decision-making.

Example : A healthcare provider examines government health reports to identify trends in public health issues. Spotting an increase in lifestyle-related diseases, the provider expands its wellness programs, directly addressing the growing demand for preventive care services.

Market Research Reports

Market research reports provide insights into industry trends, consumer behavior, and competitive landscapes. These reports are invaluable for making informed business decisions, from product development to marketing strategies.

Example : A consumer goods company reviews market research reports to analyze trends in eco-friendly packaging. Learning about the positive consumer response to sustainable packaging, the company redesigns its packaging to be more environmentally friendly, resulting in increased brand loyalty and market share.

White Papers

White papers offer in-depth analysis or arguments on specific issues, often highlighting solutions or innovations. They are a key resource for understanding complex problems, technological advancements, and industry best practices.

Example : A technology firm exploring the implementation of AI in customer service operations consults white papers on AI applications. Insights from these papers guide the development of an AI-powered customer service chatbot, enhancing efficiency and customer satisfaction.

Private Company Data

Data from private companies, such as annual reports or case studies, provides insight into business strategies, performance metrics, and operational challenges. This information can be instrumental in benchmarking and strategic planning.

Example : By analyzing competitor annual reports, a retail chain identifies a gap in the market for affordable luxury products. This insight leads to the launch of a new product line that successfully captures this underserved segment, boosting the company's revenue and market positioning.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Secondary Research

Secondary research offers a foundation upon which organizations can build their knowledge base, informing everything from strategic planning to day-to-day decision-making. However, like any method, it comes with its own set of advantages and disadvantages. Understanding these can help researchers and businesses make the most of secondary research while being mindful of its limitations.

Advantages of Secondary Research

• Cost-Effectiveness : Secondary research is often less expensive than primary research, as it involves the analysis of existing data, eliminating the need for costly data collection processes like surveys or experiments.
• Time Efficiency : Accessing and analyzing existing data is generally faster than conducting primary research, allowing organizations to make timely decisions based on available information.
• Broad Scope of Data : Secondary research provides access to a wide range of data across different geographies and time periods, enabling comprehensive market analyses and trend identification.
• Basis for Primary Research : It can serve as a preliminary step to identify gaps in existing research, helping to pinpoint areas where primary research is needed.

Disadvantages of Secondary Research

• Relevance and Specificity : Existing data may not perfectly align with the current research objectives, leading to potential mismatches in relevance and specificity.
• Data Quality and Accuracy : The quality and accuracy of secondary data can vary, depending on the source. Researchers must critically assess the credibility of their sources to ensure the reliability of their findings.
• Timeliness : Data may be outdated, especially in fast-moving sectors where recent information is crucial for making informed decisions.
• Limited Control Over Data : Researchers have no control over how data was collected and processed, which may affect its suitability for their specific research needs.

Secondary research, when approached with an understanding of its strengths and weaknesses, has the potential be a powerful tool. By effectively navigating its advantages and limitations, businesses can lay a solid foundation for informed decision-making and strategic planning.

Primary vs. Secondary Research: A Comparative Analysis

When undertaking a research project, understanding the distinction between primary and secondary research is pivotal. Both forms of research serve their own purposes and can complement each other in providing a comprehensive overview of a given topic.

What is Primary Research?

Primary research involves the collection of original data directly from sources. This method is firsthand and is specific to the researcher's questions or hypotheses.

The main advantage of primary research is its specificity and relevancy to the particular issue or question at hand. It offers up-to-date and highly relevant data that is directly applicable to the research objectives.

Example : A company planning to launch a new beverage product conducts focus groups and survey research to understand consumer preferences. Through this process, they gather firsthand insights on flavors, packaging, and pricing preferences specific to their target market.

What is Secondary Research?

Secondary research involves the analysis of existing information compiled and collected by others. It includes studies, reports, and data from government agencies, trade associations, and other organizations.

Secondary research provides a broad understanding of the topic at hand, offering insights that can help frame primary research. It is cost-effective and time-saving, as it leverages already available data.

Example : The same company explores industry reports, academic research, and market analyses to understand broader market trends, competitor strategies, and consumer behavior within the beverage industry.

Comparative Analysis

Synergistic Use in Research

The most effective research strategies often involve a blend of both primary and secondary research. Secondary research can serve as a foundation, helping to inform the development of primary research by identifying gaps in existing knowledge and refining research questions.

Understanding the distinct roles and benefits of primary and secondary research is crucial for any successful research project. By effectively leveraging both types of research, researchers can gain a deeper, more nuanced understanding of their subject matter, leading to more informed decisions and strategies. Remember, the choice between primary and secondary research should be guided by your research objectives, resources, and the specificity of information required.

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What is secondary research?

Last updated

7 February 2023

Reviewed by

Cathy Heath

In this guide, we explain in detail what secondary research is, including the difference between this research method and primary research, the different sources for secondary research, and how you can benefit from this research method.

Analyze your secondary research

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• Overview of secondary research

Secondary research is a method by which the researcher finds existing data, filters it to meet the context of their research question, analyzes it, and then summarizes it to come up with valid research conclusions.

This research method involves searching for information, often via the internet, using keywords or search terms relevant to the research question. The goal is to find data from internal and external sources that are up-to-date and authoritative, and that fully answer the question.

Secondary research reviews existing research and looks for patterns, trends, and insights, which helps determine what further research, if any, is needed.

• Secondary research methods

Secondary research is more economical than primary research, mainly because the methods for this type of research use existing data and do not require the data to be collected first-hand or by a third party that you have to pay.

Secondary research is referred to as ‘desk research’ or ‘desktop research,’ since the data can be retrieved from behind a desk instead of having to host a focus group and create the research from scratch.

Finding existing research is relatively easy since there are numerous accessible sources organizations can use to obtain the information they need. These  include:

The internet:  This data is either free or behind a paywall. Yet, while there are plenty of sites on the internet with information that can be used, businesses need to be careful to collect information from trusted and authentic websites to ensure the data is accurate.

Government agencies: Government agencies are typically known to provide valuable, trustworthy information that companies can use for their research.

The public library: This establishment holds paper-based and online sources of reliable information, including business databases, magazines, newspapers, and government publications. Be mindful of any copyright restrictions that may apply when using these sources.

Commercial information: This source provides first-hand information on politics, demographics, and economic developments through information aggregators, newspapers, magazines, radio, blogs, podcasts, and journals. This information may be free or behind a paywall.

Educational and scientific facilities: Universities, colleges, and specialized research facilities carry out significant amounts of research. As a result, they have data that may be available to the public and businesses for use.

• Key differences between primary research and secondary research

Both primary and secondary research methods provide researchers with vital, complementary information, despite some major differences between the two approaches.

Primary research involves gathering first-hand information by directly working with the target market, users, and interviewees. Researchers ask questions directly using surveys , interviews, and focus groups.

Through the primary research method, researchers obtain targeted responses and accurate results directly related to their overall research goals.

Secondary research uses existing data, such as published reports, that have already been completed through earlier primary and secondary research. Researchers can use this existing data to support their research goals and preliminary research findings.

Other notable differences between primary and secondary research  include:

Relevance: Primary research uses raw data relevant to the investigation's goals. Secondary research may contain irrelevant data or may not neatly fit the parameters of the researcher's goals.

Time: Primary research takes a lot of time. Secondary research can be done relatively quickly.

Researcher bias: Primary research can be subject to researcher bias.

Cost: Primary research can be expensive. Secondary research can be more affordable because the data is often free. However, valuable data is often behind a paywall. The piece of secondary research you want may not exist or be very expensive, so you may have to turn to primary research to fill the information gap.

• When to conduct secondary research

Both primary and secondary research have roles to play in providing a holistic and accurate understanding of a topic. Generally, secondary research is done at the beginning of the research phase, especially if the topic is new.

Secondary research can provide context and critical background information to understand the issue at hand and identify any gaps, that could then be filled by primary research.

• How to conduct secondary research

Researchers usually follow several steps for secondary research.

1. Identify and define the research topic

Before starting either of these research methods, you first need to determine the following:

Topic to be researched

Purpose of this research

For instance, you may want to explore a question, determine why something happened, or confirm whether an issue is true.

At this stage, you also need to consider what search terms or keywords might be the most effective for this topic. You could do this by looking at what synonyms exist for your topic, the use of industry terms and acronyms, as well as the balance between statistical or quantitative data and contextual data to support your research topic.

It’s also essential to define what you don’t want to cover in your secondary research process. This might be choosing only to use recent information or only focusing on research based on a particular country or type of consumer. From there, once you know what you want to know and why you can decide whether you need to use both primary and secondary research to answer your questions.

2. Find research and existing data sources

Once you have determined your research topic , select the information sources that will provide you with the most appropriate and relevant data for your research. If you need secondary research, you want to determine where this information can likely be found, for example:

Trade associations

Government sources

Create a list of the relevant data sources , and other organizations or people that can help you find what you need.

3. Begin searching and collecting the existing data

Once you have narrowed down your sources, you will start gathering this information and putting it into an organized system. This often involves:

Checking the credibility of the source

Setting up meetings with research teams

Signing up for accounts to access certain websites or journals

One search result on the internet often leads to other pieces of helpful information, known as ‘pearl gathering’ or ‘pearl harvesting.’ This is usually a serendipitous activity, which can lead to valuable nuggets of information you may not have been aware of or considered.

4. Combine the data and compare the results

Once you have gathered all the data, start going through it by carefully examining all the information and comparing it to ensure the data is usable and that it isn’t duplicated or corrupted. Contradictory information is useful—just make sure you note the contradiction and the context. Be mindful of copyright and plagiarism when using secondary research and always cite your sources.

Once you have assessed everything, you will begin to look at what this information tells you by checking out the trends and comparing the different datasets. You will also investigate what this information means for your research, whether it helps your overall goal, and any gaps or deficiencies.

5. Analyze your data and explore further

In the final stage of conducting secondary research, you will analyze the data you have gathered and determine if it answers the questions you had before you started researching. Check that you understand the information, whether it fills in all your gaps, and whether it provides you with other insights or actions you should take next.

If you still need further data, repeat these steps to find additional information that can help you explore your topic more deeply. You may also need to supplement what you find with primary research to ensure that your data is complete, accurate, transparent, and credible.

• The advantages of secondary research

There are numerous advantages to performing secondary research. Some key benefits are:

Quicker than primary research: Because the data is already available, you can usually find the information you need fairly quickly. Not only will secondary research help you research faster, but you will also start optimizing the data more quickly.

Plenty of available data: There are countless sources for you to choose from, making research more accessible. This data may be already compiled and arranged, such as statistical information,  so you can quickly make use of it.

Lower costs:  Since you will not have to carry out the research from scratch, secondary research tends to be much more affordable than primary research.

Opens doors to further research:  Existing research usually identifies whether more research needs to be done. This could mean follow-up surveys or telephone interviews with subject matter experts (SME) to add value to your own research.

