Market Research Flashcards
What is primary research?
Data collected first-hand for a specific research purpose
What is secondary research?
Data that already exists and which has been collected for a different purpose
What are some examples of primary research?
- Focus groups
- Interviews
- Surveys/questionnaires
- Product trials
What are some examples of secondary research?
- Market reports
- Analytics
What are some advantages of primary research?
- Directly focused to research objectives - fit for purpose
- Generally up to date
- More detailed insights, mainly into customers views
What are some disadvantages of primary research?
- Very time consuming and often expensive to obtain
- Risk of survey bias - data may not be representative of the population
What are some advantages of secondary research?
- Often free and easy to obtain
- Good source of market insights
- Quick to access and use
What are some disadvantages of secondary research?
- Can quickly become out of date
- Not always tailored to specific research needs
- Specialist reports can be expensive
What is quantitative research?
- More concerned with data
- Answers questions like ‘how many?’ ‘How often?’ ‘Who?’ ‘When?’ And ‘where?’
- Larger samples used therefore it is more statistically valid
- Main methods of obtaining it are different types of surveys
- Ensures the research results reflect the whole population
What is qualitative research?
- Based on opinions, attitudes, beliefs and intentions
- Answers questions like ‘Why?’ ‘Would?’ Or ‘how?’
- Aims to understand why customers behave in a certain way or how they may respond to a new product
- Focus groups and interviews are common methods
What are the benefits of quantitative research?
- Data relatively easy to analyse
- Numerical data provides insights into relevant trends
- Can be compared with data from other sources
What are the drawbacks of quantitative data?
- Focuses on data rather than explaining why things happen
- Doesn’t explain the reasons behind numerical trends
- May lack reliability if sample size and method isn’t valid
What are the benefits of qualitative research?
- Essential for important new product development and launches
- Focuses on understanding needs and wants
- Highlights issues that need addressing
What are the drawbacks of qualitative research?
- Expensive to collect and analyse - requires specialist research skills
- Based around opinions - always at risk that the sample size isn’t representative
What is market segmentation?
Dividing a market into parts that reflect different customer needs and wants
What are the benefits of market segmentation?
- Focuses resources on parts of a market where the business can succeed
- Allows a business to grow share in markets
- Helps with new product development - focused on needs and wants of customers in the segment
- Helps make the marketing mix more effective - better targeting of promotion
What are the drawbacks of market segmentation?
- Data isn’t always available, up to date or reliable
- Even if the segment is identified, it doesn’t mean the customers are reached
- Markets are increasingly dynamic
What is market orientation?
Business responds to customer needs and wants and designs products accordingly
What is product orientation?
Business develops products based on what it is good at doing
