Every business owner knows that in order to grow the business, you need to market it. And in order to market a business to its full potential, it’s critical to know as much as possible about the business’ customer base. Large corporations have huge departments with big budgets to conduct market research. Small businesses don’t often have that luxury, yet market research is just as important to a local business as it is to a nationwide corporation.

So how can you gather data on your customers without having to carve a huge chunk out of your budget? Here are five simple and inexpensive ideas that any small business can put in place.

One of the oldest market research tools is still one of the best. Survey your customers. You can do it simply by having them answer a few questions preprinted on a survey card. Keep the cards near the register and ask every customer if they’d like to take a quick survey. As appreciation for their time (and as enticement to complete the survey), enter each completed survey into a drawing for a chance to win a basket of free merchandise (keep the basket on display so customers can see what they can win) or offer a $50 or $100 shopping spree.

Use some of today’s new tech tool to make surveys even easier. Check out Survey Monkey. This online software allows you to create quick web-based surveys that you can email to your customers. The Basic Plan is free and allows you to create any number of surveys with a limit of 10 questions per survey and 100 responses per survey. The Pro Plan ($19.95 billed per month) allows an unlimited number of questions per survey as well as other enhancements such as branded surveys and downloadable results. The Unlimited Plan ($200 billed annually) allows unlimited questions and unlimited responses. Do a search for online survey companies to find other similar resources.

You can also informally survey customers through a feedback section of your website, a simple e-mail survey, or by browsing through the comments posted at online review sites such as Yelp or Yahoo Local. Or ask for feedback on your Facebook page through a simple post or one of the poll applications.

Some companies are using preprinted messages on their cash-register receipts that direct customers to a web survey. With this method, it’s critical that the store clerks point out the survey to every customer.

2. Dig Into the U.S. Census Bureau Website

The Census Bureau website  has a wealth of information available on the demographics of your city, town, county and state. Check out the Quick Facts section to learn what percentage of people in your area own their own homes, what the media household income is, how many building permits were issues, the population growth, etc. This can tell you whether your community is growing or shrinking. Look especially at neighboring communities and counties. Perhaps you’ll find that you need to market more in a nearby, wealthier community.

3. Check With Your County or State Economic Development Office

Most states and counties have economic development offices that track information such as the number of new businesses, closing businesses, retail sales, community demographics, etc. This information might be more detailed than what is available through the Census Bureau. Additionally, many economic development offices have personnel, classes or other sources to help you grow your business as one of their main goals is to build the economic development in their area.

4. Hire Business School Students to do a School Project or Internship

Contact your community college or nearby business school and see if you can offer an internship to their students or work with them on conducting market research for your company as part of a school project. The students would welcome the opportunity to do some real-time work (it looks great on their resume!) and you get a group of professionally trained marketers to do research at a minimal cost. Most schools will simply ask that you provide feedback on the students’ work, complete a survey or write up a review.

5. Share Your Database Insights with Other Companies

It’s likely you know other businesses that have a similar group of customers as yours. Consider swapping the information you’ve collected on your customers with the other company. If you are a bridal shop, a stationery shop or florist in your area might have similar customers. Share the number of transactions per day or the average ticket; this might help you decide if you need to beef up your customer interaction or suggestive selling techniques. Or share insights with another shop in a similar community as yours. You might find that the other shop does a strong business after 5 p.m., which might encourage you to try staying open later one or two nights a week.

Gathering market research is all well and good, but if you don’t do anything with that research, then it is a wasted practice. So before conducting any research, determine first your goals and objectives. Do you want to learn more about the economics of neighboring communities to determine where to place ads? Do you want to find out why and how often customers come into your store to brainstorm new ways to have them visit more often? Do you want to find out the reason most customers choose your shop over another (the answer might not be what you expected) so you can use that information to target more possible customers?

Conduct the research, take steps to use that research to improve your business and you’ll be one step closer to success.