• The disadvantages of secondary research

While there are plenty of benefits to secondary research are plenty, there are some issues you should be aware of. These include:

Credibility issues: It is important to verify the sources used. Some information may be biased and not reflect or hide, relevant issues or challenges. It could also be inaccurate.

No recent information:  Even if data may seem accurate, it may not be up to date, so the information you gather may no longer be correct. Outdated research can distort your overall findings.

Poor quality: Because secondary research tends to make conclusions from primary research data, the success of secondary research will depend on the quality and context of the research that has already been completed. If the research you are using is of poor quality, this will bring down the quality of your own findings.

Research doesn’t exist or is not easily accessible, or is expensive: Sometimes the information you need is confidential or proprietary, such as sales or earnings figures. Many information-based businesses attach value to the information they hold or publish, so the costs to access this information can be prohibitive.

Should you complete secondary research or primary research first?

Due to the costs and time involved in primary research, it may be more beneficial to conduct secondary market research first. This will save you time and provide a picture of what issues you may come across in your research. This allows you to focus on using more expensive primary research to get the specific answers you want.

What should you ask yourself before using secondary research data?

Check the date of the research to make sure it is still relevant. Also, determine the data source so you can assess how credible and trustworthy it is likely to be. For example, data from known brands, professional organizations, and even government agencies are usually excellent sources to use in your secondary research, as it tends to be trustworthy.

Be careful when using some websites and personal blogs as they may be based on opinions rather than facts. However, these sources can be useful for determining sentiment about a product or service, and help direct any primary research.

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What is Secondary Research? Types, Methods, Examples

Appinio Research · 20.09.2023 · 13min read

Have you ever wondered how researchers gather valuable insights without conducting new experiments or surveys? That's where secondary research steps in—a powerful approach that allows us to explore existing data and information others collect.

Whether you're a student, a professional, or someone seeking to make informed decisions, understanding the art of secondary research opens doors to a wealth of knowledge.

What is Secondary Research?

Secondary Research refers to the process of gathering and analyzing existing data, information, and knowledge that has been previously collected and compiled by others. This approach allows researchers to leverage available sources, such as articles, reports, and databases, to gain insights, validate hypotheses, and make informed decisions without collecting new data.

Benefits of Secondary Research

Secondary research offers a range of advantages that can significantly enhance your research process and the quality of your findings.

• Time and Cost Efficiency: Secondary research saves time and resources by utilizing existing data sources, eliminating the need for data collection from scratch.
• Wide Range of Data: Secondary research provides access to vast information from various sources, allowing for comprehensive analysis.
• Historical Perspective: Examining past research helps identify trends, changes, and long-term patterns that might not be immediately apparent.
• Reduced Bias: As data is collected by others, there's often less inherent bias than in conducting primary research, where biases might affect data collection.
• Support for Primary Research: Secondary research can lay the foundation for primary research by providing context and insights into gaps in existing knowledge.
• Comparative Analysis : By integrating data from multiple sources, you can conduct robust comparative analyses for more accurate conclusions.
• Benchmarking and Validation: Secondary research aids in benchmarking performance against industry standards and validating hypotheses.

Primary Research vs. Secondary Research

When it comes to research methodologies, primary and secondary research each have their distinct characteristics and advantages. Here's a brief comparison to help you understand the differences.

Primary Research

• Data Source: Involves collecting new data directly from original sources.
• Data Collection: Researchers design and conduct surveys, interviews, experiments, or observations.
• Time and Resources: Typically requires more time, effort, and resources due to data collection.
• Fresh Insights: Provides firsthand, up-to-date information tailored to specific research questions.
• Control: Researchers control the data collection process and can shape methodologies.

Secondary Research

• Data Source: Involves utilizing existing data and information collected by others.
• Data Collection: Researchers search, select, and analyze data from published sources, reports, and databases.
• Time and Resources: Generally more time-efficient and cost-effective as data is already available.
• Existing Knowledge: Utilizes data that has been previously compiled, often providing broader context.
• Less Control: Researchers have limited control over how data was collected originally, if any.

Choosing between primary and secondary research depends on your research objectives, available resources, and the depth of insights you require.

Types of Secondary Research

Secondary research encompasses various types of existing data sources that can provide valuable insights for your research endeavors. Understanding these types can help you choose the most relevant sources for your objectives.

Here are the primary types of secondary research:

Internal Sources

Internal sources consist of data generated within your organization or entity. These sources provide valuable insights into your own operations and performance.

• Company Records and Data: Internal reports, documents, and databases that house information about sales, operations, and customer interactions.
• Sales Reports and Customer Data: Analysis of past sales trends, customer demographics, and purchasing behavior.
• Financial Statements and Annual Reports: Financial data, such as balance sheets and income statements, offer insights into the organization's financial health.

External Sources

External sources encompass data collected and published by entities outside your organization.

These sources offer a broader perspective on various subjects.

• Published Literature and Journals: Scholarly articles, research papers, and academic studies available in journals or online databases.
• Market Research Reports: Reports from market research firms that provide insights into industry trends, consumer behavior, and market forecasts.
• Government and NGO Databases: Data collected and maintained by government agencies and non-governmental organizations, offering demographic, economic, and social information.
• Online Media and News Articles: News outlets and online publications that cover current events, trends, and societal developments.

Each type of secondary research source holds its value and relevance, depending on the nature of your research objectives. Combining these sources lets you understand the subject matter and make informed decisions.

How to Conduct Secondary Research?

Effective secondary research involves a thoughtful and systematic approach that enables you to extract valuable insights from existing data sources. Here's a step-by-step guide on how to navigate the process:

1. Define Your Research Objectives

Before delving into secondary research, clearly define what you aim to achieve. Identify the specific questions you want to answer, the insights you're seeking, and the scope of your research.

2. Identify Relevant Sources

Begin by identifying the most appropriate sources for your research. Consider the nature of your research objectives and the data type you require. Seek out sources such as academic journals, market research reports, official government databases, and reputable news outlets.

3. Evaluate Source Credibility

Ensuring the credibility of your sources is crucial. Evaluate the reliability of each source by assessing factors such as the author's expertise, the publication's reputation, and the objectivity of the information provided. Choose sources that align with your research goals and are free from bias.

4. Extract and Analyze Information

Once you've gathered your sources, carefully extract the relevant information. Take thorough notes, capturing key data points, insights, and any supporting evidence. As you accumulate information, start identifying patterns, trends, and connections across different sources.

5. Synthesize Findings

As you analyze the data, synthesize your findings to draw meaningful conclusions. Compare and contrast information from various sources to identify common themes and discrepancies. This synthesis process allows you to construct a coherent narrative that addresses your research objectives.

6. Address Limitations and Gaps

Acknowledge the limitations and potential gaps in your secondary research. Recognize that secondary data might have inherent biases or be outdated. Where necessary, address these limitations by cross-referencing information or finding additional sources to fill in gaps.

7. Contextualize Your Findings

Contextualization is crucial in deriving actionable insights from your secondary research. Consider the broader context within which the data was collected. How does the information relate to current trends, societal changes, or industry shifts? This contextual understanding enhances the relevance and applicability of your findings.

8. Cite Your Sources

Maintain academic integrity by properly citing the sources you've used for your secondary research. Accurate citations not only give credit to the original authors but also provide a clear trail for readers to access the information themselves.

9. Integrate Secondary and Primary Research (If Applicable)

In some cases, combining secondary and primary research can yield more robust insights. If you've also conducted primary research, consider integrating your secondary findings with your primary data to provide a well-rounded perspective on your research topic.

You can use a market research platform like Appinio to conduct primary research with real-time insights in minutes!

10. Communicate Your Findings

Finally, communicate your findings effectively. Whether it's in an academic paper, a business report, or any other format, present your insights clearly and concisely. Provide context for your conclusions and use visual aids like charts and graphs to enhance understanding.

Remember that conducting secondary research is not just about gathering information—it's about critically analyzing, interpreting, and deriving valuable insights from existing data. By following these steps, you'll navigate the process successfully and contribute to the body of knowledge in your field.

Secondary Research Examples

To better understand how secondary research is applied in various contexts, let's explore a few real-world examples that showcase its versatility and value.

Market Analysis and Trend Forecasting

Imagine you're a marketing strategist tasked with launching a new product in the smartphone industry. By conducting secondary research, you can:

• Access Market Reports: Utilize market research reports to understand consumer preferences, competitive landscape, and growth projections.
• Analyze Trends: Examine past sales data and industry reports to identify trends in smartphone features, design, and user preferences.
• Benchmark Competitors: Compare market share, customer satisfaction , and pricing strategies of key competitors to develop a strategic advantage.
• Forecast Demand: Use historical sales data and market growth predictions to estimate demand for your new product.

Academic Research and Literature Reviews

Suppose you're a student researching climate change's effects on marine ecosystems. Secondary research aids your academic endeavors by:

• Reviewing Existing Studies: Analyze peer-reviewed articles and scientific papers to understand the current state of knowledge on the topic.
• Identifying Knowledge Gaps: Identify areas where further research is needed based on what existing studies still need to cover.
• Comparing Methodologies: Compare research methodologies used by different studies to assess the strengths and limitations of their approaches.
• Synthesizing Insights: Synthesize findings from various studies to form a comprehensive overview of the topic's implications on marine life.

Competitive Landscape Assessment for Business Strategy

Consider you're a business owner looking to expand your restaurant chain to a new location. Secondary research aids your strategic decision-making by:

• Analyzing Demographics: Utilize demographic data from government databases to understand the local population's age, income, and preferences.
• Studying Local Trends: Examine restaurant industry reports to identify the types of cuisines and dining experiences currently popular in the area.
• Understanding Consumer Behavior: Analyze online reviews and social media discussions to gauge customer sentiment towards existing restaurants in the vicinity.
• Assessing Economic Conditions: Access economic reports to evaluate the local economy's stability and potential purchasing power.

These examples illustrate the practical applications of secondary research across various fields to provide a foundation for informed decision-making, deeper understanding, and innovation.

Secondary Research Limitations

While secondary research offers many benefits, it's essential to be aware of its limitations to ensure the validity and reliability of your findings.

• Data Quality and Validity: The accuracy and reliability of secondary data can vary, affecting the credibility of your research.
• Limited Contextual Information: Secondary sources might lack detailed contextual information, making it important to interpret findings within the appropriate context.
• Data Suitability: Existing data might not align perfectly with your research objectives, leading to compromises or incomplete insights.
• Outdated Information: Some sources might provide obsolete information that doesn't accurately reflect current trends or situations.
• Potential Bias: While secondary data is often less biased, biases might still exist in the original data sources, influencing your findings.
• Incompatibility of Data: Combining data from different sources might pose challenges due to variations in definitions, methodologies, or units of measurement.
• Lack of Control: Unlike primary research, you have no control over how data was collected or its quality, potentially affecting your analysis. Understanding these limitations will help you navigate secondary research effectively and make informed decisions based on a well-rounded understanding of its strengths and weaknesses.

