Vietnam is an attractive market for Japanese companies looking to enter or expand their businesses, supported by a young population of around 100 million people and a growing consumer market. Recently, there has also been an increase in inquiries from Japanese companies considering market entry through partnerships, investments, and M&A with local Vietnamese companies.

At the same time, there are many cases where difficulties at the preliminary market research stage affect subsequent processes such as partner selection and investment decisions, ultimately forcing companies to reconsider their entire business plan.

This article examines five common failure patterns frequently seen in Vietnam market research, explaining why each occurs and how to avoid it.

Why Is Vietnam Market Research Prone to Failure?

There are several structural factors that make market research in Vietnam challenging. First, the availability of official statistics published by the Vietnamese government and industry organizations is not as well-developed or systematically organized as in Japan, and detailed data by industry and region are still lacking in many areas. In addition, consumer behavior differs significantly between urban and rural areas, and because economic growth is progressing rapidly, it is not uncommon for reports from just a few years ago to already diverge from the current market reality.

Furthermore, informal channels, such as individual shops and sales through social media, still account for a significant share of retail and distribution activity, making it difficult to capture the full picture of the market based solely on publicly available information.

In such an environment, simply applying the same approach used for market research in Japan can result in business plans moving forward without sufficiently accurate information for decision-making. The following sections examine these specific failure patterns.

Failure ①: Drawing Conclusions from Secondary Data Alone in Vietnam Market Research

Public statistics and existing industry reports are useful for gaining an initial understanding of the market, but they have limitations in terms of update frequency and level of detail. In Vietnam in particular, there is often a time lag before statistics are reflected, and in some industries, regional data are extremely limited. As a result, relying solely on secondary data to assess market demand or the competitive landscape can cause plans to move forward based on assumptions that differ from the actual market situation.

To avoid this failure, it is essential to incorporate a process of validating hypotheses developed through desk research using primary information, such as local interviews, store observations, and simple quantitative surveys. It is useful to establish from the outset that secondary data are primarily “inputs for developing hypotheses,” rather than “evidence for reaching conclusions.”

Failure ②: Applying Urban Trends to the National Market

In Vietnam market research, data tend to be biased toward the two major cities of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City because information is more readily available there. It is true that urban areas represent major markets for Japanese companies. However, there are significant differences in income levels, purchasing behavior, and decision-making processes between these two cities and regional cities and rural areas. Applying urban trends directly to the entire country can therefore lead to an overestimation of market demand.

An effective way to address this issue is to clearly define “which regions are being targeted” at the initial stage of the research and prepare different research designs for urban and regional areas, including differences in respondent profiles and interview topics. The more a company considers nationwide expansion, the more its research design needs to take regional differences into account, as these differences can significantly affect the accuracy of the results.

Failure ③: Commissioning Vietnam Market Research Without Clearly Defining the Purpose

When a company commissions a research firm with only a vague objective such as “we want to understand the market situation,” it can easily end up with a report that is comprehensive in content but difficult to apply to actual decision-making. Research should fundamentally be designed not by working backward from “what should we investigate,” but from “what decision do we need to make based on the results?”

For example, whether the research is intended to support a decision on whether to enter the market or to narrow down potential partners will result in completely different levels of data detail and research methodologies. Before commissioning the research, clearly articulating internally which decisions the company intends to make using the research results is the first critical point that determines the quality of the research.

Failure ④: Applying a Successful Japanese Business Model Directly to the Vietnamese Market

There are also many cases where companies attempt to transfer a business model that has succeeded in Japan or another country to Vietnam without sufficiently examining differences in pricing, distribution structures, and the regulatory environment. For example, a pricing strategy that was effective in Japan may not be accepted in Vietnam as-is due to differences in disposable income levels and purchasing habits.

Such failures can be more easily avoided by identifying the “underlying assumptions of the company’s business model” during the research stage and then individually testing whether each assumption holds true in the Vietnamese market. Using a successful business model as a reference can be effective, but simply transferring the conclusion without considering differences in the underlying assumptions increases the risk of misjudging demand.

Failure ⑤: Considering Vietnam Market Research Complete After Researching Only with AI

By asking generative AI questions, companies can quickly obtain organized information on market overviews and basic statistics. However, in the Vietnamese market, where information asymmetry is significant, AI responses may remain little more than a compilation of publicly available data and may not sufficiently reflect delays in information updates or the actual conditions in regional and informal sectors. If this is not properly verified and the information is used as a basis for decision-making, plans may proceed while remaining disconnected from the actual market situation.

AI is highly effective as a tool for organizing key issues and developing hypotheses during the initial stages. However, rather than treating its responses as conclusions in themselves, companies need to incorporate an additional step into the research process to validate them against local primary information and expert insights.

3 Perspectives for Avoiding Failure in Vietnam Market Research

The five failures discussed above all stem from proceeding without clearly defining the sources of information and the purpose of the research. There are three major points that should be organized before starting.

First, define in advance which decisions the research results will be used to support.

Second, combine secondary data and primary information, as well as urban and regional data, to design the research without relying on a single source of information.

Third, clearly define the respective roles of efficiency-enhancing tools, including AI: use them during the hypothesis-building stage, while ensuring that the final decision-making inputs are validated against actual conditions on the ground.

Comparison of Market Research methods in Vietnam

Source: B&Company

Which methods should actually be combined will vary depending on the research objective. The characteristics of representative methods are summarized below. Rather than trying to reach conclusions using a single method, combining these methods according to the research objective can also help prevent both Failure ① (overreliance on secondary data) and Failure ② (bias toward urban data) at the same time. Simply keeping these three points and the perspective of method selection in mind can significantly improve both the accuracy of the research and the reliability of subsequent decision-making.

Conclusion: How to Make Vietnam Market Research Successful

Many failures in Vietnam market research stem not from the means of collecting information themselves, but from how the research objectives are defined and how different information sources are combined. Secondary data, urban data, a company’s past business models, and AI-generated responses can all be useful inputs when used individually, but using them as the basis for conclusions without understanding their respective limitations can become a source of failure.

For areas where it is difficult to make a judgment internally, seeking insights from experts with an understanding of actual local market conditions is also one option for ensuring the accuracy of the decision-making process.

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