AM35 Marketing Research Notes

• Philip Kotler: “Marketing Research is the systematic problem analysis, model

building and fact finding for the purpose of improved decision making and control in
the marketing of goods and services.”

• A marketing information system consists of people, equipment, and procedures to

gather, sort, analyse, evaluate, and distribute needed, timely, and accurate
information to marketing decision-makers.

• Formulation of a research problem means to state the problem in a way that is

researchable. It means to shape the research topic in a manner that it becomes
ready for scientific investigation. A research problem is simply the research topic.

• A research proposal is a simply a structured, formal document that explains what

you plan to research, why it's worth researching, and how you plan to investigate it.
The research proposal is your chance to explain the significance of your project to
organizations who might wish to fund or otherwise support it.

• A population is the entire group that you want to draw conclusions about. A sample
is the specific group that you will collect data from. The size of the sample is always
less than the total size of the population.

• Primary data refers to the first-hand data gathered by the researcher

himself. Secondary data means data collected by someone else earlier.

• The research design refers to the overall strategy that you choose to integrate the
different components of the study in a coherent and logical way, thereby, ensuring
you will effectively address the research problem; it constitutes the blueprint for the
collection, measurement, and analysis of data.

• Qualitative research involves collecting and analyzing non-numerical data (e.g., text,
video, or audio) to understand concepts, opinions, or experiences. It can be used to
gather in-depth insights into a problem or generate new ideas for research.

• Research reports are recorded data prepared by researchers or statisticians after

analyzing information gathered by conducting organized research, typically in the
form of surveys or qualitative methods.

• The practice of spying or using spies to obtain information about the plans and
activities especially of a competing company is corporate espionage.

• A research report is typically made up of three main divisions: (i) Preliminary pages,
(ii) Body of report, and (iii) Supplementary pages.
• According to John D.C. Little, MDSS is related to data collection and analysis,
techniques and procedures that also includes related software and hardware which
an organization uses to collect and interpret required information from the
environment and utilize that information for marketing decisions.

• A marketing information system (MkIS) is a set of procedures, frameworks and

technology for the continuous gathering of information that might affect the
promotion and selling of a product or service.

• Factor analysis is a technique that is used to reduce a large number of variables into
fewer numbers of factors. This technique extracts maximum common variance from
all variables and puts them into a common score.

• Conjoint analysis is a statistical analysis and marketing research technique to

measure what consumers value most about your products and services. For
example, a TV manufacturer would want to know if customers value picture or
sound quality more, or if they value low price more than picture quality.

• The objective of cluster analysis is to assign observations to groups so that

observations within each group are similar to one another with respect to variables
or attributes of interest, and the groups them- selves stand apart from one another.

• Multidimensional scaling (MDS) is a series of techniques that helps the analyst to

identify key dimensions underlying respondents' evaluations of objects. It is often
used in Marketing to identify key dimensions underlying customer evaluations of
products, services or companies.

• Sales forecasting is the process of estimating future revenue by predicting the

amount of product or services a sales unit (which can be an individual salesperson, a
sales team, or a company) will sell in the next week, month, quarter, or year.

• Trend analysis is a methodology used in research to gather and study data for
prediction-making about future customer behavior based on the analysis of
observed and recorded data from past and ongoing trends.

• Data mining is the process of sorting through large data sets to identify patterns and
relationships that can help solve business problems through data analysis. Data
mining techniques and tools enable enterprises to predict future trends and make
more-informed business decisions.
• A consumer panel is a group of individuals selected by a business or organization to
provide input and opinion on products and services for research on consumer
behaviour. Panel members are chosen to be representative of the general
population or a target group.

• reposition strategy where you look to adjust or update (not completely change) your
brand's identity which can include your associations, core message, personality, and
status to meet the market needs.

• A go-to-market strategy (GTM) is the planning and preparation for introducing a

new product or service to a market. This checklist will put you in a position to
capitalize on your launch and reach product-market fit.

• TRP is a device that signifies a show's success on tv screens. It's being used to
evaluate which program has been most viewed on tv screens. TRP provides a
measure of people's interests and indicates a specific.

• Market potential is the total number of potential customers in a particular

market. However, market demand is the actual demand for the product in the
market.

• A moving average is a calculation used to analyze data points by creating a series of

averages of different subsets of the full data set.

• Steps involve in the new product development

• Stage 1: Idea Generation.
• Stage 2: Idea Screening.
• Stage 3: Concept Development & Testing.
• Stage 4: Market Strategy/Business Analysis.
• Stage 5: Product Development.
• Stage 6: Deployment.
• Stage 7: Market Entry/Commercialization.

• Research in media focuses on the communication process and examines the

relationships among the media organizations and the target audience. Media
research focus is on the social and psychological aspects and effects of the different
mass media.