Secondary research is a valuable tool that businesses can use to their advantage. By tapping into existing data and insights, companies can save time, resources, and effort that would otherwise be spent on primary research. This approach equips decision-makers with a broader understanding of market trends, consumer behaviors, and competitive landscapes. Additionally, benchmarking against industry standards and validating hypotheses empowers businesses to make informed choices that lead to growth and success.

As you navigate the world of secondary research, remember that it's not just about data retrieval—it's about strategic utilization. With a clear grasp of how to access, analyze, and interpret existing information, businesses can stay ahead of the curve, adapt to changing landscapes, and make decisions that are grounded in reliable knowledge.

How to Conduct Secondary Research in Minutes?

In the world of decision-making, having access to real-time consumer insights is no longer a luxury—it's a necessity. That's where Appinio comes in, revolutionizing how businesses gather valuable data for better decision-making. As a real-time market research platform, Appinio empowers companies to tap into the pulse of consumer opinions swiftly and seamlessly.

• Fast Insights: Say goodbye to lengthy research processes. With Appinio, you can transform questions into actionable insights in minutes.
• Data-Driven Decisions: Harness the power of real-time consumer insights to drive your business strategies, allowing you to make informed choices on the fly.
• Seamless Integration: Appinio handles the research and technical complexities, freeing you to focus on what truly matters: making rapid data-driven decisions that propel your business forward.

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Secondary Research: Methods, Examples, and Strategic Insights

Kate Williams

Last Updated: 29 May 2024

10 min read

Table Of Contents

Secondary Research

• An Overview
• Primary vs Secondary

Sources and References

• Conducting Research
• Pros and Cons

Secondary research involves the analysis and interpretation of existing data and information collected by others. It provides valuable insights for informed decision-making without conducting new surveys or experiments. But, why is it important for businesses? Successful enterprises attribute their strategic decisions to comprehensive secondary research. In this blog, we will look into its importance, pros and cons, and all that you need to know.

What is Secondary Research?

Secondary research is not just about compiling data. It’s about synthesizing information to draw meaningful conclusions. Analysts sift through vast datasets, identifying patterns, trends, and correlations. This methodical approach transforms raw data into actionable insights, guiding businesses in their strategic endeavors.

Simply put, it involves the analysis and interpretation of existing data and information collected by others. This data can come from a variety of sources, such as academic papers, industry reports, market studies, government publications, and online databases. By tapping into pre-existing data, businesses can gain valuable insights without the time and resource-intensive process of conducting primary research, making it a cost-effective and efficient approach.

Why not think about elevating your data collection too? SurveySparrow stands ready, a friendly suggestion to boost your research process. You can create engaging surveys, collect data, analyze, and act upon the rich insights you gain from the process.

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Primary vs Secondary Research

Now, before we delve into the details, we need to be very clear about what primary research is. Why? Because the former builds upon the latter. Secondary research can only be done upon the existence of data. And, what better way than a comparison of the two to get a better grasp?

Primary Research:

Direct Data Collection: It involves gathering data directly from the source. Researchers use methods like surveys, interviews, experiments, or observations to collect specific information tailored to their study.

Specific to Study: The data collected in primary research is exclusive to the research question at hand. It is designed to address specific inquiries and provide detailed, targeted insights into the topic of interest.

Time-Consuming: Moreover, it can be time-intensive as it requires planning, conducting surveys or interviews, and analyzing the collected data. Researchers invest significant time to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information gathered.

Tailored Questions: Researchers formulate precise and tailored questions to extract relevant information from participants. These questions are carefully designed to elicit specific responses, contributing to the depth of the research findings.

Costly: Implementing primary research methods often involves expenses related to participant recruitment, survey administration, and data analysis. The costs can vary based on the complexity and scope of the research.

Fresh Information: It provides fresh, firsthand information directly from the participants. It offers unique perspectives and insights, making it valuable for studies requiring original data.

Read More: How To Do Primary Research: An Ultimate Guide

Existing Data Analysis: It involves the analysis and interpretation of pre-existing data. Researchers explore reports, articles, studies, and other pre-existing information to draw conclusions or generate insights.

Broad Overview: It provides a comprehensive overview of a subject matter. It encompasses a wide range of data, allowing researchers to explore multiple facets of a topic without the need for new data collection.

Time-Efficient: Researchers utilize information readily available from various sources. This approach saves time compared to the process of collecting new data through primary research methods.

General Insights: The insights gained are general. They offer a broad understanding of a topic without the specificity that primary research can provide. Basically, it forms a foundation for initial exploration.

Cost-Effective: Compared to primary research, it is cost-effective as it utilizes existing data sources. Researchers do not incur the costs associated with participant recruitment and data collection, making it a budget-friendly option.

Historical Data: Secondary research often involves historical data, which can provide trends and patterns over time. Researchers can analyze past information to identify changes, making it valuable for longitudinal studies.

When conducting secondary research for a company, the focus narrows down to specific sources that offer relevant insights into market trends, consumer behaviors, industry competition, and other business-related aspects.

Here’s a tailored list of key sources and references:

1. Industry Reports and Market Research Firms

Market research is key! Industry-specific reports from reputable market research firms offer detailed analyses, market forecasts, and competitor landscapes, aiding businesses in understanding market trends and customer demands.

2. Competitor Websites and Annual Reports

Your competitor’s website and annual reports are like their personal diary. Analyzing them provides valuable information on their products, strategies, financial performance, and market positioning, helping businesses identify competitive advantages and market gaps.

3. Trade Publications and Business Magazines

They provide industry-specific news, expert opinions, and case studies. This in turn provides insights into merging trends, best practices, and successful business strategies.

4. Government Economic Data and Regulatory Publications

Governments share economic data and regulations. For instance, you get data on GDP growth, employment rates, and industry regulations. You’ll know what’s changing and how it might affect your business.

5. Academic Journals and Research Papers

These are like textbooks. They provide in-depth information about theories and analyses. With it, you can understand the “whys” behind market behaviors.

How to Conduct Secondary Research

1. Define Your Research Questions

Clearly outline what you want to know. Define specific research questions to guide your search and keep your focus sharp. Also, remember to make the questions to the point to provide a clear direction for your study.

2. Identify Your Sources

Don’t just stick to one source. Explore all the options available to get a broad view of the subject. Later, narrow down your findings to get to the precise point you have been deducing.

3. Use Online Databases Wisely

Develop a robust set of keywords related to your topic. Utilize Boolean operators ( AND, OR, NOT ) to refine your search. Experiment with various combinations to obtain the most relevant results.

4. Evaluate Your Sources

Assess the credibility of each source. Check the author’s credentials, publication date, and publisher. Peer-reviewed journals and academic institutions are usually trustworthy.

5. Take Thorough Notes

Record key points, statistics, and quotes. Note the publication details for proper citation. Organize your notes by topic for easy reference.

6. Synthesize Information

Analyze the gathered data. Identify patterns, trends, and discrepancies. Compare and contrast information from different sources to gain comprehensive insights. By doing this, you can see how different sources complement or contradict each other.

7. Validate the Information

Once you have all the information needed, properly source and add references. Any unauthorized data can cause huge differences in the decisions you make based on the insights. In the case of academic research, create a comprehensive bibliography listing all your sources.

8. Stay Curious and Keep Exploring

Research does not end with a single project. Stay curious about new developments, theories, and research findings. Continue learning to broaden your knowledge base and refine your research skills.

Types of Secondary Research

1. literature reviews.

Literature reviews involve analyzing existing academic publications, research papers, books, and articles related to the topic of study. Through literature reviews, scholars gain insights into the evolution of ideas, theories, and methodologies, providing a solid foundation for their research endeavors.

2. Content Analysis

Content analysis is a methodical examination of various media forms, such as articles, advertisements, social media posts, or documents, to extract meaningful insights. Researchers scrutinize the content to identify patterns, themes, attitudes, or trends within the material. This method is widely used in media studies, communication, and social sciences.

 3. Historical Analysis

This method allows researchers to explore the social, cultural, and political factors that have shaped societies, providing valuable context for contemporary studies. It is the meticulous study of historical documents, records, artifacts, or events to gain insights into past behaviors or trends.

4. Case Studies

Case studies delve into specific instances, organizations, or events, offering an in-depth exploration of real-life situations. Researchers analyze existing reports, documents, or publications related to the chosen case to extract valuable insights. It is widely used in business, social sciences, and medical research.

5. Surveys and Polls

Surveys and polls involve the analysis of data that is collected from diverse populations. Researchers explore data sets generated by organizations or research institutions through survey administration. They provide the quantitative data you need to make informed decisions. Moreover, they make it easy to gain insights into public opinions, attitudes, behaviors, or trends across various demographics.

Read More: How to Conduct a Survey

Pros and Cons of Secondary Research

Cost-Effectiveness: Utilizes existing data, saving on research costs. Time Efficiency: Quick access to a wide range of data. Broad Scope: Covers diverse topics and historical data. In-Depth Analysis: Enables detailed examination and exploration.

Disadvantages

Data Quality Concerns: Varied quality and potential biases in existing data. Limited Control: No control over data collection, limiting specific variables. Data Relevance: Data might not precisely align with research questions. Outdated Information: Data can become obsolete in rapidly changing fields.

Alright, before we end this, let’s talk timing! Secondary research guides you through different points of your research process. Imagine you are at the beginning, trying to go deeper into the topic. This is where it comes of use. It gives you foundational knowledge and helps you refine your questions. Then, later, when you’re digging into scholarly articles, research shows you where others have tread and where unexplored territories lie.

So, before you conduct primary research make sure you make a quick secondary research pitstop. It will not only save you time and effort but also help you understand the trends that matter, whether you’re at the beginning, middle, or even near the end of your research.

And, while you’re at it, make sure you stop by SurveySparrow and give it a try! This pitstop might be your ultimate solution.

Content Marketer at SurveySparrow

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Integrated Primary & Secondary Research

6 Process of Conducting Secondary Research

Step 1: Define your research topic and question

• Start with a thorough literature review
• Ensure that the research question has clinical or policy relevance and is based on sound a priori reasoning. A good question is what makes a study good, not a large sample size
• Be flexible to adapt your question to the strengths and limitations of the potential datasets

Step 2: Select a dataset

• Use a resource such as the Society of General Internal Medicine’s Online Compendium
• To increase the novelty of your work, consider selecting a dataset that has not been widely used in your field or link datasets together to gain a fresh perspective
• Factor in the complexity of the dataset
• Factor in dataset cost and time to acquire the actual dataset
• Consider selecting a dataset your mentor has used previously

Step 3: Get to know your dataset

• Why does the database exist?
• Who reports the data?
• What are the incentives for accurate reporting?
• How are the data audited, if at all?
• Can you link your dataset to other large datasets?
• Read everything you can about the database
• Check to see if your measures have been validated against other sources
• Get a close feel for the data by analyzing it yourself or closely reviewing outputs if someone else is doing the programming

Step 4: Structure your analysis and presentation of findings in a way that is clinically meaningful

• Think carefully about the clinical implications of your findings
• Be cautious when interpreting statistical significance (i.e., p-values). Large sample sizes can yield associations that are highly statistically significant but not clinically meaningful
• Consult with a statistician for complex datasets and analyses
• Think carefully about how you portray the data. A nice figure sometimes tells the story better than rows of data

Attribution

This page contains materials taken from:

Smith, A.K., Ayanian, J.Z., Covinsky, K.E. et al. Conducting High-Value Secondary Dataset Analysis: An Introductory Guide and Resources. J GEN INTERN MED 26, 920–929 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11606-010-1621-5

An Open Guide to Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) Copyright © 2023 by Andrea Niosi and KPU Marketing 4201 Class of Summer 2020 is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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• What Is Research?
• Types of Research

What is Secondary Research?

