Marketing research is needed by every marketer. Large business organizations have their own departments of marketing research. There are four steps in marketing research process.
In the first step the researcher and manager properly specify the problem and developing the research goals. The goals may be descriptive, exploratory or casual. The activity of building the research plan for obtaining data from primary and secondary resources is included in the second step.
Choosing the research approach, choosing a contact method, designing a sampling plan and developing a research instruments are covered in the primary data collection activity.
The collection, processing and analyzation of the information as a result of implementation of the marketing research plan are included in the third step.
The interpretation and reporting of the findings are included in the fourth step. More strict findings from the information are built by the marketing managers who perform further analysis of information in order to apply the information and gives advanced statistical procedures and models.
Some marketers deal with certain marketing research conditions like performing research in non-profit, small business or international situations. Smaller business organizations better perform marketing research because of their smaller budgets.
More challenging problems are faced by international marketing researchers as compared to domestic marketing researchers in spite of having the same steps. Main ethical issues and public policy surrounding marketing research should be understood by the business organizations.
Application and Uses of Research in Marketing
In all kinds of business organizations, decision making is critical process. This decision making needs the information that is acquired and collected through marketing research process.
This information may be related to competitors, customer business organizations or other environmental factors. Following are the main uses of marketing research in the business organizations.
- Marketing potential is measured through marketing research.
- Market share is analyzed through marketing research.
- Market features are determined through marketing research.
- Sales are analyzed through marketing research.
- Product testing is done through marketing research.
- Forecasting is done through marketing research.
- Business trends are studied through marketing research.
- The products of competitors are studied through marketing research.
Steps in Marketing Research Process
The nature of problem to be solved should first considered by the marketing researcher before it gives information to the manager. Following are the steps involved in the marketing research.
- – Specifying the problem and research objectives
- – Developing the marketing plan
- – Implementing the research plan
- – Interpreting and reporting the findings
These are discussing one by one here below:
(A) – Specification of Problem and Research Objectives
Specification of Problem and Research Objectives the first step in the marketing research process. The researcher and marketing manager should function closely together to specify the issue and agree on the research purposes. The marketing manager should have understanding of the marketing research so that he can assist in planning and interpretation of the research results.
The most difficult step in the marketing research process is to specify the problem and objectives of the research. The research objectives should be determined by the manager and researcher has specified the problem properly. Following are three common kinds of objectives.
Exploratory Research
In this research, the purpose is to collect preliminary information that will assist to properly specify the problems and propose hypothesis for their solution.
Descriptive Research
In descriptive research, the purpose is to identify things like potential of market for particular product or attitude or customers who purchase that product or demographics.
Casual Research
The hypothesis of cause and effect relationship is covered in the casual research.
The entire research process will be guided by the statement of issue and research purposes.
This is the best option to write the problem and research objectives in order to reach at an agreement and everybody understand the direction of effort of research.
(B) – Developing the Research Plan
In the second step of marketing research process, information required is decided along with the building the plan for collecting that information properly and presenting the plan to the management.
They plan points out particular research approaches, contact methods, sampling plans and tools that will be employed to collect data by the researcher.
Before the process of new data collection starts, the business organization should know what data already is already present. Following are the steps that are involved in developing the research plan.
Determine Particular Information Needs
Research purposes are translated into particular information requirements in this step. For example determining the economic, demographic and lifestyle features of target customers
Gathering Secondary Information
The information that is present somewhere else and has gathered for some other objective is consider as secondary data. Both internal and external sources are included in the secondary data sources.
Business organizations can purchase secondary data reports from outside suppliers, in other words commercial data resources.
Commercial online databases can be used to get information. Examples are Dialog, CompuServe and Lexis-Nexus. Most of these sources do not charge any cost. Secondary data includes following advantages.
- The required information might not present.
- The data might not be utilizable even it is found.
- Secondary information should be measured by the researcher in order to ensure that it is current, relevant, accurate and impartial. Although the secondary data is efficient beginning point but still the business organization should aim to gather primary data.
The information gathered for particular objective at hand is referred to as primary data. A number of decisions are made on the research approaches, contact methods, sampling plans and research tools through plan for primary data gathering.
Research Approaches:
Following types of research approaches can be used.
Observational Research
By observation of relevant actions, people and situations, information is obtained through observational research.
However, some things like attitudes, private behaviors, feeling and motives cannot be noticed. Single source data systems can provide mechanical observation.
In this regard, the electronic systems connect exposure of consumers to advertising, television and promotion with what they purchase in stores.
The information that people are unable or unwilling to provide can be obtained from observational research.
Survey Research
The collection of primary data by enquiring people questions about their attitudes, knowledge, buying behaviors and preferences.
Survey research is effective for obtaining descriptive information. Most widely used kind of primary data collection is the survey research. This research is flexible, which is its advantage.
However there are certain disadvantages attached with this research like the respondent provides inaccurate answers, unwilling to respond or not willing to give time for answers.
Experimental Research
Experimental research includes collection of primary data by choosing agreed groups, providing them various treatments, controlling relative components, and examining for variations in group responses.
Cause and effect relationships are are covered in this kind of research. In experimental research, surveys and observation can be utilized to gather information. For casual information this form of research is effective.
Contact Methods
In order to obtain the information, contact methods are utilized. Following are some of contact methods that are used.
