MARKETING RESEARCH

Samir K Mahajan

NATURE OF MARKETING RESEARCH

Marketing research is a systematic and objective process of identifying and formulating the marketing problems, setting research objectives and methods for collecting, tabulating, evaluating, analysing, interpreting the data in order to find justified solutions for these problems.

The nature of marketing research cannot be properly understood without knowing the meaning of market research. Market research is the gathering, recording and analysing of market data to identify the present and potential customers and their motives and buying habits. It is worthwhile to quote Richard D. Crips to identify clearly the scope of Marketing research and market research. “Marketing research is the systematic, objective and exhaustive search for the study of the facts relevant to any problem in the field of marketing. Market research is restricted to the study of actual and potential buyers, their location, their actual and potential value of purchases and their motives and habits.” Market research may be conducted for the following reasons: o  To identify the present and potential customers and their needs.o To forecast the demand of a product.o To determine customers preferences with regard to packaging, design, size, price and other features of a product.o To locate the demand for products with regard to time and place, such as festival demand.o To explore new markets for existing products.

BRANCHES / AREAS / SCOPE OF MARKETING RESEARCH

 Marketing research specifies the information required to address these issues, design the method for collecting information, manages and implements the data collection process, analyses the result and communicates the findings and their implications. Marketing research covers different aspects of marketing of goods, services and ideas. There are many areas of marketing management where marketing research has special branches.

Product Research: Product research is associated with the conversion of customer needs into tangible product offer. This includes development and testing of new products, improving the existing products, and a tab on the changing customer preferences, habits, tastes, etc. Packaging design, branding, and labelling decisions are also included here.

Customer Research: Consumer research studies consumer behaviour. It studies the consumers needs, wants, likes, dislikes, attitude, age, sex, income, location; buying motives, etc. This data is used to take decisions about the product, its price, place and promotion. This research type includes investigation into the customer buying behaviour – the economic, social, cultural, personal and psychological influences.

Sales Research: Sales research involves decisions concerning selection of store location, channels, territories, sales force motivation and compensation, etc. The purpose is to reach the target customer more effectively, efficiently and timely. Sales research studies the selling activities of the company. It studies the sales outlets, sales territories, sales forecasting, sales trends, sales methods, effectiveness of the sales force, etc.

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Promotion Research: Promotion research encompasses all efforts by the marketers to communicate the company’s offer. This includes advertising, publicity, public relations, sales promotion, etc.

Packaging Research: Packaging research is a part of product research. It studies the package of the product. It improves the quality of the package. It makes the package more attractive. It makes the package more convenient for the consumers. It reduces the cost of packaging. It selects a suitable method for packaging. It also selects suitable packaging material.

Pricing Research: Pricing Research studies the pricing of the product. It selects a suitable method of pricing. It fixes the price for the product. It compares the company’s price with the competitor's price. It also fixes the discount and commission which are given to middlemen. It studies the market price trends. It also studies the future price trends.

Distribution Research: Distribution research studies the channels of distribution. It selects a suitable channel for the product. It fixes the channel objectives. It identifies the channel functions like storage, grading, etc. It evaluates the competitor's channel.

Policy Research: Policy research studies the company's policies. It evaluates the effectiveness of the marketing policies, sales policies, distribution policies, pricing policies, inventory policies, etc. Necessary changes, if any, are made in these policies.

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Media Research: Media research studies various advertising media. The different advertising media are television (TV), radio, newspapers, magazines, the internet, etc. Media research studies the merits and demerits of each media. It selects a suitable media for advertising. It does media planning. It also studies media cost. It helps in sales promotion and to avoid wastage in advertising.

Motivation Research: Motivation research studies consumers' buying motives. It studies those factors that motivate consumers to buy a product. It mainly finds out, Why the consumers buy the product? It also finds out the causes of consumer behaviour in the market.