• Guide License
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• Using and Evaluating Sources
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Secondary research, also known as a literature review , preliminary research , historical research , background research , desk research , or library research , is research that analyzes or describes prior research. Rather than generating and analyzing new data, secondary research analyzes existing research results to establish the boundaries of knowledge on a topic, to identify trends or new practices, to test mathematical models or train machine learning systems, or to verify facts and figures. Secondary research is also used to justify the need for primary research as well as to justify and support other activities. For example, secondary research may be used to support a proposal to modernize a manufacturing plant, to justify the use of newly a developed treatment for cancer, to strengthen a business proposal, or to validate points made in a speech.

The following guides, published by the library, offer more information on how to do secondary research or a literature review:

• << Previous: Types of Research
• Next: Developing Your Topic >>
• Last Updated: Jul 24, 2024 4:33 PM
• URL: https://guides.library.iit.edu/research_basics

• What is Secondary Research? + [Methods & Examples]

In some situations, the researcher may not be directly involved in the data gathering process and instead, would rely on already existing data in order to arrive at research outcomes. This approach to systematic investigation is known as secondary research. 

There are many reasons a researcher may want to make use of already existing data instead of collecting data samples, first-hand. In this article, we will share some of these reasons with you and show you how to conduct secondary research with Formplus. 

What is Secondary  Research?

Secondary research is a common approach to a systematic investigation in which the researcher depends solely on existing data in the course of the research process. This research design involves organizing, collating and analyzing these data samples for valid research conclusions. 

Secondary research is also known as desk research since it involves synthesizing existing data that can be sourced from the internet, peer-reviewed journals , textbooks, government archives, and libraries. What the secondary researcher does is to study already established patterns in previous researches and apply this information to the specific research context. 

Interestingly, secondary research often relies on data provided by primary research and this is why some researches combine both methods of investigation. In this sense, the researcher begins by evaluating and identifying gaps in existing knowledge before adopting primary research to gather new information that will serve his or her research. 

What are Secondary Research Methods?

As already highlighted, secondary research involves data assimilation from different sources, that is, using available research materials instead of creating a new pool of data using primary research methods. Common secondary research methods include data collection through the internet, libraries, archives, schools and organizational reports. 

• Online Data

Online data is data that is gathered via the internet. In recent times, this method has become popular because the internet provides a large pool of both free and paid research resources that can be easily accessed with the click of a button. 

While this method simplifies the data gathering process , the researcher must take care to depend solely on authentic sites when collecting information. In some way, the internet is a virtual aggregation for all other sources of secondary research data. 

• Data from Government and Non-government Archives

You can also gather useful research materials from government and non-government archives and these archives usually contain verifiable information that provides useful insights on varying research contexts. In many cases, you would need to pay a sum to gain access to these data. 

The challenge, however, is that such data is not always readily available due to a number of factors. For instance, some of these materials are described as classified information as such, it would be difficult for researchers to have access to them. 

• Data from Libraries

Research materials can also be accessed through public and private libraries. Think of a library as an information storehouse that contains an aggregation of important information that can serve as valid data in different research contexts. 

Typically, researchers donate several copies of dissertations to public and private libraries; especially in cases of academic research. Also, business directories, newsletters, annual reports and other similar documents that can serve as research data, are gathered and stored in libraries, in both soft and hard copies. 

• Data from Institutions of Learning

Educational facilities like schools, faculties, and colleges are also a great source of secondary data; especially in academic research. This is because a lot of research is carried out in educational institutions more than in other sectors. 

It is relatively easier to obtain research data from educational institutions because these institutions are committed to solving problems and expanding the body of knowledge. You can easily request research materials from educational facilities for the purpose of a literature review. 

Secondary research methods can also be categorized into qualitative and quantitative data collection methods . Quantitative data gathering methods include online questionnaires and surveys, reports about trends plus statistics about different areas of a business or industry.  

Qualitative research methods include relying on previous interviews and data gathered through focus groups which helps an organization to understand the needs of its customers and plan to fulfill these needs. It also helps businesses to measure the level of employee satisfaction with organizational policies. 

When Do We Conduct Secondary Research?

Typically, secondary research is the first step in any systematic investigation. This is because it helps the researcher to understand what research efforts have been made so far and to utilize this knowledge in mapping out a novel direction for his or her investigation. 

For instance, you may want to carry out research into the nature of a respiratory condition with the aim of developing a vaccine. The best place to start is to gather existing research material about the condition which would help to point your research in the right direction. 

When sifting through these pieces of information, you would gain insights into methods and findings from previous researches which would help you define your own research process. Secondary research also helps you to identify knowledge gaps that can serve as the name of your own research. 

Questions to ask before conducting Secondary Research

Since secondary research relies on already existing data, the researcher must take extra care to ensure that he or she utilizes authentic data samples for the research. Falsified data can have a negative impact on the research outcomes; hence, it is important to always carry out resource evaluation by asking a number of questions as highlighted below:

• What is the purpose of the research? Again, it is important for every researcher to clearly define the purpose of the research before proceeding with it. Usually, the research purpose determines the approach that would be adopted. 
• What is my research methodology? After identifying the purpose of the research, the next thing to do is outline the research methodology. This is the point where the researcher chooses to gather data using secondary research methods. 
• What are my expected research outcomes? 
• Who collected the data to be analyzed? Before going on to use secondary data for your research, it is necessary to ascertain the authenticity of the information. This usually affects the data reliability and determines if the researcher can trust the materials.  For instance, data gathered from personal blogs and websites may not be as credible as information obtained from an organization’s website. 
• When was the data collected? Data recency is another factor that must be considered since the recency of data can affect research outcomes. For instance, if you are carrying out research into the number of women who smoke in London, it would not be appropriate for you to make use of information that was gathered 5 years ago unless you plan to do some sort of data comparison. 
• Is the data consistent with other data available from other sources? Always compare and contrast your data with other available research materials as this would help you to identify inconsistencies if any.
• What type of data was collected? Take care to determine if the secondary data aligns with your research goals and objectives. 
• How was the data collected? 

Advantages of Secondary Research

• Easily Accessible With secondary research, data can easily be accessed in no time; especially with the use of the internet. Apart from the internet, there are different data sources available in secondary research like public libraries and archives which are relatively easy to access too. 
• Secondary research is cost-effective and it is not time-consuming. The researcher can cut down on costs because he or she is not directly involved in the data collection process which is also time-consuming. 
• Secondary research helps researchers to identify knowledge gaps which can serve as the basis of further systematic investigation. 
• It is useful for mapping out the scope of research thereby setting the stage for field investigations. When carrying out secondary research, the researchers may find that the exact information they were looking for is already available, thus eliminating the need and expense incurred in carrying out primary research in these areas. 

Disadvantages of Secondary Research  

• Questionable Data: With secondary research, it is hard to determine the authenticity of the data because the researcher is not directly involved in the research process. Invalid data can affect research outcomes negatively hence, it is important for the researcher to take extra care by evaluating the data before making use of it. 
• Generalization: Secondary data is unspecific in nature and may not directly cater to the needs of the researcher. There may not be correlations between the existing data and the research process. 
• Common Data: Research materials in secondary research are not exclusive to an individual or group. This means that everyone has access to the data and there is little or no “information advantage” gained by those who obtain the research.
• It has the risk of outdated research materials. Outdated information may offer little value especially for organizations competing in fast-changing markets.

How to Conduct Online Surveys with Formplus 

Follow these 5 steps to create and administer online surveys for secondary research: 

• Sign into Formplus

In the Formplus builder, you can easily create an online survey for secondary research by dragging and dropping preferred fields into your form. To access the Formplus builder, you will need to create an account on Formplus. 

Once you do this, sign in to your account and click on “Create Form ” to begin. 

• Edit Form Title

Click on the field provided to input your form title, for example, “Secondary Research Survey”.

• Click on the edit button to edit the form.

• Add Fields: Drag and drop preferred form fields into your form in the Formplus builder inputs column. There are several field input options for questionnaires in the Formplus builder. 
• Edit fields
• Click on “Save”
• Preview form. 
• Customize your Form

With the form customization options in the form builder, you can easily change the outlook of your form and make it more unique and personalized. Formplus allows you to change your form theme, add background images and even change the font according to your needs. 

• Multiple Sharing Options

Formplus offers multiple form sharing options which enables you to easily share your questionnaire with respondents. You can use the direct social media sharing buttons to share your form link to your organization’s social media pages. 

You can send out your survey form as email invitations to your research subjects too. If you wish, you can share your form’s QR code or embed it on your organization’s website for easy access. 

Why Use Formplus as a Secondary Research Tool?

• Simple Form Builder Solution

The Formplus form builder is easy to use and does not require you to have any knowledge in computer programming, unlike other form builders. For instance, you can easily add form fields to your form by dragging and dropping them from the inputs section in the builder. 

In the form builder, you can also modify your fields to be hidden or read-only and you can create smart forms with save and resume options, form lookup, and conditional logic. Formplus also allows you to customize your form by adding preferred background images and your organization’s logo. 

• Over 25 Form Fields

With over 25 versatile form fields available in the form builder, you can easily collect data the way you like. You can receive payments directly in your form by adding payment fields and you can also add file upload fields to allow you receive files in your form too. 

• Offline Form feature

With Formplus, you can collect data from respondents even without internet connectivity . Formplus automatically detects when there is no or poor internet access and allows forms to be filled out and submitted in offline mode. 

Offline form responses are automatically synced with the servers when the internet connection is restored. This feature is extremely useful for field research that may involve sourcing for data in remote and rural areas plus it allows you to scale up on your audience reach. 

• Team and Collaboration

 You can add important collaborators and team members to your shared account so that you all can work on forms and responses together. With the multiple users options, you can assign different roles to team members and you can also grant and limit access to forms and folders. 

This feature works with an audit trail that enables you to track changes and suggestions made to your form as the administrator of the shared account. You can set up permissions to limit access to the account while organizing and monitoring your form(s) effectively. 

• Embeddable Form

Formplus allows you to easily add your form with respondents with the click of a button. For instance, you can directly embed your form in your organization’s web pages by adding Its unique shortcode to your site’s HTML. 

