Consumer Insights (Market Research)

Dr D Sriram
Session Objective
✬ By the end of the session, students will be able to:
✦ Understand the importance of marketing research to identify customer
needs, assess consumption patterns and gauge emerging needs
✦ Learn the various marketing research methodologies and marketing
research process
✦ Synthesize learning through case discussion

Sriram D 1
Your thoughts…
✬ M/s Parle Agro recently launched Hazelnut Chocolate as the
fourth variant to its “Smoodh” milk shake lineup. After a month,
they have received complaints about the taste and some
reports of lumpiness in the milkshake. What is your PoA?

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Market Research
✬ What is market research?
✦ Marketing research is the systematic design, collection, analysis, and
reporting of data and findings relevant to a specific marketing situation
facing the company
✬ Why market research?
✦ To obtain insights about product performance, customer preferences &
perceptions,
✦ To explore a new phenomenon (e.g. customer behavior during pandemic)
✬ Who does market research?
✦ Organizations, market research firms, marketers, consumer behavior
researchers
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Types of Research
✬ Qualitative Research
✦ Many data collection protocols (e.g., interviews, observation)
✦ Data is primarily text (non-verbal communication is important too)
✦ Analysis methods are many (content analysis, sentiment analysis, natural
language processing)
✬ Quantitative Research
✦ Many research protocols (e.g., survey research, behavioral research,
experimental research)
✦ Data source (e.g., primary, secondary data)
✦ Predominantly data for analysis is numerical
✦ Numerous statistical techniques used to analyze data
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Qualitative Research
✬ Types of research
✦ Biography
✦ Ethnography, Netnography
✦ Phenomenology
✦ Focus Group Discussion (FGD)
✦ Grounded Theory
✬ Data collection methods
✦ Interviews (Structured, Semi-structured, Open)
✦ Observation (Participant, Non-participant)
✦ Text Analysis
✬ Points to consider
✦ Generalizability (difficult because of small samples)
✦ Resource heavy (cost & time)
✦ Good for exploring a phenomenon (exploratory research)
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Survey Research
✬ Survey research
✦ Problem Statement (Hypotheses)
✦ Questionnaire Design (should control measurement error, fundamental
laws, pretesting is essential)
✦ Sample Selection
⏀ Probability sampling (random)
⏀ Non probability sampling (convenience)
✦ Sample size
⏀ Sampling error
⏀ Sampling bias
⏀ Diminishing return of extra sample

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Experimental Research
✬ Manipulation of one or more variables to measure its effect on other
variables
✬ Controlling the environment / other variables
✬ Test Group vs Control Group
✬ Measure Results – Change in effect

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Behavioral research

✬ Assess purchasing behavior in store

✦ Scanner panel data
✦ Customer database analysis
✦ Social media research (Netnography)

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Quantitative research techniques
✬ Data collection
✦ Primary Data – Questionnaire
✦ Secondary Data – Published data, reports, transactions
✬ Popular MR techniques – Regression, Factor analysis, ANOVA
✬ Predicting customer behavior
✦ Logistic regression, multinomial logistic regression, text mining, structural
equation modeling
✬ Market / customer segmentation
✦ Cluster analysis, C.A.R.T., collaborative filtering
✬ New Product Development
✦ Conjoint analysis
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Market Research Process

DEFINE THE PROBLEM COLLECT INFORMATION PRESENT FINDINGS

DEVELOP RESEARCH
PLAN ANALYZE INFORMATION MAKE DECISIONS

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Market research process
✬ 1. Define the Problem
✦ Objective of the research
✦ Descriptive, Exploratory, Causal
✬ 2. Develop research plan
✦ Data sources (Primary, Secondary)
✦ Research Approaches
✬ 3. Collect information
✦ Data collection protocols (sampling, bias, ethics)

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Market research process
✬ Analyze information
✦ Sentiment analysis, text mining, coding & grouping
✦ Statistical methods (significance, explanatory power, generalizability)
✬ 5. Present findings
✦ Tabulation of results
✦ Reports
✬ 6. Make decisions
✦ Take appropriate decisions based on findings

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