AI Market Research by Phone: How to Learn Stock, Prices and Demand From Companies

What phone-based market research is

It's calling companies with a short questionnaire: what do you sell, what's in stock, at what price, what lead times, who's your supplier. Call center operators used to do this. Now an AI agent can make the first touch, and a person gets a table of answers, recordings and transcripts.

There's a market for this: research agencies have sold phone surveys of companies for years, and AI surveys are now offered as a separate service, pitched as much cheaper than a call center.

What we collected on our own calls

Our campaign was about sales, not research. But the agent recorded everything clients said about the market. The result: 472 facts from 190 companies: 235 from the UAE, 177 from Venezuela, the rest from South Africa and Mexico.

Most came from calls (394 facts), the rest from WhatsApp. Each fact is tied to a company, a date and a quote, so it can be checked against the recording.

Why prices rarely come up

Companies named a specific price for a model in only eight cases. And that's not unique to our industry. When Google tested AI calls to businesses to ask about prices, about a third of businesses didn't pick up, and 48% of those who did wouldn't name a price (CXM World).

Our practical takeaway: don't make price the main question. We even removed questions about the client's price from the script, because on a sales call they annoyed people. In research you can ask about price, but have a backup plan.

How to build phone-based research

1. Define what counts as an answer. “Named stock and lead time” is an answer. “Call back later” isn't. Both the report and the billing depend on this.
2. Start with easy questions. What's in stock, which models get asked for most, what volume. People answer these willingly.
3. Ask about price as a range or through terms. “Is it closer to X or to Y?” “Is that price with delivery or without?” That's easier to answer than naming a number.
4. Record the quote. Every number in the report should link to a call recording.
5. Don't promise a response rate up front. It depends on the country, industry and list. The honest move is to show it after the first 100 calls.
6. Check conclusions by hand. The agent is good at collecting answers, but a person draws conclusions about the market.

Where it's useful

• Before entering a market. Who buys, what they ask for, which volumes and ports.
• Stock monitoring. What distributors have right now.
• List validation. Along the way you learn who on the list is your customer and who isn't. For us, “we don't import” and “Chinese brands aren't our segment” became filters for the next waves.

FAQ

Why is an AI phone survey better than an email questionnaire?

Hardly anyone answers an email. On the phone, a company answers right away, and you can ask a follow-up question in the moment. In our campaign, 46% of the companies we called had a conversation longer than 20 seconds.

Will people tell a robot the truth?

Usually the same thing they'd tell any stranger on the phone. Facts about stock, models and volumes, gladly; prices, rarely. That's why verification matters: every number in the report is checked against the recording.

How much does this kind of research cost with you?

Pricing is on request: it depends on the country, the number of companies and the questionnaire. Write to us through the form on the home page.