You can also share your form to your social media pages using the social media direct sharing buttons available in the form builder. You can choose to embed the form as an iframe or web pop-up that is easy to fill. 

With Formplus, you can share your form with numerous form respondents in no time. You can invite respondents to fill out your form via email invitation which allows you to also track responses and prevent multiple submissions in your form. 

In addition, you can also share your form link as a QR code so that respondents only need to scan the code to access your form. Our forms have a unique QR code that you can add to your website or print in banners, business cards and the like. 

While secondary research can be cost-effective and time-efficient, it requires the researcher to take extra care in ensuring that the data is authentic and valid. As highlighted earlier, data in secondary research can be sourced through the internet, archives, and libraries, amongst other methods. 

Secondary research is usually the starting point of systematic investigation because it provides the researcher with a background of existing research efforts while identifying knowledge gaps to be filled. This type of research is typically used in science and education. 

It is, however, important to note that secondary research relies on the outcomes of collective primary research data in carrying out its systematic investigation. Hence, the success of your research will depend, to a greater extent, on the quality of data provided by primary research in relation to the research context.

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How to do your dissertation secondary research in 4 steps

(Last updated: 12 May 2021)

Since 2006, Oxbridge Essays has been the UK’s leading paid essay-writing and dissertation service

We have helped 10,000s of undergraduate, Masters and PhD students to maximise their grades in essays, dissertations, model-exam answers, applications and other materials. If you would like a free chat about your project with one of our UK staff, then please just reach out on one of the methods below.

If you are reading this guide, it's very likely you may be doing secondary research for your dissertation, rather than primary. If this is indeed you, then here's the good news: secondary research is the easiest type of research! Congratulations!

In a nutshell, secondary research is far more simple. So simple, in fact, that we have been able to explain how to do it completely in just 4 steps (see below). If nothing else, secondary research avoids the all-so-tiring efforts usually involved with primary research. Like recruiting your participants, choosing and preparing your measures, and spending days (or months) collecting your data.

That said, you do still need to know how to do secondary research. Which is what you're here for. So, go make a decent-sized mug of your favourite hot beverage (consider a glass of water , too) then come back and get comfy.

Here's what we'll cover in this guide:

The basics: What's secondary research all about?

Understanding secondary research, advantages of secondary research, disadvantages of secondary research, methods and purposes of secondary research, types of secondary data, sources of secondary data, secondary research process in 4 steps, step 1: develop your research question(s), step 2: identify a secondary data set, step 3: evaluate a secondary data set, step 4: prepare and analyse secondary data.

To answer this question, let’s first recall what we mean by primary research . As you probably already know, primary research is when the researcher collects the data himself or herself. The researcher uses so-called “real-time” data, which means that the data is collected during the course of a specific research project and is under the researcher’s direct control.

In contrast, secondary research involves data that has been collected by somebody else previously. This type of data is called “past data” and is usually accessible via past researchers, government records, and various online and offline resources.

So to recap, secondary research involves re-analysing, interpreting, or reviewing past data. The role of the researcher is always to specify how this past data informs his or her current research.

In contrast to primary research, secondary research is easier, particularly because the researcher is less involved with the actual process of collecting the data. Furthermore, secondary research requires less time and less money (i.e., you don’t need to provide your participants with compensation for participating or pay for any other costs of the research).

One of the most obvious advantages is that, compared to primary research, secondary research is inexpensive . Primary research usually requires spending a lot of money. For instance, members of the research team should be paid salaries. There are often travel and transportation costs. You may need to pay for office space and equipment, and compensate your participants for taking part. There may be other overhead costs too.

These costs do not exist when doing secondary research. Although researchers may need to purchase secondary data sets, this is always less costly than if the research were to be conducted from scratch.

As an undergraduate or graduate student, your dissertation project won't need to be an expensive endeavour. Thus, it is useful to know that you can further reduce costs, by using freely available secondary data sets.

But this is far from the only consideration.

Most students value another important advantage of secondary research, which is that secondary research saves you time . Primary research usually requires months spent recruiting participants, providing them with questionnaires, interviews, or other measures, cleaning the data set, and analysing the results. With secondary research, you can skip most of these daunting tasks; instead, you merely need to select, prepare, and analyse an existing data set.

Moreover, you probably won’t need a lot of time to obtain your secondary data set, because secondary data is usually easily accessible . In the past, students needed to go to libraries and spend hours trying to find a suitable data set. New technologies make this process much less time-consuming. In most cases, you can find your secondary data through online search engines or by contacting previous researchers via email.

A third important advantage of secondary research is that you can base your project on a large scope of data . If you wanted to obtain a large data set yourself, you would need to dedicate an immense amount of effort. What's more, if you were doing primary research, you would never be able to use longitudinal data in your graduate or undergraduate project, since it would take you years to complete. This is because longitudinal data involves assessing and re-assessing a group of participants over long periods of time.

When using secondary data, however, you have an opportunity to work with immensely large data sets that somebody else has already collected. Thus, you can also deal with longitudinal data, which may allow you to explore trends and changes of phenomena over time.

With secondary research, you are relying not only on a large scope of data, but also on professionally collected data . This is yet another advantage of secondary research. For instance, data that you will use for your secondary research project has been collected by researchers who are likely to have had years of experience in recruiting representative participant samples, designing studies, and using specific measurement tools.

If you had collected this data yourself, your own data set would probably have more flaws, simply because of your lower level of expertise when compared to these professional researchers.

The first such disadvantage is that your secondary data may be, to a greater or lesser extent, inappropriate for your own research purposes. This is simply because you have not collected the data yourself.

When you collect your data personally, you do so with a specific research question in mind. This makes it easy to obtain the relevant information. However, secondary data was always collected for the purposes of fulfilling other researchers’ goals and objectives.

Thus, although secondary data may provide you with a large scope of professionally collected data, this data is unlikely to be fully appropriate to your own research question. There are several reasons for this. For instance, you may be interested in the data of a particular population, in a specific geographic region, and collected during a specific time frame. However, your secondary data may have focused on a slightly different population, may have been collected in a different geographical region, or may have been collected a long time ago.

Apart from being potentially inappropriate for your own research purposes, secondary data could have a different format than you require. For instance, you might have preferred participants’ age to be in the form of a continuous variable (i.e., you want your participants to have indicated their specific age). But the secondary data set may contain a categorical age variable; for example, participants might have indicated an age group they belong to (e.g., 20-29, 30-39, 40-49, etc.). Or another example: A secondary data set may contain too few ethnic categories (e.g., “White” and “Other”), while you would ideally want a wider range of racial categories (e.g., “White”, “Black or African American”, “American Indian”, and “Asian”). Differences such as these mean that secondary data may not be perfectly appropriate for your research.

The above two disadvantages may lead to yet another one: the existing data set may not answer your own research question(s) in an ideal way. As noted above, secondary data was collected with a different research question in mind, and this may limit its application to your own research purpose.

Unfortunately, the list of disadvantages does not end here. An additional weakness of secondary data is that you have a lack of control over the quality of data. All researchers need to establish that their data is reliable and valid. But if the original researchers did not establish the reliability and validity of their data, this may limit its reliability and validity for your research as well. To establish reliability and validity, you are usually advised to critically evaluate how the data was gathered, analysed, and presented.

But here lies the final disadvantage of doing secondary research: original researchers may fail to provide sufficient information on how their research was conducted. You might be faced with a lack of information on recruitment procedures, sample representativeness, data collection methods, employed measurement tools and statistical analyses, and the like. This may require you to take extra steps to obtain such information, if that is possible at all.

At this point, we should ask: “What are the methods of secondary research?” and “When do we use each of these methods?” Here, we can differentiate between three methods of secondary research: using a secondary data set in isolation , combining two secondary data sets, and combining secondary and primary data sets. Let’s outline each of these separately, and also explain when to use each of these methods.

Initially, you can use a secondary data set in isolation – that is, without combining it with other data sets. You dig and find a data set that is useful for your research purposes and then base your entire research on that set of data. You do this when you want to re-assess a data set with a different research question in mind.

Let’s illustrate this with a simple example. Suppose that, in your research, you want to investigate whether pregnant women of different nationalities experience different levels of anxiety during different pregnancy stages. Based on the literature, you have formed an idea that nationality may matter in this relationship between pregnancy and anxiety.

If you wanted to test this relationship by collecting the data yourself, you would need to recruit many pregnant women of different nationalities and assess their anxiety levels throughout their pregnancy. It would take you at least a year to complete this research project.

Instead of undertaking this long endeavour, you thus decide to find a secondary data set – one that investigated (for instance) a range of difficulties experienced by pregnant women in a nationwide sample. The original research question that guided this research could have been: “to what extent do pregnant women experience a range of mental health difficulties, including stress, anxiety, mood disorders, and paranoid thoughts?” The original researchers might have outlined women’s nationality, but weren’t particularly interested in investigating the link between women’s nationality and anxiety at different pregnancy stages. You are, therefore, re-assessing their data set with your own research question in mind.

Your research may, however, require you to combine two secondary data sets . You will use this kind of methodology when you want to investigate the relationship between certain variables in two data sets or when you want to compare findings from two past studies.

To take an example: One of your secondary data sets may focus on a target population’s tendency to smoke cigarettes, while the other data set focuses on the same population’s tendency to drink alcohol. In your own research, you may thus be looking at whether there is a correlation between smoking and drinking among this population.

Here is a second example: Your two secondary data sets may focus on the same outcome variable, such as the degree to which people go to Greece for a summer vacation. However, one data set could have been collected in Britain and the other in Germany. By comparing these two data sets, you can investigate which nation tends to visit Greece more.

Finally, your research project may involve combining primary and secondary data . You may decide to do this when you want to obtain existing information that would inform your primary research.

Let’s use another simple example and say that your research project focuses on American versus British people’s attitudes towards racial discrimination. Let’s say that you were able to find a recent study that investigated Americans’ attitudes of these kind, which were assessed with a certain set of measures. However, your search finds no recent studies on Britons’ attitudes. Let’s also say that you live in London and that it would be difficult for you to assess Americans’ attitudes on the topic, but clearly much more straightforward to conduct primary research on British attitudes.

In this case, you can simply reuse the data from the American study and adopt exactly the same measures with your British participants. Your secondary data is being combined with your primary data. Alternatively, you may combine these types of data when the role of your secondary data is to outline descriptive information that supports your research. For instance, if your project is focusing on attitudes towards McDonald’s food, you may want to support your primary research with secondary data that outlines how many people eat McDonald’s in your country of choice.

TABLE 3 summarises particular methods and purposes of secondary research:

We have already provided above several examples of using quantitative secondary data. This type of data is used when the original study has investigated a population’s tendency to smoke or drink alcohol, the degree to which people from different nationalities go to Greece for their summer vacation, or the degree to which pregnant women experience anxiety.

In all these examples, outcome variables were assessed by questionnaires, and thus the obtained data was numerical.

