Basic Concepts Of Marketing Research

Marketing Strategy & Plan

Marketing Strategy is a plan that enables an organization to make the best use of its resources to meet marketing objective Marketing Plan is a formal document that specifies the organizations resources, objectives, strategy and implementation and control efforts in marketing a specific product
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Marketing Concept & Research

Marketing Concept is an organizational philosophy that emphasizes determining customers needs first and then coordinating all activities to satisfy those needs Marketing Research is the set of techniques and principles for systemically collecting, recording, analyzing and interpreting data to aid marketing decision makers
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Basic Marketing Research Principles

Marketing Research has three principles or guidelines for generating information useful to managers:
Attend to the timeliness and relevance of research. Define research objectives carefully and clearly. Do not conduct research to support decisions already made
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Marketing research applications: basic or applied research

Basic research is conducted to generate or create knowledge Applied Research is conducted to solve a problem

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Marketing Research Process: Steps

Justify the need for marketing research. Define the research objective. Identify data needs. Identify data sources. Choose an appropriate research design and data collection method. Design the research instrument or form. Identify the sample. Collect data, including any relevant secondary data. Analyze and interpret the data. Present the research findings to decision makers 6 Mkt Research/ RNS/ VIT
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Types of Marketing Res.

Qualitative Research is the collection analysis, and interpretation of data that cannot be meaningfully quantified, that is, summarized in the form of numbers. Quantitative Research is the collection of data that involves larger, more representative respondent samples and the numerical calculation of results.
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(Types of Mktg. Res.).contd.

Descriptive Research is essentially to describe something; it is intended to generate data describing the composition and characteristics of relevant groups of units such as customers, sales people and market areas.

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(Types of Mktg. Res.).contd.

Exploratory Research helps investigators gain some initial insights and may pave the way for further research. Conclusive Research helps investigators verify insights and select the appropriate course of action.

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 Case Study Method: The Case study method is an-depth examination of a unit of interest. The unit can be a customer, store, salesperson, firm, market area, web-site and so on. By virtue of its insight-generating potential, the case study method is a useful form of exploratory research.
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Research project components a) Research purpose

Exploratory research

Conclusive research

General: to generate insights about a situation Vague Ill defined

Specific: to verify insights and aid in selecting a course of action Clear Well defined Usually structured

b) Data needs c) Data sources

d) Data collection form Open-ended, rough e) Sample

Relatively small; Relatively large; objectively subjectively selected to selected to permit maximize generalization of generalization of findings. insights. Flexible; no set Procedure Informal; typically nonquantitative Mkt Research/ RNS/ VIT
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f) Data collection g) Data analysis h) Inferences/

Rigid: well laid-out Procedure Formal; typically quantitative

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More final than tentative

Observational Method: The observational method involves human or mechanical observation of what people actually do or what events take place during a buying or consumption situation. Longitudinal Studies are repeated-measurement studies, that collect data over several periods in time.

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 Nominal Scale, numbers are no more than labels and are used solely to identify different categories of responses Ordinal Scale is more powerful than a nominal scale in that the numbers possess the property of rank order. Interval Scale has all the properties of an ordinal scale, and the differences between scale values can be meaningfully interpreted RATIO SCALE possesses all the properties of an interval scale, and the ratios of numbers on these scales have meaningful interpretations.
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SCALES

SCALE
FORCED-CHOICE SCALE does not give respondents the option to express a neutral or middle ground. NONFORCED-CHOICE SCALE gives respondents the option to express a neutral attitude. BALANCED SCALE has an equal number of positive/favorable and negative/unfavorable response choices. UNBALANCED SCALE has a larger number of response choices on the side of the scale where the overall attitude of the respondent sample is likely to fall.
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