A researcher is brought into a film to study a problem.

He starts designing a questionnaire to study the

problem on his very first day. He does not talk to managers to understand the issues at hand, and does
no background analysis to familiarize himself with the complexity of the problem. This researcher has
not performed a very important component of the research process, called the: situation analysis

In which of the following situation would you recommend conducting marketing research? The product
you are dealing with is a breakthrough product

A marketing research plays all the following roles in strategy development EXCEPT: overcoming
gatekeeper technologies

All the following are true about developing the sampling design and sample size, EXCEPT: in collecting
data, researchers use samples when the target population is small

Abraham, a researcher with AC Nielsen, is planning to conduct a research study. He wants to follow the
four stage approach to the research process. Which of the following activities should be called out as
part of executing the research design? Interpretation of the data to create knowledge

A national bank, established in 1952, is facing tough competition from an International bank established
in their locality recently. Their loyal customers are shifting to the new bank in large numbers. The
marketing manager is given the task of identifying reasons for this. He asked consumers to identify the
key differentiating factors and asked them the value they placed on these. He then asked them to
evaluate the new bank on the same parameters. What kind of analysis is the manager conducting?
Importance-performance analysis

Which of the following is an example of conducting research below professional standards? Interviewer
curbstoning

When low-carbohydrate diets gained popularity, a frozen food company known for its “heat-n-eat”
burgers ordered a marketing research study to find out if it could increase its sales by introducing a low-
carbohydrate burger. Which of the following functions of marketing research is carried out in this
example? Identification of marketing opportunities

Which of the following is NOT true about market analysis? It involves conducting benefit and lifestyle
studies that examine similarities and differences in consumers' needs.

Which of the following is NOT a part of target marketing? Identifying a new business opportunity

CHAPTER 1

Marketing Research for Managerial Decision Making

The Growing Complexity of Marketing Research

• Technology and growth of global business are increasing the complexity of marketing research
 • New data collection tools, including Twitter, clickstream tracking, and GPS, pose serious
questions in regard to consumer privacy

• Current variety of available tools and techniques makes choosing a method for a particular
research project increasingly challenging

• Marketing research is a systematic process

Tasks include:

• Designing methods for collecting information

• Managing the information collection process

• Analyzing and interpreting results

• Communicating findings to decision makers

Marketing Research – Links an organization to its market through the gathering of information

The Role and Value of Marketing Research

• Marketing research draws heavily on the social sciences both for methods and theory

• Marketing research methods:

– Are diverse

– Span a wide variety of qualitative and quantitative techniques

– Borrow from disciplines such as psychology, sociology, and anthropology

• Marketing research can be applied to a wide variety of problems involving the four Ps:

– Price

– Place

– Promotion

– Product

Marketing Research and Marketing Mix Variables

• Product - Product decisions are varied and include:

– New product development and introduction

– Branding

– Positioning products

• Perceptual mapping: Used to picture the relative position of products on two or more product
dimensions important to consumer purchase decisions

• Place/Distribution - Decisions include choosing and evaluating:

 – Locations

– Channels

– Distribution partners

• Retailing research: Focus on trade area analysis, store image/perception, in-store traffic
patterns, and location analysis

• Behavioral targeting: Displays ads at one website based on the user’s previous surfing behavior

• Shopper marketing: Marketing to consumers based on research of the entire process

consumers go through when making a purchase

• Promotion - Important influences on any company’s sales

– Essential that companies know how to obtain good returns from their promotional
budgets

• Most common research tasks in integrated marketing communications:

– Advertising effectiveness studies

– Attitudinal research

– Sales tracking

• Price - Pricing decisions involve:

– Pricing new products

– Establishing price levels in test marketing

– Modifying prices for existing products

• Marketing research provides answers:

– How large is the demand potential within the target market at various price levels?

• What are the sales forecasts at various price levels?

– How sensitive is demand to changes in price levels?

– Are there identifiable segments that have different price sensitivities?

– Are there opportunities to offer different price lines for different target markets?

Consumers and Markets – Segmentation Studies

• Major focuses of a marketing research project:

– Creating customer profiles

– Understanding behavioral characteristics

• Benefit and lifestyle studies: Examine similarities and differences in consumers’ needs
 – Researchers use these studies to identify two or more segments within the market for a
particular company’s products

• Marketers use ethnographic research

– To study consumer behavior as activities embedded in a cultural context and laden with
identity

– Requires extended observation of consumers in context

Marketing Theory

• Important to many businesses

– Can be useful in thinking business problems and opportunities

Types of Marketing Research Firms

• Internal or external

Organizational units that reside within a company

Benefits:

• Research method consistency

• Shared information across the company

• Lower research costs

• Ability to produce actionable research results

• External

• Perform all aspects of the research

Benefits:

• Objective suppliers

• Less subject to company politics and regulations

• Specialized talent for the same cost

• Greater flexibility in scheduling studies and specific project requirements

• Custom or standardized

Customized research firms: Provide tailored services for clients

Standardized research firms: Provide general results following a standard format so that results
of a study conducted for one client can be compared to norms
 - Syndicated business services: Services provided by standardized research
firms that include data made or developed from a common data pool or
database

• Brokers or facilitators

Changing Skills for a Changing Industry

• As marketing research firms expand, requirements for successfully executing marketing research
projects will change

• Top five skills:

– Ability to understand and interpret secondary data

– Presentation skills

– Foreign-language competency

– Negotiation skills

– Computer proficiency

Ethics in Marketing Research Practices

• Major sources of ethical issues are the interactions among the three key groups:

– Research information providers

– Research information users

– Respondents
Ethical Challenges in Marketing Research

Ethical Questions in General Business Practices

• Potential ethical pitfalls for research providers:

