You need Discovery if you answer “yes” to the following important questions:

• “haven’t decided yet”;
• “We want to promote everything”;
• “We don’t know who our best customer is”;
• “We don’t know which product is a priority”;
• “We don’t know where we want to end up”;
• “We don’t know whether we need B2B or B2C”;
• “The partners have different perspectives”;
• “We haven’t decided on our sales channels yet—it seems like our customers are on LinkedIn, but all our competitors are on Instagram”;
• “Let’s do the marketing first, and then we’ll see”;
• “We want more customers, but we don’t know what kind”;
• “We don’t know how many additional orders we can fulfill.”

In this situation, it is too early to launch a large-scale demand study.

First, we need to determine exactly what we plan to develop and what business outcome we’re aiming for.

You can move on to the Demand Map without going through Discovery if the business owner can already answer the following questions clearly enough.

1. What exactly do we sell?

Not just a general “company services,” but specifically:

• main products or services;
• which of them are actually ready for sale;
• which areas are not yet priorities.

2. Which of these does the business want to promote first and foremost?

For example:

• one main product;
• 2–3 priority services;
• a specific B2B sector;
• a new market;
• a separate product for scaling.

You don’t necessarily need to know what’s most searched for on Google. That’s exactly what we’re going to investigate.

But businesses need to understand that selling is strategically important for them.

3. Who is the most desirable customer for a business?

There is no need for a ready-made marketing segmentation.

It is enough to understand this, at least on a hypothetical level:

• B2B or B2C;
• an individual or a company;
• company size;
• industry;
• the role of the decision-maker;
• a local, Ukrainian, or international client.

4. What business goal should you aim to achieve in the next 6–12 months?

For example:

• increase the number of corporate clients;
• to ramp up production;
• expand into a new region;
• launch a new product;
• increase the share of more profitable orders;
• reduce reliance on recommendations or a single advertising channel;
• Establish a steady stream of B2B inquiries.

“I want more sales” is too general of an answer.

5. Which products or customers are most valuable to the business?

It is advisable for the owner to have at least a general understanding of:

• where the average check is higher;
• where profitability is higher;
• who are more likely to make repeat purchases;
• which customers stay for a long time;
• that it is most profitable for a business to scale up.

Precise financial data is not required, but priorities must be clear.

6. How much additional demand can the business handle?

It’s important to understand:

• whether there are manufacturing or service facilities;
• Will there be enough staff?;
• how many new customers can be accepted;
• Are there any regional restrictions?;
• Is it possible to scale up the execution?

There’s no point in designing a system for 100 new customers if the business can physically handle only 10 more.

7. How are sales going right now?

You need to know at least the basics:

• who receives the request;
• who is selling;
• how quickly they respond;
• how a consultation or estimate is conducted;
• What is the typical transaction cycle?;
• What happens after a lead is received.

Demand Map can improve the digital customer journey, but it cannot replace a missing internal sales process.

8. Which area of geography is truly a priority?

For example:

• Kyiv;
• All of Ukraine;
• certain regions;
• Poland;
• Germany;
• EU;
• specific international markets.

There’s no point in researching “the whole world” if the company is really only prepared to work with three countries.

9. What have you already tried in marketing?

Important to know:

• whether there was any SEO;
• Google Ads;
• Meta Ads;
• SMM;
• email;
• LinkedIn;
• exhibitions;
• cold calls;
• partners;
• Recommendations.

And most importantly—what more or less worked, and what didn’t.

This helps ensure that the system isn’t designed in a vacuum.

10. What digital assets are already available?

For example:

• website;
• domain;
• Google Business Profile;
• social media;
• CRM;
• customer base;
• email database;
• photo;
• video;
• cases;
• reviews;
• presentations;
• analytics;
• advertising offices.

11. What are the actual limitations?

For example:

• budget;
• team;
• production capacity;
• lack of content;
• legal restrictions;
• seasonality;
• a complex product;
• long sales cycle;
• dependence on the owner;
• the inability to quickly make changes to the website.

12. What is the approximate amount of resources the business is willing to invest in the project?

You don’t need to know the exact media plan just yet.

But there needs to be an understanding of the budget process.

For example:

• are only willing to develop SEO gradually;
• are willing to invest in advertising;
• ready for a 90-day launch;
• we can fund new pages, content, and external promotion;
• For now, all we can do is draw up a plan and implement it step by step.

This affects what kind of system it makes sense to design in the first place.

13. Who makes the decisions?

It should be clear that:

• Who sets the priorities;
• who approves the budget;
• who can provide business information;
• Who is responsible for implementation on the client’s side?

What a Business Owner DOESN’T Need to Know Before Using Demand Map

You don’t need to prepare it yourself:

• semantic core;
• list of keywords;
• clustering;
• search demand analysis;
• a map of competitors;
• The website’s SEO structure;
• a list of upcoming pages;
• content plan;
• the structure of Google Ads;
• selection of marketing channels;
• customer journey;
• search intent map.

This is precisely what forms part of the professional research and design of the Demand Map.