Quantitative secondary research is much more common than qualitative secondary research. However, this is not to say that you cannot use qualitative secondary data in your research project. This type of secondary data is used when you want the previously-collected information to inform your current research. More specifically, it is used when you want to test the information obtained through qualitative research by implementing a quantitative methodology.

For instance, a past qualitative study might have focused on the reasons why people choose to live on boats. This study might have interviewed some 30 participants and noted the four most important reasons people live on boats: (1) they can lead a transient lifestyle, (2) they have an increased sense of freedom, (3) they feel that they are “world citizens”, and (4) they can more easily visit their family members who live in different locations. In your own research, you can therefore reuse this qualitative data to form a questionnaire, which you then give to a larger population of people who live on boats. This will help you to generalise the previously-obtained qualitative results to a broader population.

Importantly, you can also re-assess a qualitative data set in your research, rather than using it as a basis for your quantitative research. Let’s say that your research focuses on the kind of language that people who live on boats use when describing their transient lifestyles. The original research did not focus on this research question per se – however, you can reuse the information from interviews to “extract” the types of descriptions of a transient lifestyle that were given by participants.

TABLE 4 highlights the two main types of secondary data and their associated purposes:

Internal sources of data are those that are internal to the organisation in question. For instance, if you are doing a research project for an organisation (or research institution) where you are an intern, and you want to reuse some of their past data, you would be using internal data sources.

The benefit of using these sources is that they are easily accessible and there is no associated financial cost of obtaining them.

External sources of data, on the other hand, are those that are external to an organisation or a research institution. This type of data has been collected by “somebody else”, in the literal sense of the term. The benefit of external sources of data is that they provide comprehensive data – however, you may sometimes need more effort (or money) to obtain it.

Let’s now focus on different types of internal and external secondary data sources.

There are several types of internal sources. For instance, if your research focuses on an organisation’s profitability, you might use their sales data . Each organisation keeps a track of its sales records, and thus your data may provide information on sales by geographical area, types of customer, product prices, types of product packaging, time of the year, and the like.

Alternatively, you may use an organisation’s financial data . The purpose of using this data could be to conduct a cost-benefit analysis and understand the economic opportunities or outcomes of hiring more people, buying more vehicles, investing in new products, and so on.

Another type of internal data is transport data . Here, you may focus on outlining the safest and most effective transportation routes or vehicles used by an organisation.

Alternatively, you may rely on marketing data , where your goal would be to assess the benefits and outcomes of different marketing operations and strategies.

Some other ideas would be to use customer data to ascertain the ideal type of customer, or to use safety data to explore the degree to which employees comply with an organisation’s safety regulations.

The list of the types of internal sources of secondary data can be extensive; the most important thing to remember is that this data comes from a particular organisation itself, in which you do your research in an internal manner.

The list of external secondary data sources can be just as extensive. One example is the data obtained through government sources . These can include social surveys, health data, agricultural statistics, energy expenditure statistics, population censuses, import/export data, production statistics, and the like. Government agencies tend to conduct a lot of research, therefore covering almost any kind of topic you can think of.

Another external source of secondary data are national and international institutions , including banks, trade unions, universities, health organisations, etc. As with government, such institutions dedicate a lot of effort to conducting up-to-date research, so you simply need to find an organisation that has collected the data on your own topic of interest.

Alternatively, you may obtain your secondary data from trade, business, and professional associations . These usually have data sets on business-related topics and are likely to be willing to provide you with secondary data if they understand the importance of your research. If your research is built on past academic studies, you may also rely on scientific journals as an external data source.

Once you have specified what kind of secondary data you need, you can contact the authors of the original study.

As a final example of a secondary data source, you can rely on data from commercial research organisations. These usually focus their research on media statistics and consumer information, which may be relevant if, for example, your research is within media studies or you are investigating consumer behaviour.

At this point, you should have a clearer understanding of secondary research in general terms.

Now it may be useful to focus on the actual process of doing secondary research. This next section is organised to introduce you to each step of this process, so that you can rely on this guide while planning your study. At the end of this blog post, in Table 6 , you will find a summary of all the steps of doing secondary research.

For an undergraduate thesis, you are often provided with a specific research question by your supervisor. But for most other types of research, and especially if you are doing your graduate thesis, you need to arrive at a research question yourself.

The first step here is to specify the general research area in which your research will fall. For example, you may be interested in the topic of anxiety during pregnancy, or tourism in Greece, or transient lifestyles. Since we have used these examples previously, it may be useful to rely on them again to illustrate our discussion.

Once you have identified your general topic, your next step consists of reading through existing papers to see whether there is a gap in the literature that your research can fill. At this point, you may discover that previous research has not investigated national differences in the experiences of anxiety during pregnancy, or national differences in a tendency to go to Greece for a summer vacation, or that there is no literature generalising the findings on people’s choice to live on boats.

Having found your topic of interest and identified a gap in the literature, you need to specify your research question. In our three examples, research questions would be specified in the following manner: (1) “Do women of different nationalities experience different levels of anxiety during different stages of pregnancy?”, (2) “Are there any differences in an interest in Greek tourism between Germans and Britons?”, and (3) “Why do people choose to live on boats?”.

It is at this point, after reviewing the literature and specifying your research questions, that you may decide to rely on secondary data. You will do this if you discover that there is past data that would be perfectly reusable in your own research, therefore helping you to answer your research question more thoroughly (and easily).

But how do you discover if there is past data that could be useful for your research? You do this through reviewing the literature on your topic of interest. During this process, you will identify other researchers, organisations, agencies, or research centres that have explored your research topic.

Somewhere there, you may discover a useful secondary data set. You then need to contact the original authors and ask for a permission to use their data. (Note, however, that this happens only if you are relying on external sources of secondary data. If you are doing your research internally (i.e., within a particular organisation), you don’t need to search through the literature for a secondary data set – you can just reuse some past data that was collected within the organisation itself.)

In any case, you need to ensure that a secondary data set is a good fit for your own research question. Once you have established that it is, you need to specify the reasons why you have decided to rely on secondary data.

For instance, your choice to rely on secondary data in the above examples might be as follows: (1) A recent study has focused on a range of mental difficulties experienced by women in a multinational sample and this data can be reused; (2) There is existing data on Germans’ and Britons’ interest in Greek tourism and these data sets can be compared; and (3) There is existing qualitative research on the reasons for choosing to live on boats, and this data can be relied upon to conduct a further quantitative investigation.

Because such disadvantages of secondary data can limit the effectiveness of your research, it is crucial that you evaluate a secondary data set. To ease this process, we outline here a reflective approach that will allow you to evaluate secondary data in a stepwise fashion.

Step 3(a): What was the aim of the original study?

During this step, you also need to pay close attention to any differences in research purposes and research questions between the original study and your own investigation. As we have discussed previously, you will often discover that the original study had a different research question in mind, and it is important for you to specify this difference.

Let’s put this step of identifying the aim of the original study in practice, by referring to our three research examples. The aim of the first research example was to investigate mental difficulties (e.g., stress, anxiety, mood disorders, and paranoid thoughts) in a multinational sample of pregnant women.

How does this aim differ from your research aim? Well, you are seeking to reuse this data set to investigate national differences in anxiety experienced by women during different pregnancy stages. When it comes to the second research example, you are basing your research on two secondary data sets – one that aimed to investigate Germans’ interest in Greek tourism and the other that aimed to investigate Britons’ interest in Greek tourism.

While these two studies focused on particular national populations, the aim of your research is to compare Germans’ and Britons’ tendency to visit Greece for summer vacation. Finally, in our third example, the original research was a qualitative investigation into the reasons for living on boats. Your research question is different, because, although you are seeking to do the same investigation, you wish to do so by using a quantitative methodology.

Importantly, in all three examples, you conclude that secondary data may in fact answer your research question. If you conclude otherwise, it may be wise to find a different secondary data set or to opt for primary research.

Step 3(b): Who has collected the data?

Let’s say that, in our example of research on pregnancy, data was collected by the UK government; that in our example of research on Greek tourism, the data was collected by a travel agency; and that in our example of research on the reasons for choosing to live on boats, the data was collected by researchers from a UK university.

Let’s also say that you have checked the background of these organisations and researchers, and that you have concluded that they all have a sufficiently professional background, except for the travel agency. Given that this agency’s research did not lead to a publication (for instance), and given that not much can be found about the authors of the research, you conclude that the professionalism of this data source remains unclear.

Step 3(c): Which measures were employed?

Original authors should have documented all their sample characteristics, measures, procedures, and protocols. This information can be obtained either in their final research report or through contacting the authors directly.

It is important for you to know what type of data was collected, which measures were used, and whether such measures were reliable and valid (if they were quantitative measures). You also need to make a clear outline of the type of data collected – and especially the data relevant for your research.

Let’s say that, in our first example, researchers have (among other assessed variables) used a demographic measure to note women’s nationalities and have used the State Anxiety Inventory to assess women’s anxiety levels during different pregnancy stages, both of which you conclude are valid and reliable tools. In our second example, the authors might have crafted their own measure to assess interest in Greek tourism, but there may be no established validity and reliability for this measure. And in our third example, the authors have employed semi-structured interviews, which cover the most important reasons for wanting to live on boats.

Step 3(d): When was the data collected?

Ideally, you want your secondary data to have been collected within the last five years. For the sake of our examples, let’s say that all three original studies were conducted within this time-range.

Step 3(e): What methodology was used to collect the data?

We have already noted that you need to evaluate the reliability and validity of employed measures. In addition to this, you need to evaluate how the sample was obtained, whether the sample was large enough, if the sample was representative of the population, if there were any missing responses on employed measures, whether confounders were controlled for, and whether the employed statistical analyses were appropriate. Any drawbacks in the original methodology may limit your own research as well.

For the sake of our examples, let’s say that the study on mental difficulties in pregnant women recruited a representative sample of pregnant women (i.e., they had different nationalities, different economic backgrounds, different education levels, etc.) in maternity wards of seven hospitals; that the sample was large enough (N = 945); that the number of missing values was low; that many confounders were controlled for (e.g., education level, age, presence of partnership, etc.); and that statistical analyses were appropriate (e.g., regression analyses were used).

Let’s further say that our second research example had slightly less sufficient methodology. Although the number of participants in the two samples was high enough (N1 = 453; N2 = 488), the number of missing values was low, and statistical analyses were appropriate (descriptive statistics), the authors failed to report how they recruited their participants and whether they controlled for any confounders.

Let’s say that these authors also failed to provide you with more information via email. Finally, let’s assume that our third research example also had sufficient methodology, with a sufficiently large sample size for a qualitative investigation (N = 30), high sample representativeness (participants with different backgrounds, coming from different boat communities), and sufficient analyses (thematic analysis).

Note that, since this was a qualitative investigation, there is no need to evaluate the number of missing values and the use of confounders.

Step 3(f): Making a final evaluation

We would conclude that the secondary data from our first research example has a high quality. Data was recently collected by professionals, the employed measures were both reliable and valid, and the methodology was more than sufficient. We can be confident that our new research question can be sufficiently answered with the existing data. Thus, the data set for our first example is ideal.