NEED AND IMPORTANCE OF MARKETING RESEARCH

Marketing research uses scientifically-led studies to collect necessary market information, enabling entrepreneurs to make the right commercial decisions. The term market research encompasses a number of activities that are designed to connect marketers to consumers through information gathering and evaluation. Followings are the importance of marketing research:

Provides valuable data :Marketing research provides valuable data to the decision makers. It provides data about demand, supply, consumer behaviour, competition, etc. This data is used for decision making. This data improves the quality of decisions. It makes the decision very successful.

Studies consumer Behaviour: Marketing research provides data about consumer behaviour. It provides data about age, incomes, likes, dislikes, etc. of the consumers. It also finds out the opinions of the consumers about a company’s product. This data is used to make production and marketing policies.

Solves marketing problems: A business faces many types of marketing problems such as with respect to its product, price, place and promotion. It also faces problems about product design, packaging, branding, marketing channels, advertising, etc. Some marketing problems are very serious. Therefore, in the marketing, managers use marketing research as an important tool to solve marketing problems.

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Supplies marketing information: Marketing research supplies data about the market situation such as present and future demand and supply position, level of competition and steps taken to control it, market opportunities, cause of fall in sales level and so on.

Evaluates Marketing Performance: Marketing research helps the company to evaluate its marketing performance and to take steps to improve it. Marketing research is used to find out the effect of price, package, brand name, etc. on sales. It is used to find consumers’ reaction towards the company’s product. It is used to evaluate the inventory and pricing policies. It is also used to evaluate the effectiveness of advertising, sales promotion techniques, channels of distribution, etc.

Selects promotional Techniques: Marketing research helps the company to select suitable sales promotion techniques. It helps to select marketing techniques. It helps to select proper media for advertising. It helps to solve the problems of after-sales service. It also helps to prepare the budget for advertising and sales promotion.

Miscellaneous Needs and Importance: There are miscellaneous needs and importance of marketing research. Marketing research improves the efficiency of the marketing department. It helps the marketing manager to take the rational and effective decisions. It is used to make growth and expansions programs. it benefits the company, distributor, advertising agency, consumer, government and the entire society.

PROCESS OF MARKETING RESEARCH

A typical marketing research process involves following steps:

Step 1: Defining the Problem: The first step in the marketing research project is to define the problem. Defining the Problem is identifying the reason or problem for which research is to be conducted. In many ways, research starts with a problem that management is facing. This problem needs to be understood, the cause diagnosed, and solutions developed. This includes collecting of relevant initial information and how this information will affect decision making process. Once the problem is defined precisely and the need of research is discussed.

Step 2: Planning a Research Design: Development of an approach to the problem includes formulating research objectives or theoretical framework, research methodology, research questions proposed through surveys, hypotheses, and identifying characteristics or factors that can influence the research design. This process is guided by discussions with management and industry experts, case studies and simulations, analysis of secondary data, qualitative research etc.

Step 3: Planning a SampleSampling involves any procedure that draws conclusions based on measurements of a ‘portion’ of the population. The first sampling question to ask is “Who is to be sampled?” The answer to this primary question requires the identification of a target population. The next sampling issue concerns sample size. How big should the sample be? The final sampling decision is how to select the sampling units.

Step 4: Collecting the DataThis process includes field work and desk work for collecting all relevant data and information. Field work includes interviewing the personals by interacting them face to face by visiting them in home or offices or arranging group meetings at any preferred place. Desk work includes contacting personals over telephone or via series of emails and web meetings. This could take comparatively more time as compared to the field work. Involving experienced and trained executive for this helps in reducing data collection errors.

Step 5: Analysing the DataAfter the data collecting stage the collected data is edited, corrected if required and validated. This process is the most important process in the research as the results are generated on the basis of data preparation. So it is required for an organization to verify the authenticity of the collected data and edit or correct it if needed. The data from the questionnaires are transcribed into the computer.

Step 6: Drawing Conclusions and Preparing a ReportThe entire project should be documented in a written report which addresses the specific research questions identified, describes the approach, the research design, data collection, and data analysis procedures adopted, and presents the results and the major findings. The findings should be presented in a comprehensible format so that they can be readily used in the decision making process. In addition, an oral presentation should be made to management using tables, figures, and graphs to enhance clarity and impact.

Reference: Internet