Secondary Research

Purpose: move Assumptions → Facts where possible — before and alongside customer discovery, never instead of it. Not a one-off: understanding your business environment is continuous.

Where to start

Which industry/sector should you research? Hint: who are your likely competitors — which sector are they in? If you believe you have no competitor, think again: your target customers are using something right now (a product, a workaround, a shop visit, postponement). Whatever they use defines the industry to analyse — the status quo is the real competitor.

The five focus areas (checklist, not exhaustive)

a) Demand — demand pattern; unit of consumption; growth rate vs GDP; seasonality or concentration (festivals, fiscal years, weather); thousands of customers or a few; new vs established market; does one sale trigger follow-on revenue (printers→cartridges, cars→service)?

b) Competition — how many suppliers; basis of competition (price, quality, reliability, status, convenience); intensity; what determines market share; new entrants in the past 3 years and their entry strategies; who has tried this model and failed — and why (failed lookalikes are the cheapest education available).

c) Value chain — every entity between originator and consumer (distributor, transporter, regulator, financier, platform); the role of each; who plays the critical roles in the purchase, consumption, and payment decisions.

d) Customer types — how many distinct types exist; the differences between them.

e) Purchase process — when the need is felt; how they learn what/where to buy; how they decide among competitors; the actual steps; anything odd that stands out.

Evidence rules (non-negotiable)

1. Every figure needs URL + publisher + date. Prefer: government/statistical data, filings, credible trade press, primary company sources. Note when data is old (e.g., a decade-old census) and label derived estimates as derived.
2. Sources conflict → report both. Nothing credible found → the item stays UNKNOWN — say so plainly. Never fill a gap with a plausible number.
3. Grade confidence per finding: HIGH (official/primary-adjacent) / MEDIUM (single secondary source) / UNKNOWN.
4. Separate global from local: national market stats rarely answer "how many buyers in THIS town" — derive carefully or mark unknown.

Output

Findings table (Focus area | Finding | Source URL | Confidence) → 3–5 key conclusions about the business environment (each labeled) → "What this cannot tell you — needs interviews" — the honest list of questions only customer discovery answers (willingness to pay, actual behavior, trust barriers, why a past launch failed). Feed conclusions back into /facts-assumptions-unknowns as explicit list movements.

Ledger discipline (v2): reference Belief Ledger IDs ([A4], [F7]) for every claim; propose new/changed items in a closing "Ledger delta" section rather than restating claims — restated claims drift.

Fill-in templates: TEMPLATES.md in this skill's folder — copy the structures into your project's discovery/ and fill with labels.