Over the past year or so, I have been getting an incredible amount of impromptu calls from job seekers asking the same question. “Do you have any open research analyst positions you are trying to fill?” My response is always the same. “What kind of research analyst are you?” Sometimes there is a long pause, and often, perhaps out of discomfort, the caller starts providing all the career highlights they can think of.
From the first day I switched over from market researcher to industry recruiting 4 years ago, I’ve taken a karmic approach, and even if I don’t have a relevant position for a job seeker who gives me a call, I try to help out and make sure they are on the right track. The answer to my question helps quickly profile the candidate’s experience, proficiencies and interests so that I can better guide them relative to their competencies and interests.
Equally important, it also shows how well they understand the function of a research analyst, how many types of research analysts there are, the difference between the types and how they all contribute to the biggest picture of all…better informed decision making by management.
Most seasoned researchers gain experience analyzing multiple data sources over time and almost all start by specializing in just one of the data sources below. It tends to become a proficiency that remains their most relied upon career asset. Once researchers have built up several years of experience with a particular data stream or within a vertical industry, they stay there for a very long time…so it’s an important thing to think about at the research analyst level. So the quick answer to my question is…what generally determines the kind of analyst you are (or want to be) is the type of data you spend the majority of your time analyzing.
Data Sources Include:
- Primary Data (custom primary survey research with customers/prospects)
- Syndicated Data (multi-client behavioral/purchasing characteristics)
- Web/Interactive Data (website surfing behavior, analysis of interactive campaigns)
- Internal Data Resources (customer purchase history over time, DSS, ERP, CRM, etc.)
- Secondary Data (industry reports, intelligence and analysis available for purchase/subscription)
I searched the web looking for a great explanation of career tracks based on the data sources above. I consider myself an expert user of Google, Boolean logic and advanced search commands, and yet I could not find anything that wrapped it all up nicely. So I decided to take a different approach based on my most recent experience.
I have to admit it, I love job descriptions. They give so much information about people, positions, companies and industries. Regardless of the title, once you read the job description, you usually know exactly what that person does (and will do). Additionally, if read between the lines, they usually show a given company’s approach to their decision support function, what they think is important, what they are currently focusing on, and what talents and skills they believe are needed to compete and succeed.
To help research analysts trying to make sense of it all, I decided to do a comprehensive title search to exemplify career paths/titles a research analyst might consider. Simply Hired is one of the largest job aggregators there are and a great resource, so I decided use it as my analysis tool. Within a few minutes of searching, I was able to pull together a list of relevant and most commonly advertised analyst job titles that are relevant to the 5 data sources. This approach is not without challenges though, for there is insufficient title conformity from company-to-company or industry-to-industry, making it difficult to determine which data source(s) will be analyzed based on title alone. Additionally, there’s a continuing trend toward combining the analysis of multiple data sources into one position, although one data source usually predominates.
I tool a crack at sorting the below list of 30+ analyst titles by data source. The list of titles is by no means comprehensive, but it hits most of the major ones. If a particular title was vague or I was unable to make a decent guess as to the data source, I categorized the data source as unspecific, which means that analyst title is used for at least 2 data sources. Studying the descriptions will have a two-fold benefit. First, you’ll have a better understanding of the responsibilities and requirements of each one, the data sources they analyze, as well as the expectations. Second, it shows which skill sets you’ll need to acquire and develop to be successful on whatever path you choose.
The amount of data available for executive decision making support is growing at an increasing rate. Your value as an analyst, and as you grow into roles of more responsibility, will be based upon your ability to impact decisions. Having a better understanding of the data sources available will be a key to your success. The more you master any one data source, or multiple data sources better still, the more valuable you’ll be, the more job security you’ll have and the more you will be compensated.
Take a look at the quick list of titles below. Let me know if you have any questions or if there are other titles that should be added.
Click on any of the links below to see a listing of all positions currently posted for that title on Simply Hired in real time.
Data Source-Title
- Unspecific-Data Analyst
- Unspecific-Marketing Analyst
- Unspecific-Marketing Data Analyst
- Unspecific-Product Marketing Analyst
- Unspecific-Research Analyst
- Unspecific-Senior Data Analyst
- Unspecific-Senior Marketing Analyst
- Unspecific-Senior Research Analyst
- Unspecific-Market Analyst
- Internal Data-Business Analyst
- Internal Data-Business Data Analyst
- Internal Data-Business Intelligence Analyst
- Internal Data-Database Marketing Analyst
- Internal Data-Decision Support Analyst
- Internal Data-Intelligence Analyst
- Primary-Consumer Market Research Analyst
- Primary-Consumer Market Research Analyst
- Primary-Lifecycle Market Research Analyst
- Primary-Market Product Research Analyst
- Primary-Market Research Analyst
- Primary-Marketing Research Analyst
- Primary-Quantitative Market Research Analyst
- Primary-Consumer Insights Analyst
- Primary-Client Insights Analyst
- Primary-Customer Insights Analyst
- Primary-Global Insights Analyst
- Primary-Insights Analyst
- Secondary-Competitive Intelligence Analyst
- Syndicated-Media Research Analyst
- Web/Interactive-Web Analyst
- Web/Interactive-Online Marketing Analyst
- Web/Interactive-Search Engine Marketing Analyst
- Web/Interactive-Web Analytics Analyst
- Web/Interactive-Web Analytics Business Analyst
- Web/Interactive-Digital Marketing Analyst
- Web/Interactive-Digital Research Analyst
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