– Unethical pricing

– Unnecessary or unwarranted research services

– Client confidentiality issues

– Use of “black-box” methodologies

• Branded “black-box” methodologies: Offered by research firms that are

branded
 – Do not provide information about how the methodology works

Conducting Research Not Meeting Professional Standards

• Reasons:

– Fearful of losing the business entirely

– Client pressure to perform research to prove a predetermined conclusion

– Cost cutting

– Interviewers working for research firms may also engage in unethical behavior

• Curbstoning: Data collection personnel filling out surveys for fake respondents

Abuse of Respondents

• Potential ways to abuse respondents in marketing research:

– By not providing promised incentive to respondents for completing interviews or

questionnaires

– By stating that interviews are very short when in reality they may last an hour or more

– By using “fake” sponsors

• At the end of any study involving deception, subjects must be “debriefed” to explain deception

– Subject debriefing: Fully explaining to respondents any deception that was used during
research

• Sugging/frugging: Claiming that a survey is for research purposes and then asking for a sale or
donation

• De-anonymizing data: Combining different publicly available information, usually unethically, to

determine consumers’ identities, especially on the Internet

Unethical Activities of the Client/Research User

• Requesting detailed research proposals from several competing research providers with no
intention of actually selecting a firm to conduct the research

• Promising a prospective research provides a long-term relationship or additional projects in

order to obtain a very low price on the initial research project

• Overstating results of a marketing research project

Unethical Activities by the Respondent

• Providing dishonest answers

– Faking behavior
Marketing Research Codes of Ethics

• Marketing Research Society summarizes the central principles in ESOMAR’s code as follows:

– Conform to all national and international laws

– Behave ethically

– Be particularly careful with children and other vulnerable groups

– Ensure respondents are cooperating voluntarily and are well informed of risks

– Respect rights of respondents

– Protect personal data and use only for intended purpose

– Conduct projects with accuracy, transparency, objectivity, and quality

– Conform to principles of fair competition

Emerging Trends

• Increased emphasis on secondary data collection methods

• Movement toward technology-related data management

• Expanded use of digital technology for information acquisition and retrieval

• Broader international client base

• Movement beyond data analysis toward a data interpretation/information management

environment

Marketing Research in Action:

Continuing Case: The Santa Fe Grill

• What kind of information about products, services and customers should the owners of Santa Fe
Grill consider collecting?

• Is a research project actually needed?

– Is the best approach a survey of customers?

– Should employees also be surveyed?

– Why or why not?

CHAPTER 2

The Marketing Research process and proposals

Value of the Research Process

• Additional information is needed to make a decision or to solve a problem

 – Solution - Marketing research study based on a scientific research process

Changing View of the Marketing Research Process

• Organizations are increasingly confronted with new and complex challenges and opportunities

– Internet is the most influential factor

• Growing emphasis on:

– Secondary data: Information previously collected for some other problem or issue

– Primary data: Information collected for a current research problem or opportunity

Developments Affecting Marketing Decision Makers

• Large businesses link purchase data collected in-store and online with customer profiles already
in company databases

• Increased use of gatekeeper technologies as a means of protecting one’s privacy against

intrusive marketing practices

– Gatekeeper technologies: Technologies such as caller ID that are used to prevent

intrusive marketing practices such as by telemarketers and illegal scam artists

• Firms’ widespread expansion into global markets

• Marketing research is being repositioned in businesses to play a more important role in strategy
development

• Information research process: A systematic approach to collecting, analyzing, interpreting, and

transforming data into decision-making information

Determining the Need for Information Research

• Questions a decision maker should ask:

– Can the problem and/or opportunity be resolved using existing information and
managerial judgment?

– Is adequate information available within the company’s internal record systems to

address the problem?

– Is there enough time to conduct the necessary research before the final managerial
decision must be made?

– Do the benefits of having the additional information outweigh the costs of gathering the
information?

– Will the research provide useful feedback for decision making?

– Will this research give our competitors too much information about our marketing
strategy?
Situations When Marketing Research Might not be Needed

Overview of the Research Process

• Phases of the research process are guided by the scientific method

– Scientific method: Research procedures should be logical, objective, systematic,

reliable, and valid

The Four Phases of the Information Research Process

Transforming Data into Knowledge

• Knowledge: Information becomes knowledge when someone, either the researcher or the
decision maker, interprets the data and attaches meaning
Phases and Steps in the Information Research Process

Relevant Key Terms in the Information Research Process

Iceberg principle Decision makers are aware of only 10 percent of the

true problem

Situation analysis Gathers and synthesizes background information to

familiarize the researcher with the overall complexity
of the problem

Unit of analysis Specifies whether data should be collected about

individuals, households, organizations, departments,
geographical areas, or some combination

Exploratory research Generates insights that will help define the problem
situation confronting the researcher or improves the
understanding of consumer motivations, attitudes,
and behavior that are not easy to access using other
research methods

Descriptive research Collects quantitative data to answer research

questions such as who, what, when, where, and how

Causal research Collects data that enables decision makers to

determine cause-and-effect relationships between
two or more variables

Target population The population from which the researcher wants to

collect data

Census The researcher attempts to question or observe all the

members of a defined target population

Sample A small number of members of the target population

from which the researcher collects data
The Iceberg Principle

Develop a Research Proposal

• Research proposal: Document that provides an overview of the proposed research and
methodology

– Serves as a written contract between the decision maker and the researcher
General Outline of a Research Proposal
Marketing Research in Action:
What Does a Research Proposal Look Like?

• If a proposal is accepted, will it achieve the objectives of management?

• Is the target population being interviewed the appropriate one?

• Are there other questions that should be asked in the project?