Topic 9: Marketing Research

Question 1

Marketing analytics

Answer 1

involves tools and technologies used in making sound marketing decisions that lead to effective outcomes and return on marketing investment

Question 2

Marketing analytics process

Answer 2

. This process requires data collection and analysis from all channels in the physical and digital arenas, including big data, over a time span.

Question 3

The real value of marketing research and marketing information lies in

Answer 3

how they are used – in the customer insights they provide

Question 4

Customer insights groups

Answer 4

Customer insights groups collect customer and market information from a wide variety of sources – ranging from traditional marketing research studies, to mingling with and observing consumers, to monitoring consumer online conversations about the company and its products. Then, they use this information to develop important customer insights from which the company can create more value for its customers.

Question 5

marketing information system (MIS)

Answer 5

consists of people and procedures dedicated to assessing information needs, developing the needed information and helping decision makers use the information to generate and validate actionable customer and market insights.

Question 6

A marketing information system (MIS) process

Answer 6

First, it interacts with these information users to assess information needs. Next, it interacts with the marketing environment to develop needed information through internal company databases, marketing intelligence activities and marketing research. Finally, the MIS helps users to analyse and use the information to develop customer insights, make marketing decisions and manage customer relationships.

Question 7

Marketing research

Answer 7

is the systematic design, collection, analysis and reporting of data relevant to a specific marketing situation facing an organisation

Question 8

The marketing research process has four steps

Answer 8

(1) defining the problem and research objectives;
(2) developing the research plan;
(3) implementing the research plan; and
(4) interpreting and reporting the findings.

Question 9

A marketing research project might have one of three types of objectives

Answer 9

exploratory research
descriptive research
causal research

Question 10

objective of exploratory research

Answer 10

is to gather preliminary information that will help define the problem and to suggest hypotheses

Question 11

The objective of descriptive research

Answer 11

is to describe things, such as the market potential for a product or the demographics and attitudes of consumers who buy the product.

Question 12

The objective of causal research

Answer 12

is to test hypotheses about cause-and-effect relationships

Question 13

Developing the research plan

Answer 13

researchers must determine the exact information needed, develop a plan for gathering it efficiently and present the plan to management. The research plan outlines sources of existing data and spells out the specific research approaches, contact methods, sampling plans and instruments that researchers will use to gather new data.

Question 14

To meet the manager’s information needs, the research plan can call for gathering secondary data, primary data or both

Answer 14

Secondary data consists of information that already exists somewhere, having been collected for another purpose. Primary data consists of information collected for the specific purpose at hand.

Question 15

Primary data collection

Answer 15

They need to make sure the data will be relevant, accurate, current and unbiased. designing a plan for primary data collection calls for a number of decisions on research approaches, contact methods, sampling plan and research instruments

Question 16

Research approaches for gathering primary data include

Answer 16

observation, surveys and experiments.

Question 17

Contact methods

Answer 17

Information can be collected by mail, telephone, personal interview or online

Question 18

Sampling plan

Answer 18

is a segment of the population selected for marketing research to represent the population as a whole.

Question 19

In collecting primary data, marketing researchers have a choice of two main research instruments

Answer 19

the questionnaire and mechanical devices

Question 20

Mechanical instruments

Answer 20

Nielsen Media Research attaches people meters to television sets, cable boxes and satellite systems in selected homes to record who watches which programs. Retailers use checkout scanners to record shoppers’ purchases

Question 21

Implementing the research plan

Answer 21

The third step in the marketing research process (see Figure 4.2) is putting the marketing research plan into action. This involves collecting, processing and analysing the information

Question 22

Interpreting and reporting the findings

Answer 22

As the final step in the marketing research process, the market researcher must now interpret the findings, draw conclusions and report them to management

Question 23

Two major public policy and ethics issues in marketing research are

Answer 23

intrusions on consumer privacy and the misuse of research findings,

Question 24

Intrusions on consumer privacy

Answer 24

Increasing consumer privacy concerns have become a major problem for the marketing research industry. Companies face the challenge of unearthing valuable but potentially sensitive consumer data while also maintaining consumer trust. At the same time, consumers wrestle with the trade-offs between personalisation and privacy

Question 25

Misuse of research findings

Answer 25

Research studies can be powerful persuasion tools; companies often use study results as claims in their advertising and promotion. Today, however, many research studies appear to be little more than vehicles for pitching the sponsor’s products. In fact, in some cases, the research surveys appear to have been designed just to produce the intended effect