• International marketing research is the systematic design, collection, recording,

analysis, interpretation, and reporting of information pertinent to a particular
marketing decision facing a company operating internationally.
• Methods of Data collection
• Questionnaire and Surveys, Interviews, Focus Groups, Direct Observation,
Documents

• What is the different type of research? Discuss type of research with suitable
examples.
1. Exploratory Research - Exploratory research is a methodology approach that
investigates research questions that have not previously been studied in
depth. Exploratory research is often qualitative in nature.
2. Descriptive research - aims to accurately and systematically describe a
population, situation or phenomenon. It can answer what, where, when and
how questions, but not why questions. A descriptive research design can use
a wide variety of research methods to investigate one or more variables.
3. Causal research - can be defined as a research method that is used to
determine the cause-and-effect relationship between two variables. This
research is used mainly to identify the cause of the given behaviour.
4. Qualitative - Qualitative research involves collecting and analyzing non-
numerical data to understand concepts, opinions, or experiences. It can be
used to gather in-depth insights into a problem or generate new ideas for
research.
5. Quantitative research - is a systematic investigation of phenomena by
gathering quantifiable data and performing statistical, mathematical, or
computational techniques.

• Explain the scope and objective of Marketing Research

➢ Scope of Marketing Research
1. Product Research
2. Price Research
3. Advertising Research /Promotion Research
4. Distribution Research
5. Sales Research (Sales Analysis, Sales Methods and Policies)
➢ Marketing Research Objectives
6. To Know the Buyers
7. To Measure the Impact of Promotional Efforts
8. To Know Consumer Response
9. To Know Market Costs and Profits
10. To Master the External Forces
11. To Design and Implement Marketing Control
 • Why Marketing Research is important? Also state the limitation of marketing
research?
➢ Importance of Marketing Research
1. Decision Making
2. Management Planning
3. Problem Solving
4. Control technique
5. Large Scale production
6. Helps with dealing with complex market
7. Pattern Consumption
8. Suitable Market Options
9. Marketing Strategy
10. Operating Managerial Function
➢ limitation of marketing research

• What is MDSS? Explain the advantage and disadvantage of MDSS.

➢ According to John D.C. Little, MDSS is related to data collection and analysis,
techniques and procedures that also includes related software and hardware which
an organization uses to collect and interpret required information from the
environment and utilize that information for marketing decisions.
➢ Advantages: -
1. Improves efficiency and speed of decision-making activities.
2. Increases the control, competitiveness and capability of futuristic decision-making of the
organization.
3. Facilitates interpersonal communication.
4. Encourages learning or training.
5. Since it is mostly used in non-programmed decisions, it reveals new approaches and sets
up new evidences for an unusual decision and Helps automate managerial processes.
➢ Disadvantage
1. difficult to understand
2. Limited Information Sharing
3. Require Extensive Knowledge
4. Slow

• State the different component of component of MkIS.

• Outline the different steps of marketing research proposal

• Discuss the code of ethics in research

1. Ethics are the set of rules that govern our expectations of our own and others’
behaviour.
2. Research ethics are the set of ethical guidelines that guides us on how scientific
research should be conducted and disseminated.
3. Research ethics govern the standards of conduct for scientific researchers It is the
guideline for responsibly conducting the research.
4. Research that implicates human subjects or contributors’ rears distinctive and
multifaceted ethical, legitimate, communal and administrative concerns.

• Discuss the procedure of conjoint analysis with example.

▪ Conjoint analysis is a form of statistical analysis that firms use in market research
to understand how customers value different components or features of their
products or services. It’s based on the principle that any product can be broken
down into a set of attributes that ultimately impact users’ perceived value of an
item or service.
▪ The central idea is that consumers evaluate different characteristics of a product
and decide which are more relevant to them for any purchase decision.
▪ In this conjoint study example, we’ll assume the product is a mobile phone. The
competitors are Apple, Samsung, and Google. The organization needs to
understand how different customers value attributes, such as brand, price,
screen size, and screen resolution. Armed with this information, they can create
their product range to match consumer preferences.

• Write the steps involved in the process of advertising research.

1. SWOT Analysis: in the first step, the company should discuss on the new product
briefly and do the SWOT analysis.
2. Determine the Objective: What message should be delivered through the upcoming
campaign? The answer to this question is determined at this stage.
3. Market Research: The actual market research begins here. Information about
market behaviour, current trends, competitors, consumers’ response on an
existing/relevant product, availability of resources, etc, is collected and analysed.
4. Identify the Target Audience: Here, extensive research is done to determine the
target audience that are likely to buy the new product.
5. Choosing the Right Media: Identify the right platform to promote the products so
that information to the target customers is reached in the right and effective
manner.
6. Deciding on the Budget: Based on the above steps, the advertising budget is planned
at this step. Also, the availability of funds and the profit to be generated is also
estimated here.
7. Designing the Ad: Here, a creative ad is created on paper by the copywriters with a
meaningful story. Further, the actual creation of the ad is done by the art directors.
The ad is redefined and polished several times to bring out the best.
 8. Launch Date & Time: Based on the market research, the date, time and place of the
launch is decided.
9. Actual Launch: Finally, the product is launched as and when decided.
10. Performance Assessment: After the product is launched, the last step is to analyse
the performance of the campaign in terms of awareness, reach, lead generation,
customer acquisition, sales, and profits earned.

5 Marks

• Role of Information in Marketing Decision

1. Gaining Operational Excellence

2. Developing the new products, Services, and Business Model
3. Customer/Supplier Intimacy (Habit)
4. Improved Decision Making
5. Achieving Competitive Advantage
6. Day to Day Survival