Market Research in Saudi Arabia: How to Do It Before You Launch

Market research in Saudi Arabia means gathering reliable evidence about demand, customers, prices and competitors before you enter the market or launch a product. Start with desk research from official sources such as the General Authority for Statistics, the Ministry of Investment, sector regulators and Monsha’at. Then fill the gaps with primary research: interviews, surveys and mystery shopping. Use both to size the market and read your competitors, and handle any personal data you collect under the Personal Data Protection Law.

What market research is and when you need it

Market research answers practical questions: who will buy, how many of them there are, what they pay today, who they buy from and why they would switch. In Saudi Arabia it matters most at four moments: before a foreign company enters the market, before a local business launches a new product or opens in a new city, before a pricing change, and when investors or lenders ask for evidence behind a business plan or feasibility study.

Good research need not be large, but it must be tied to a decision, rest on sources you can name and admit what it could not find out.

Start with a clear research question

Write down the decision the research must support, then the questions that settle it. “Is there demand for our product?” is too broad. Better questions look like this:

• Which customer groups buy this type of product today, and in which cities?
• What price range do they pay, and through which channels?
• Which licenses or approvals does the activity need before you can sell?

For each question, note what evidence would answer it and where to find it. That list is your research plan, and it stops you collecting data you will never use.

Desk research: official and public sources

Desk research uses information that already exists, costs less than fieldwork and should come first. Useful Saudi sources include:

• The General Authority for Statistics: population, household income and spending, the labor force, prices and establishments, often broken down by region.
• The Ministry of Investment (MISA): sector overviews, investment opportunities and information on the rules that apply to foreign investors.
• Sector regulators: for example, the Saudi Central Bank (SAMA) publishes financial and payment statistics, including point-of-sale spending, and the Saudi Food and Drug Authority keeps public lists of registered products.
• Monsha’at: periodic reports on small and medium enterprises and the conditions they work in.
• The Ministry of Commerce: periodic bulletins on the business sector and commercial registrations.
• Listed companies: annual reports and disclosures published on the Saudi Exchange often describe market conditions in detail.
• Government tenders: for markets that sell to the government, the Etimad platform shows the tenders public bodies put out.

Check the date and method behind every figure you use. International market reports can help, but many estimate the Saudi market from regional data; treat them as a starting point, not as proof.

Primary research: interviews, surveys and mystery shopping

Primary research collects new information to fill the gaps desk research leaves, especially on customer behavior, prices and service quality.

Interviews

Interviews with customers, distributors, retailers and procurement managers explain why people buy and what would make them switch. In business-to-business markets, a few well-chosen interviews often tell you more than a large survey. Offer interviews in Arabic and English, and prepare a short guide so every conversation covers the same points.

Surveys

Surveys measure how common a behavior or opinion is. Write the questionnaire in Arabic first, test it on a few people, and avoid leading or hypothetical questions such as “Would you buy this?”. Design the sample to reflect the customers you actually target, by city, age group, gender and nationality where relevant, since Saudi and expatriate customers often behave differently. Online panels are quick but can over-represent some groups.

Mystery shopping

Mystery shopping means visiting, calling or ordering from competitors as an ordinary customer to record prices, service, delivery times and after-sales handling. Keep to what any customer could see, record facts rather than impressions, and do not record staff or collect their personal data.

Sizing the market

Market sizing estimates how much customers spend, or could spend, on what you sell. Use two methods and compare them:

• Top-down: start from official totals, such as population or household spending on a category, and narrow down to the segment you can serve.
• Bottom-up: count likely customers and multiply by how often they buy and the average price, using what you learned from interviews, surveys and competitor checks.

If the two results are far apart, find out why before you trust either. Separate the total market from the part you can realistically reach with your channels, licenses and cities, and from the share you can expect to win in the first years. Present ranges, not a single figure, and write down every assumption so others can test it.

Reading your competitors

List direct competitors, indirect ones and substitutes, both online and in physical stores. For each, record the offer, prices, sales channels, locations, service levels and what customers say in public reviews. Their websites, online stores, advertising, job postings and, for listed companies, published reports show where they are investing and where they are struggling.

Then look for the gap: customer groups that are poorly served, cities with few options, slow delivery, weak after-sales service or prices that leave room for a different offer. Stick to information that is public or open to any customer, and do not seek confidential material such as internal price lists or customer data.

Survey data and the Personal Data Protection Law

Names, phone numbers, email addresses, voice recordings and any answer that can identify a person are personal data, so surveys and interviews fall under the Personal Data Protection Law. The Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA) has issued the law’s implementing regulations and guidance. In practice:

• Tell participants who is running the research, why, what you will collect and how long you will keep it.
• Get consent where the law requires it, and before recording any interview.
• Collect only what the research needs; most surveys do not need names.
• Remove identifying details as early as possible and report results in aggregate.
• Store the data securely, limit who can see it and delete it when the project ends.
• Check where your survey tool stores data, since the law sets rules for transferring personal data outside the Kingdom.
• If an agency or a freelancer collects data for you, set out in the contract how they handle and protect it.

Health information and other sensitive data need extra care; take advice before collecting them.

Doing it yourself, hiring a freelancer or an agency

You can do much of the early work yourself: desk research, a first round of customer interviews and competitor checks. Founders who talk to customers directly often learn things that never appear in a report.

A freelance market researcher suits defined tasks, such as designing a questionnaire, analyzing survey results or compiling desk research on one sector. Ask for samples of past work and agree on the scope and confidentiality in writing.

A market research agency makes sense when you need:

• Large consumer surveys across several cities, with controlled sampling.
• Focus groups or fieldwork that need trained moderators and suitable venues.
• Access to business decision makers who are hard to reach.
• An independent study that investors, lenders or partners will rely on.

When comparing agencies, ask how they recruit participants, check fieldwork quality and protect personal data, and what the final report will contain. Innovant can help you frame the research question, review the sources and turn the findings into an entry or launch plan.

Common mistakes

• Launching a survey before checking what official data already shows.
• Asking customers whether they would buy, instead of what they buy today and at what price.
• Surveying friends, one city or one nationality and treating the result as the whole market.
• Treating market size as your expected revenue.
• Ignoring the licenses and regulations that decide who can sell in the sector.

Frequently asked questions

Related reading: Business Model: What It Is and How to Build One with the Canvas

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