The two secondary data sets from our second research example seem, however, less than ideal. Although we can answer our research questions on the basis of these recent data sets, the data was collected by an unprofessional source, the reliability and validity of the employed measure is uncertain, and the employed methodology has a few notable drawbacks.

Finally, the data from our third example seems sufficient both for answering our research question and in terms of the specific evaluations (data was collected recently by a professional source, semi-structured interviews were well made, and the employed methodology was sufficient).

The final question to ask is: “what can be done if our evaluation reveals the lack of appropriateness of secondary data?”. The answer, unfortunately, is “nothing”. In this instance, you can only note the drawbacks of the original data set, present its limitations, and conclude that your own research may not be sufficiently well grounded.

Your first sub-step here (if you are doing quantitative research) is to outline all variables of interest that you will use in your study. In our first example, you could have at least five variables of interest: (1) women’s nationality, (2) anxiety levels at the beginning of pregnancy, (3) anxiety levels at three months of pregnancy, (4) anxiety levels at six months of pregnancy, and (5) anxiety levels at nine months of pregnancy. In our second example, you will have two variables of interest: (1) participants’ nationality, and (2) the degree of interest in going to Greece for a summer vacation. Once your variables of interest are identified, you need to transfer this data into a new SPSS or Excel file. Remember simply to copy this data into the new file – it is vital that you do not alter it!

Once this is done, you should address missing data (identify and label them) and recode variables if necessary (e.g., giving a value of 1 to German participants and a value of 2 to British participants). You may also need to reverse-score some items, so that higher scores on all items indicate a higher degree of what is being assessed.

Most of the time, you will also need to create new variables – that is, to compute final scores. For instance, in our example of research on anxiety during pregnancy, your data will consist of scores on each item of the State Anxiety Inventory, completed at various times during pregnancy. You will need to calculate final anxiety scores for each time the measure was completed.

Your final step consists of analysing the data. You will always need to decide on the most suitable analysis technique for your secondary data set. In our first research example, you would rely on MANOVA (to see if women of different nationalities experience different stress levels at the beginning, at three months, at six months, and at nine months of pregnancy); and in our second example, you would use an independent samples t-test (to see if interest in Greek tourism differs between Germans and Britons).

The process of preparing and analysing a secondary data set is slightly different if your secondary data is qualitative. In our example on the reasons for living on boats, you would first need to outline all reasons for living on boats, as recognised by the original qualitative research. Then you would need to craft a questionnaire that assesses these reasons in a broader population.

Finally, you would need to analyse the data by employing statistical analyses.

Note that this example combines qualitative and quantitative data. But what if you are reusing qualitative data, as in our previous example of re-coding the interviews from our study to discover the language used when describing transient lifestyles? Here, you would simply need to recode the interviews and conduct a thematic analysis.

In summary…

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Secondary Research Advantages, Limitations, and Sources

Summary: secondary research should be a prerequisite to the collection of primary data, but it rarely provides all the answers you need. a thorough evaluation of the secondary data is needed to assess its relevance and accuracy..

5 minutes to read. By author Michaela Mora on January 25, 2022 Topics: Relevant Methods & Tips , Business Strategy , Market Research

Secondary research is based on data already collected for purposes other than the specific problem you have. Secondary research is usually part of exploratory market research designs.

The connection between the specific purpose that originates the research is what differentiates secondary research from primary research. Primary research is designed to address specific problems. However, analysis of available secondary data should be a prerequisite to the collection of primary data.

Advantages of Secondary Research

Secondary data can be faster and cheaper to obtain, depending on the sources you use.

Secondary research can help to:

• Answer certain research questions and test some hypotheses.
• Formulate an appropriate research design (e.g., identify key variables).
• Interpret data from primary research as it can provide some insights into general trends in an industry or product category.
• Understand the competitive landscape.

Limitations of Secondary Research

The usefulness of secondary research tends to be limited often for two main reasons:

Lack of relevance

Secondary research rarely provides all the answers you need. The objectives and methodology used to collect the secondary data may not be appropriate for the problem at hand.

Given that it was designed to find answers to a different problem than yours, you will likely find gaps in answers to your problem. Furthermore, the data collection methods used may not provide the data type needed to support the business decisions you have to make (e.g., qualitative research methods are not appropriate for go/no-go decisions).

Lack of Accuracy

Secondary data may be incomplete and lack accuracy depending on;

• The research design (exploratory, descriptive, causal, primary vs. repackaged secondary data, the analytical plan, etc.)
• Sampling design and sources (target audiences, recruitment methods)
• Data collection method (qualitative and quantitative techniques)
• Analysis point of view (focus and omissions)
• Reporting stages (preliminary, final, peer-reviewed)
• Rate of change in the studied topic (slowly vs. rapidly evolving phenomenon, e.g., adoption of specific technologies).
• Lack of agreement between data sources.

Criteria for Evaluating Secondary Research Data

Before taking the information at face value, you should conduct a thorough evaluation of the secondary data you find using the following criteria:

• Purpose : Understanding why the data was collected and what questions it was trying to answer will tell us how relevant and useful it is since it may or may not be appropriate for your objectives.
• Methodology used to collect the data : Important to understand sources of bias.
• Accuracy of data: Sources of errors may include research design, sampling, data collection, analysis, and reporting.
• When the data was collected : Secondary data may not be current or updated frequently enough for the purpose that you need.
• Content of the data : Understanding the key variables, units of measurement, categories used and analyzed relationships may reveal how useful and relevant it is for your purposes.
• Source reputation : In the era of purposeful misinformation on the Internet, it is important to check the expertise, credibility, reputation, and trustworthiness of the data source.

Secondary Research Data Sources

Compared to primary research, the collection of secondary data can be faster and cheaper to obtain, depending on the sources you use.

Secondary data can come from internal or external sources.

Internal sources of secondary data include ready-to-use data or data that requires further processing available in internal management support systems your company may be using (e.g., invoices, sales transactions, Google Analytics for your website, etc.).

Prior primary qualitative and quantitative research conducted by the company are also common sources of secondary data. They often generate more questions and help formulate new primary research needed.

However, if there are no internal data collection systems yet or prior research, you probably won’t have much usable secondary data at your disposal.

External sources of secondary data include:

• Published materials
• External databases
• Syndicated services.

Published Materials

Published materials can be classified as:

• General business sources: Guides, directories, indexes, and statistical data.
• Government sources: Census data and other government publications.

External Databases

In many industries across a variety of topics, there are private and public databases that can bed accessed online or by downloading data for free, a fixed fee, or a subscription.

These databases can include bibliographic, numeric, full-text, directory, and special-purpose databases. Some public institutions make data collected through various methods, including surveys, available for others to analyze.

Syndicated Services

These services are offered by companies that collect and sell pools of data that have a commercial value and meet shared needs by a number of clients, even if the data is not collected for specific purposes those clients may have.

Syndicated services can be classified based on specific units of measurements (e.g., consumers, households, organizations, etc.).

The data collection methods for these data may include:

• Surveys (Psychographic and Lifestyle, advertising evaluations, general topics)
• Household panels (Purchase and media use)
• Electronic scanner services (volume tracking data, scanner panels, scanner panels with Cable TV)
• Audits (retailers, wholesalers)
• Direct inquiries to institutions
• Clipping services tracking PR for institutions
• Corporate reports

You can spend hours doing research on Google in search of external sources, but this is likely to yield limited insights. Books, articles journals, reports, blogs posts, and videos you may find online are usually analyses and summaries of data from a particular perspective. They may be useful and give you an indication of the type of data used, but they are not the actual data. Whenever possible, you should look at the actual raw data used to draw your own conclusion on its value for your research objectives. You should check professionally gathered secondary research.

Here are some external secondary data sources often used in market research that you may find useful as starting points in your research. Some are free, while others require payment.

• Pew Research Center : Reports about the issues, attitudes, and trends shaping the world. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis, and other empirical social science research.
• Data.Census.gov : Data dissemination platform to access demographic and economic data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
• Data.gov : The US. government’s open data source with almost 200,00 datasets ranges in topics from health, agriculture, climate, ecosystems, public safety, finance, energy, manufacturing, education, and business.
• Google Scholar : A web search engine that indexes the full text or metadata of scholarly literature across an array of publishing formats and disciplines.
• Google Public Data Explorer : Makes large, public-interest datasets easy to explore, visualize and communicate.
• Google News Archive : Allows users to search historical newspapers and retrieve scanned images of their pages.
• Mckinsey & Company : Articles based on analyses of various industries.
• Statista : Business data platform with data across 170+ industries and 150+ countries.
• Claritas : Syndicated reports on various market segments.
• Mintel : Consumer reports combining exclusive consumer research with other market data and expert analysis.
• MarketResearch.com : Data aggregator with over 350 publishers covering every sector of the economy as well as emerging industries.
• Packaged Facts : Reports based on market research on consumer goods and services industries.
• Dun & Bradstreet : Company directory with business information.

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World Leaders in Research-Based User Experience

Secondary research in ux.

February 20, 2022 2022-02-20

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You don’t have to do all the user-research work yourself. If somebody else already ran a study (and published it), grab it!

Have you ever completed a project only to find out that something very similar has already been done in your organization a couple of years ago? That situation is common, especially with rising employee-churn rates, and fueled the popularity of research repositories (e.g., Microsoft Human Insights System) and the growth of the  research-operations community . It should also inspire practitioners to do more secondary research.

Secondary research,  also known as desk research or, in academic contexts, literature review, refers to the act of gathering prior research findings and other relevant information related to a new project. It is a foundational part of any emerging research project and provides the project with background and context. Secondary research allows us to stand on the shoulders of giants and not to reinvent the wheel every time we initiate a new program or plan a study.

This article provides a step-by-step guide on how to conduct secondary research in UX. The key takeaway is that this type of research is not solely an intellectual exercise, but a way to minimize research costs, win internal stakeholders and get scaffolding for your own projects.

Academic publications include a literature review at the beginning to showcase context or known gaps and to justify the motivation for the research questions. However, the task of incorporating previous results is becoming more and more challenging with a growing number of publications in all fields. Therefore, practitioners across disciplines (for instance in eHealth, business, education, and technology) develop method guidelines for secondary research.  

In This Article:

When to conduct secondary research, types of secondary research, how to conduct secondary research.

Secondary research should be a standard first step in any rigorous research practice, but it’s also often cost-effective in more casual settings. Whether you are just starting a new project, joining an existing one, or planning a primary research effort for your team, it is always good to start with a broad overview of the field and existent resources. That would allow you to synthesize findings and uncover areas where more research is needed. 

Secondary research shows which topics are particularly popular or important for your organization and what problems other researchers are trying to solve. This research method is widely discussed in library and information sciences but is often neglected in UX. Nonetheless, secondary research can be useful to uncover industry trends and to inspire further studies. For example, Jessica Pater and her colleagues looked at the foundational question of participant compensation in user studies. They could have opted for user interviews or a costly large-scale survey, yet through secondary research, they were able to review 2250 unique user studies across 1662 manuscripts published in 2018-2019. They found inconsistencies in participant compensation and suggested changes to the current practices and further research opportunities.

