How to Use AI to Do Your Own Market Research for Free

You don’t need a $5,000 market research report

A decade ago, knowing what your customers wanted (and what your competitors were doing) cost serious money. You hired a research firm, waited six weeks, and got a PDF full of charts that were already out of date.

Now you can get most of that same intelligence in an afternoon, for free, using tools that are already on your browser.

This guide walks through three: Google Trends, Perplexity, and ChatGPT. None of them require a subscription. None require a research degree. And used together, they cover most of what a small business owner actually needs to know.

What “market research” actually means for a small business

Market research is just three questions dressed up in fancy language:

• Is there demand for what I’m selling?
• Who else is selling it?
• What do customers actually care about?

You don’t need 200 survey responses or a focus group in a room with a one-way mirror. You need enough signal to make a better decision than guessing. These tools give you that.

Step 1: Google Trends (does anyone actually search for this?)

Google Trends shows you how often people search for a term, where they’re searching from, and whether interest is growing or shrinking. It’s free, updated daily, and covers Australia specifically.

Go to trends.google.com and type in your product, service, or problem category. Set the region to Australia and the time range to the past 12 months.

A few things to look for:

• Trend direction: is interest rising, flat, or declining?
• Seasonality: are there spikes in certain months? This matters a lot for retail and trades.
• Related queries: scroll down and you’ll see what people search alongside your term. That’s your customer’s vocabulary, not yours.
• Regional interest: which states care most? If you’re in Victoria, knowing Queensland is underserved for your product is useful.

Try a few variations. “Bookkeeper near me” and “bookkeeping services Australia” will return different pictures. Compare terms side by side to see which has more search volume, then write your website copy and ads around the winner.

One thing Google Trends won’t give you: absolute numbers. The scale is relative (100 = peak interest). For actual search volumes you’d need Google Keyword Planner (free with a Google Ads account) or Ahrefs. But for directional research, Trends is enough.

Step 2: Perplexity (research your market like a journalist)

Perplexity is an AI search tool that answers questions with cited sources. Unlike ChatGPT, it pulls from the live web, so the information is current.

Go to perplexity.ai. The free tier is plenty for this.

Ask it the kinds of questions a journalist would ask before writing a story about your industry:

• “What are the main competitors for [your service] in Australia in 2025?”
• “What are Australian small businesses complaining about when it comes to [your problem]?”
• “What’s changed in [your industry] in the last two years?”
• “What do customers look for when choosing a [your business type] in Australia?”

Perplexity summarises its answers and shows the sources underneath. Click the sources. Read the actual articles. The AI summary is a starting point, not the research itself.

It’s particularly good for competitive research. Ask “Who are the top [industry] businesses in [city/state] and what do they charge?” and you’ll get a useful overview in two minutes. Cross-check any specific claims about prices, market sizes, or statistics, because AI tools can get numbers wrong.

Step 3: ChatGPT (where the thinking happens)

By this point you have two things: search trend data from Google, and competitive context from Perplexity. Now use ChatGPT to think through what it means for your business.

ChatGPT (free at chat.openai.com) is good at synthesis, scenario analysis, and helping you ask better questions. Its knowledge has a cutoff date, so don’t use it for competitor research or current statistics. That’s Perplexity’s job.

Here are four ways to use it:

• Paste in your Trends data and ask: “Interest in [X] peaks in September every year in Australia. What might explain this, and how should I plan my marketing around it?”
• Paste in your Perplexity findings and ask: “Based on this overview of my competitors, what gaps do you see that a small business could fill? What are they not doing well?”
• Build a customer profile: “My customers are [describe them]. What are their most common frustrations when buying [your product/service]? What questions do they have before purchasing?”
• Pressure-test your assumptions: “I’m thinking of launching [idea] in Australia. What could go wrong? What would I need to be true for this to work?”

Treat it like a smart colleague who reads a lot but doesn’t always know the latest news. Good for thinking, not for facts.

The 90-minute workflow

Here’s how to run a full research session:

1. Google Trends (20 min): search your main term and three or four variations. Check the last 12 months, Australia region. Note the trend direction, peak months, and top related queries.
2. Perplexity (40 min): ask 5–6 questions about your market, competitors, and customer pain points. Read the sources, not just the summaries. Copy the useful bits into a doc.
3. ChatGPT (30 min): paste everything in and ask it to help you find gaps, patterns, and risks. Finish with “what am I missing?”

By the end you’ll have a clear picture of whether the demand exists, who you’re up against, and what customers care about. That’s enough to make a proper call.

What this won’t tell you

It won’t replace talking to actual customers. Nothing does. Use this research to figure out what questions to ask, then pick up the phone.

It also won’t give you reliable market size numbers. If you need those for a bank or investor, you’ll need published reports (IBISWorld is the standard for Australian industry data, though it’s not free).

But for a small business deciding whether to add a new service, enter a new suburb, or change how they market themselves? This workflow is more than enough.

Sources

• Google Trends
• Perplexity AI
• ChatGPT (OpenAI)
• IBISWorld Australia — paid industry reports, referenced for completeness

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More step-by-step guides: How-To Guides for Australian Small Business — practical guides organised by the problem you’re trying to solve.