It is not really simple to define what market research is. Since it is such an all encompassing activity, any information gathering activity in order to take a decision can very well be called as market research. Whether the information is about how many customers are coming to a restaurant on a daily basis or whether it is about what price one should charge for the burger, it will still be called market research.

Hence, one can put it this way : Any activity of information gathering, which failitates decision making, is market research.

Hence, even the activity of sifting through the newspapers and figuring out how the economy is headed to form a strategy on one’s business can legitimately be called as market research.