Secondary research can be divided into two main types:  internal  and  external research.

Internal secondary research  involves gathering all relevant research findings already available in your organization. These might include artifacts from the past primary research projects, maps (e.g.,  customer-journey map ,  service blueprint ), deliverables from external consultants, or results from different kinds of  workshops  (e.g., discovery, design thinking, etc.). Hopefully, these will be available in a  research repository . 

External secondary research  is focused on sources outside of your organization, such as academic journals, public libraries, open data repositories, internet searches, and white papers published by reputable organizations. For example, external resources for the field of human-computer interaction (HCI) can be found at the  Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) digital library ,  Journal of Usability Studies (JUS ), or research websites like  ours . University libraries and labs like  UCSD Geisel Library ,  Carnegie Mellon University Libraries ,  MIT D-Lab ,  Stanford d.school , and specialized portals like  Google Scholar  offer another avenue for directed search. 

Our goal is to have the necessary depth, rigor, and usefulness for practitioners. Here are the 4 steps for conducting secondary research:

• Choose the topic of research & write a  problem statement . 

Write a concise description of the problem to be solved. For example, if you are doing a website redesign, you might want to both learn the current standards and look at all the previous design iterations to avoid issues that your team already identified.

• Identi fy external and internal resources.

Peer-reviewed publications (such as those published in academic journals and conferences) are a fairly reliable source. They always include a section describing methods, data-collection techniques, and study limitations. If a study you plan to use does not include such information, that might be a red flag and a reason to further scrutinize that source. Public datasets also often present some challenges because of errors and inclusion criteria, especially if they were collected for another purpose. 

One should be cautious of the seemingly reputable “research” findings published across different websites in a form of blog posts, which could be opinion pieces, not backed up by primary research. If you encounter such a piece, ask yourself — is the conclusion of the writeup based on a real study? If the study was quantitative, was it properly analyzed (e.g., at the very least, are  confidence intervals  reported, and was  statistical significance  evaluated?). For all studies, was the method sound and nonbiased (e.g., did the study have  internal and external validity )?

A more nuanced challenge involves evaluating findings based on a different audience, which might not be always generalizable to your situation, but may form hypotheses worthy of investigating. For example, if a design pattern is found okay to use by young adults, you may still want to know if this finding will also be valid for older generations.

• Collect and analyze data from external and internal resources.

Remember that secondary research involves both the existing data and existing research. Both of those categories become helpful resources when they are critically evaluated for any inherent biases, omissions, and limitations. If you already have some secondary data in your organization, such as customer service logs or search logs, you should include them in secondary research alongside any existent analysis of such logs and previous reports. It is helpful to revisit previous findings, compare how they have or have not been implemented to refresh institutional memory and support future research initiatives.

• Refine your problem statement and determine what still needs to be investigated.

Once you collected the relevant information, write a summary of findings, and discuss them with your team. You might need to refine your problem statement to determine what information you still need to answer your research questions. Next time your team is planning to adopt a trendy new design pattern, it may be a good idea to go back and search the web or an academic database for any evaluations of that pattern.

It is important to note that secondary research is not a substitute for primary research. It is always better to do both. Although secondary research is often cost-effective and quick, its quality depends to a large extent on the quality of your sources. Therefore, before using any secondary sources, you need to identify their validity and limitations. 

Secondary (or desk) research involves gathering existing data from inside and outside of your organization. A literature review should be done more frequently in UX because it is a viable option even for researchers with limited time and budget. The most challenging part is to persuade yourself and your team that the existing data is worth being summarized, compared, and collated to increase the overall effectiveness of your primary research. 

Jessica Pater, Amanda Coupe, Rachel Pfafman, Chanda Phelan, Tammy Toscos, and Maia Jacobs. 2021. Standardizing Reporting of Participant Compensation in HCI: A Systematic Literature Review and Recommendations for the Field. In  Proceedings of the 2021 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems.  Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 141, 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1145/3411764.3445734

Hannah Snyder. 2019. Literature review as a research methodology: An overview and guidelines.  Journal of business research  104, 333-339. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2019.07.039. 

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7 Easy Tips for Conducting Secondary Research

Hollyn page, march 13, 2019 / uncategorized.

When developing an outreach strategy, research can guide next steps and can also show your understanding of the industry you’re working in. For example, while researching regional publications for one of our clients who is continuing to grow their presence in the banking industry in Virginia, we found that both local and regional media frequently highlight individuals from different industries in their Feature and Expert columns. We were able to reach out to multiple outlets and successfully pitch the bank’s experts to be interviewed and speak on trending financial topics.

Where Do I Start?

Despite its name, secondary research actually is the first type of research that should be implemented before conducting primary research. Since this tactic can be time consuming and overwhelming with so much information, marketers sometimes avoid or skip this step – which can be a costly mistake. However, even when operating on a tight budget, there are still some cost-efficient ways to maximize social media to conduct research.

Below is a list of seven easy tips on how to effectively conduct secondary research and filter the information found in an organized and efficient way.

• Outline your goals. What specifically are you looking for? Asking questions and taking the time to thoroughly assess the main goal is critical or you will end up spending more time trying to sift through information that is not valuable.
• Identify current trends. This is easily done by setting up alerts on the specific industry or topic and monitoring alerts each day.
• Document publications in the industry. Sign up for daily newsletters and email blasts that cover the current trends. Visit their websites a few times a week to stay up to date on what relevant coverage is being published.
• Avoid information overload. You don’t need to read every article that you find on the topic, but skimming headlines and going back to Tip #1, if you have identified your goals and what you are looking for, you can dive deeper into those articles that relate.
• Be patient. Research does take time.
• Share your findings! During the research process, be sure to highlight any articles and information you find that is important and share with your team along the way.
• Organize the research. This can be done in different ways, so figuring out the most efficient method that works best for you is key in preventing confusion and being able to successfully present your findings.

Overwhelmed with information and lacking time to conduct research? Contact me to learn more about how we can help with market research and strategic planning.

With a keen focus on results, Hollyn is a passionate account supervisor with expertise in research, branding development, media relations, content writing, project and event management, influencer strategy and more. During her time at Sweeney, she has worked directly with some of our most dynamic clients, including Acuity Brands and Atlantic Union Bank. She has a master’s in communication information with a concentration in public relations and is certified in Google Analytics.

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Research Goals

Barry Mauer and John Venecek

Researchers work with a goal in mind. Common goals include

• Bringing readers closer to a text
• Connecting a text to a larger context
• Connecting a text with other knowledge frameworks such as science

Wendy Belcher, in  Writing Your Journal Article in 12 Weeks , discusses the first two main approaches to understanding literary works: looking at a text by itself (associated with New Criticism ) and looking at texts as they connect to society (associated with  Cultural Studies ). The goal of New Criticism is to bring the reader further into the text. The goal of Cultural Studies is to discuss the network of discourses that surround and pass through the text (its context). Other approaches, such as Ecocriticism, relate literary texts to the Sciences (as well as to the Humanities).

The New Critics, starting in the 1940s,  focused on meaning within the text itself, using a method they called “ close reading .” The literary text itself becomes e vidence for a particular reading. Using this approach, you should summarize the literary work briefly and q uote particularly meaningful passages, being sure to introduce quotes and then interpret them (never let them stand alone). Make connections within the work; a sk  “why” and “how” the various parts of the text relate to each other.

Cultural Studies critics see all texts  as connected to society; the critic  therefore has to connect a text to at least one political or social issue. The methodologies associated with cultural studies involve studies of power and studies of discourse (the language systems we use to make sense of the world). How and why does the text reproduce particular knowledge systems (known as discourses) and how do these knowledge systems relate to issues of power within the society? Who speaks and when? Answering these questions helps your reader understand the text in context. Cultural contexts can include the treatment of gender (Feminist, Queer), class (Marxist), nationality, race, religion, or any other area of human society.

Other approaches, such as  psychoanalytic literary criticism , look at literary texts to better understand human psychology. A psychoanalytic reading can focus on a character, the author, the reader, or on society in general.  Ecocriticism  look at human understandings of nature in literary texts.

Let’s look at how two related theories – American formalism and Russian Formalism – seek different goals, and note that each one has attendant beliefs and practices that are related to these goals:

Example [American Formalism vs. Russian Formalism]

The theory you choose should be aligned with your research goals; are you bringing your reader closer to the literary text, discussing its context, or relating it to other knowledge frameworks?

On the following pages, we discuss different types of theories, the methodologies those theories entail, and the methods and skills necessary to do research using your chosen theory.

Research Goals Copyright © 2021 by Barry Mauer and John Venecek is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Unlocking the Potential of Data Reuse: Award Challenge for Researchers

Biomedical research has generated millions of datasets and we are issuing a $500,000 challenge to get the most out of them. The 2024 DataWorks! Prize, a partnership between the NIH Office of Data Science Strategy and the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) , invites you to conduct a secondary research analysis project that generates new scientific findings from existing datasets. Data reuse plays a critical role in advancing biomedical research by making it possible to test new hypotheses without duplicating data collection efforts, and this challenge aims to highlight innovative and impactful secondary analysis projects. 

The future of biological and biomedical research hinges on researcher’s ability to share and reuse data. The DataWorks! Prize is an opportunity for the research community to complete a secondary analysis project and receive recognition and rewards for these innovative and impactful research endeavors. This is the third iteration of the DataWorks! Prize, a challenge focused on recognizing and rewarding the impact of data sharing and reuse on human health. 

To participate, research teams must submit a proposal for a secondary analysis research project that incorporates data from one or more of the Generalist Repository Ecosystem Initiative (GREI) repositories ; other repositories including domain-specific repositories can be used as well (. If selected to advance, teams will receive up to a $25,000 award to work on the completion of the proposed project. This year, the DataWorks! Prize will award up to $500,000 across ten awardees, including a Grand Prize winner ($100,000) and up to two Distinguished Achievement Awards ($75,000 each). 

Beyond monetary awards, the DataWorks! Prize offers the research community a chance to learn from peers and apply those lessons to their research practices. The innovative approaches and tools from prize winners will be highlighted in a symposium, providing a platform that supports community learning–where researchers can share their methods, lessons learned, and best practices, thereby fostering a culture of continuous improvement and collaboration within the scientific community. 

The DataWorks! Prize is part of the NIH Office of Data Science Strategy’s ongoing support for data stewardship and management, in alignment with the NIH Data Management and Sharing Policy . This policy promotes the management and sharing of scientific data from NIH-funded or conducted research, establishing requirements for Data Management and Sharing Plans and emphasizing good data management practices. It aims to maximize the appropriate sharing of scientific data, with justified limitations or exceptions. 

The DataWorks! Prize will be open for submissions on August 14, 2024. Participants must complete the first round of submissions by October 23, 2024. Visit Challenge.gov for more information and to apply.

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