Marketing Research Kit For Dummies

Michael Hyman, Jeremy Sierra

• Verlag: For Dummies
• Jahr: 2010
• ISBN:
  9780470632567
• Auflage: 1
• Thema: Commerce
• Thema: Études marketing

The tools you need to identify, obtain, record, and analyze data

Sure, access to data is faster and easier to obtain than ever before, but how do you cut through the clutter of information to find what's most useful and organize it to suit your purposes? Marketing Research Kit For Dummies supplies a brimming box of tools that help you mine mountains of data, find the sources you need, and focus your marketing plan.

Whether you're an entrepreneur, a small business owner, or a marketer in a large organization, this powerful resource and companion CD provide you with hands-on tools you need to identify, obtain, record, and analyze secondary, data-electronic and print-for developing or revising a marketing plan, launching a new product or service, or implementing long-term strategic planning. It also offers clear, in-depth instructions and customizable forms for conducting your own primary research.

• Includes complete instructions for writing a research plan, conducting depth interviews, and focus groups
• Fully explains the process of sampling, analyzing data, and reporting results
• Features tips on developing questionnaires for face-to-face, Internet, and postal surveys
• Helps you keep an eye on your competition and analyze their results

When money is tight and everything is on the line, you need to make sure you've done your homework. You need Marketing Research Kit For Dummies.

Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.

Part I

Marketing Research: Learn It, Live It, Love It

In this part . . .

This part introduces you to marketing research and tells you how to begin the process of creating a research plan. In Chapters 1 through 3, we summarize the research process and the basic types of research you may conduct. In Chapter 4, we discuss the ethical do’s and don’ts for research doers and research consumers. Chapter 5 shows you how to choose, work with, and assess the efforts of marketing researchers you may hire.

Chapter 1

Seeing What Marketing Research Can Do for You

In This Chapter

Defining marketing research

Examining marketing information systems in context of marketing research

Reviewing problem-identification research and problem-solving research

Relating the product life cycle to your research needs

Identifying when it’s wise to conduct and avoid marketing research

Marketing research is more than those annoying people who call you during dinner to ask you a series of questions. It’s also more than those oddly cheerful people at the mall — with clipboard and pencil in hand — who want to ask you seemingly innumerable questions rather than let you shop.

Marketing research is about knowing, understanding, and evaluating. As human beings, we want to know what’s happening in our world and understand why those things are happening. We also want to identify the best choice from the alternatives available to us and then measure the success of that choice. Marketing research is both an intellectual and artistic activity. To solve marketing problems, you must obtain the necessary information and interpret it properly, which requires careful thought as well as creativity and artistry.

In this chapter, we define marketing research, compare it to marketing information systems, discuss when it should be pursued or avoided, detail its components, and explain its value in making informed and appropriate business decisions. This chapter gives you a better understanding of the systematic and objective nature of marketing research and how it can help you make better marketing-related decisions.

What Is Marketing Research?

Although professors and textbook authors have proposed many different definitions of marketing research, an appropriate and simple definition is this: Marketing research is the systematic and objective process of generating information to help you make marketing-related decisions. For a more comprehensive definition, it’s hard to go wrong with the latest one proposed by the American Marketing Association (AMA), the largest association of marketing practitioners and academicians in the world.

Although powerful, marketing researchers can’t replace managers. Think of it this way: A hammer can’t bang its own nail, and a computer can’t write its own report. Similarly, a marketing research study can’t make a decision for you or anyone else. The results of a marketing research study should be one of many inputs into a marketing-related decision. With the information in this book, you’ll better recognize the extent to which you should trust different kinds of research and which type of study you should use to make different marketing-related decisions.

Marketing research can be any of the following three things:

It can be fast, in the sense that it can be completed quickly.

It can be good, in the sense that the results can reflect reality accurately.

It can be cheap, in the sense that the researcher can choose a less costly design among comparable research designs.

Unfortunately, each research project can be only two of these three things. If a research project is good and fast, then it won’t be cheap. If it’s good and cheap, then it’s impossible to conduct it quickly. Finally, if it’s fast and cheap, then it’s unlikely to produce accurate findings.

The American Marketing Association (AMA) definition of marketing research

Every few years (or so it seems) the American Marketing Association (AMA) revises the definitions of key marketing terms. Recently, the AMA adopted the following definition of marketing research:

Marketing research is the function which links the consumer, customer, and the public to the marketer through information — information used to identify and define marketing opportunities and problems; generate, refine, and evaluate marketing actions; monitor marketing performance; and improve understanding of marketing as a process. Marketing research specifies the information required to address these issues; designs the method for collecting information; manages and implements the data collection process; analyzes the results; and communicates the findings and their implications.

The AMA definition highlights the continuous process of marketing research. Marketers must constantly seek the opinion and insight of their stakeholders. Without sound market data and analysis, it’s almost impossible to design effective products and marketing strategies that appeal to the needs and wants of targeted consumers. Sound marketing analysis is a byproduct of appropriate and timely data collection. Thus, trustworthy measurement bridges marketing research and effective business decisions.

Comparing Marketing Research to Marketing Information Systems

Differentiating marketing research from marketing information systems is essential because the data provided by each varies and the manner and context in which those data are used also vary.

Marketing information systems have four components:

Internal data: This type of data is generated from accounting records and data on sales, costs, and inventories. Because this type of data is organized according to accounting needs rather than according to marketing needs, it may be necessary to convert that data into a form that’s more readily suited to marketing purposes.

Marketing intelligence: This intelligence comprises observations and data from existing publications or companies, such as syndicated data services that are dedicated to providing such data. (We talk more about these sources in Chapter 13.) By observations we mean managers’ or business owners’ observations of and interactions with sales force members, distributors, suppliers, or other managers or co-owners.

An analytical system: This system is developed by marketing scientists who create empirical models meant to help managers make better decisions. Because such a system relies on sophisticated statistical methods and computer algorithms, the mangers who use one often don’t understand its inner workings. Fortunately, not understanding what’s under the hood is no more a problem for managers than it is for automobile drivers. Of course, most drivers must take their car to a mechanic when it breaks because they don’t know how to fix it; similarly, most managers must ask a marketing scientist to fix an analytical system that no longer produces useful information.

Marketing research: This is a component of the information system that’s triggered by observations or trends revealed by the ongoing data-collection process. For example, the first three components of a marketing information system may reveal a sales decline in one geographical region, but it’s unlikely they include the information needed to create marketing strategies and tactics to reverse that decline. However, a marketing study of consumers, retailers, and wholesalers may suggest the cause of the decline, which ...