Mail Questionnaires: Mail questionnaires are used to gather large portion of information at a minimize cost.
Telephone Interviewing: The information is gathered rapidly in telephone interviewing.
Personal Interviewing: It can take the form of group interviewing or personal interviewing.
A trained interviewer is present in focus group interviewing, who gather six to ten people for a few hours and make discussions about service, product or organization. Important issues are focused in the interview by the interviewer.
Online Marketing Research: It contains online focus groups or internet surveys. It is believed by many experts that online research will become most important instrument for marketing researchers.
Computer Interviewing: In the technology age, computer interviewing is the new method that is used. Questions are shown on the computer screen which is read by consumers in order to respond them.
Sampling Plans
In order to find how samples will be built and used, sampling plans are used to outline this. A part of population is used for market research to representing the whole population which is considered as sample.
Marketing researchers study only small part of the consumer population and on the basis of these they develop conclusions about larger part of population. Three decisions are included in designing a sample which is as follow
- How many people must be surveyed?
- Who is to be surveyed?
- How must the sample be selected?
Following are the two kinds of sampling.
Probability Samples: Every person of the population has equivalent opportunity to be selected in the sample. Moreover, sampling errors are limited as researcher measures those errors.
Non-probability Samples: In this type of sample, errors cannot be measured.
Research Instruments
The questionnaires and mechanical devices are two major research tools that are used by the marketing researcher in collection of primary data.
The most common tool is the questionnaire whether administered in person, online or by phone. There is flexibility in questionnaires and there are many methods of enquiring questions.
However before they are utilized on large scale, they should be properly established and tested. Several errors emerged when the questionnaires are not properly prepared.
It should be decided by the researcher that what kind of questions to be enquired before preparing the questionnaires. Frequently questions are excluded in questionnaires that should be answered and contains questions that cannot be answered, required not to be answered or will not to be answered.
Every question is monitored that either the question is relating towards the research purposes or not.
Response can be affected by each form of question. Open-end questions and closed-end questions are separated by the marketing researcher.
A closed-end question contains all possible subjects and answers that make options between them. Examples contain scale questions and multiple choice questions.
However in case of open-end question the respondents are free in provision of answers into their own wordings. As respondents are not limited in their answers, open end questions provide more information than closed end questions.
Open-end questions are particularly fruitful in case of exploratory research when the researcher struggle to determine what people think but not evaluating how many people think in particular manner. On the other hand closed-end questions give answers that are easy to tabulate and interpret.
Also care should be taken by the researchers in the ordering and wording of questions. They must use unbiased, simple and direct wordings. In logical order the questions must be arranged.
The question that makes interest should be asked first and those questions that are personal or difficult should be asked at last so that the respondent cannot feel defensiveness.
Mechanical tools are also utilized although questionnaires are most commonly used research tools. Examples of mechanical tools include supermarket scanners and people meters. The subject’s physical responses are measured by another kind of mechanical devices.
(C) – Implementing the Research Plan
In the research implementation step, marketing research plan is converted into action. In this step information is gathered, processed and analyzed. The staff of the business organizations or outside parties can conduct activity of data collection.
When the business organization utilizes its own staff for data collection then the organization has more control over data quality and data collection process. However, data collection activity can be performed effectively and at a lower cost by the outside organizations that are specialized in this regard.
The phase of data collection in marketing research process is highly expensive along with the high rate of occurrence of error in it.
The fieldwork of implementation of plan should closely and carefully monitored by the researcher in order to protect against issues contacting the respondents, with respondents who give dishonest or biased answer or with respondents who refuse to cooperate and with interviewers who takes shortcuts or make mistakes.
(D) – Interpreting and Reporting the Findings
The interpreting and reporting the findings is the final step in the marketing research process. Managers are kept from overwhelming fancy statistical techniques and numbers by the researcher.
The management makes decision making so researcher should present important findings in front of them. The only researcher should not perform the activity of interpretation.
Marketing managers can also deal with many problems. Interpretation is the significant activity in the marketing research process.
Although the research is effectively done but if the manager blindly accepts the interpretations from the researcher then the research will become unworthy.
The findings are interpreted, conclusions are drawn and reported to the management finally by the researcher. Managers are not overwhelmed by numbers or fancy statistical techniques by the researcher.
Rather researcher provides the proper findings to the management so that the management can perform their decision making more effectively.
However, the researcher only is not limited to make interpretations. The researchers are expert in the statistics and designing of research but managers understand more about the issues and decisions that should be performed.
Findings can be interpreted in various manners in many cases and discussions between manager and researcher will bring better interpretations.
The manager should also examine that the research project was performed effectively and that all the essential analysis was accomplished. In some cases the manager views the findings and can ask various questions that should be answered though further transferring of data.
At last it is the manager who determines that the research suggests what kind of action will be taken. The data can be presented to marketing manager directly by the researcher so that the marketing manager can do further analysis and tested new links on their own.
Interpretation is the significant part of marketing research process. The research is not effective, even if it is properly conducted, if the marketing managers blindly take faulty interpretations from the researcher.
Similarly managers are partial and they tend to take results which are according to their expectations and the mangers refuse to accept those results that they did not hope or expect.
So the researcher and marketing manager must perform closely together while interpreting the consequences of the interpretations and both should contribute responsibility the resulting decisions and the research process.
