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Research Methodology
1.
Distinguish between primary data and secondary data and summarise the practical difficulties associated
with the collection of quality information.
Ans. Primary research consists in research to collect original primary data. It is often undertaken after the researcher
has gained some insight into the issue by collecting secondary data. This can be through numerous forms,
including questionnaires, direct observation and telephone interviews amongst others.
The term primary research is widely used in academic research, market research and competitive intelligence.
There are advantages and disadvantages to primary research.
Advantages:

Addresses specific research issues as the researcher controls the search design to fit their needs

Great control; not only does primary research enable the marketer to focus on specific subjects, it also enables
the researcher to have a higher control over how the information is collected. Taking this into account, the researcher
can decide on such requirements as size of project, timeframe and goal.
Disadvantages:

Compared to secondary research, primary data may be very expensive in preparing and carrying out the
research. Costs can be incurred in producing the paper for questionnaires or the equipment for an experiment of
some sort.

In order to be done properly, primary data collection requires the development and execution of a research plan.
It takes longer to undertake primary research than to acquire secondary data.

Some research projects, while potentially offering information that could prove quite valuable, may not be within
the reach of a researcher.

By the time the research is complete it may be out of date.

Low response rate has to be expected.
An example of primary research: the government wants to know if people are pleased with how the government is being
run, so they hand out questionnaires to the public asking if they are happy and, if not, how to improve.
2.
Explain what you understand by the term test marketing and discuss the research activities undertaken
by marketing organisations during the test marketing phase.
Ans. Marketing is defined by the AMA as "the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating,
delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large." [1]
This replaces the previous definition, which still appears in the AMA's dictionary: "an organizational function and a set of
processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in
ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders."[2] It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques,
business communication, and business developments.[3] It is an integrated process through which companies build
strong customer relationships and create value for their customers and for themselves.[3]
Marketing is used to identify the customer, satisfy the customer, and keep the customer. With the customer as the focus
of its activities, marketing management is one of the major components of business management. Marketing evolved to
meet the stasis in developing new markets caused by mature markets and overcapacities in the last 2-3 centuries.[citation
needed]
The adoption of marketing strategies requires businesses to shift their focus from production to the perceived needs
and wants of their customers as the means of staying profitable.[citation needed]
The term marketing concept holds that achieving organizational goals depends on knowing the needs and wants of target
markets and delivering the desired satisfactions.[4] It proposes that in order to satisfy its organizational objectives, an
organization should anticipate the needs and wants of consumers and satisfy these more effectively than competitors. [4]
The term developed from an original meaning which referred literally to going to a market to buy or sell goods or services.
Seen from a systems point of view, sales process engineering marketing is "a set of processes that are interconnected
and interdependent with other functions,[5] whose methods can be improved using a variety of relatively new approaches."
3.
Discuss the stages of the Marketing Research Process and highlight the value of marketing research to
marketing orientated organisations.
ANS. Marketing research is "the function that links the consumers, customers, and public to the marketer through
information — information used to identify and define marketing opportunities and problems; generate, refine, and
evaluate marketing actions; monitor marketing performance; and improve understanding of marketing as a process.
Marketing research specifies the information required to address these issues, designs the method for collecting
information, manages and implements the data collection process, analyzes the results, and communicates the findings
and their implications."[1] Marketing research is the systematic gathering, recording, and analysis of data about issues
relating to marketing products and services. The goal of marketing research is to identify and assess how changing
elements of the marketing mix impacts customer behavior. The term is commonly interchanged with market research;
however, expert practitioners may wish to draw a distinction, in that market research is concerned specifically
with markets, while marketing research is concerned specifically about marketing processes. [2]
Marketing research is often partitioned into two sets of categorical pairs, either by target market:

Consumer marketing research, and

Business-to-business (B2B) marketing research
Or, alternatively, by methodological approach:

Qualitative marketing research, and

Quantitative marketing research
Consumer marketing research is a form of applied sociology that concentrates on understanding the preferences,
attitudes, and behaviors of consumers in a market-based economy, and it aims to understand the effects and
comparative success of marketing campaigns. The field of consumer marketing research as a statistical science was
pioneered by Arthur Nielsen with the founding of the ACNielsen Company in 1923.[3]
Thus, marketing research may also be described as the systematic and objective identification, collection, analysis, and
dissemination of information for the purpose of assisting management in decision making related to the identification and
solution of problems and opportunities in marketing.[
4.
As an independent consultant you have been asked to advise one of your clients on the steps to be
considered in the development of a well-designed questionnaire. What advice would you give to
your client?
5.
Explain what you understand by the following terms:
Marketing information systems A marketing information system is a management information system designed to
support marketing decision making.
Jobber (2007) defines it as a "system in which marketing data is formally gathered, stored, analysed and distributed
to managers in accordance with their informational needs on a regular basis."
Kotler, et al. (2006) define it more broadly as "people, equipment, and procedures to gather, sort, analyze, evaluate, and
distribute needed, timely, and accurate information to marketing decision makers." [1]
A formal MkIS can be of great benefit to any organization whether profit making or non profit making, no matter what its
size or the level of managerial finesse. It is true today that in many organization an MkIS is integrated as part of a
computerized system. To manage a business well is to anage its future and this means tha management of information,
in the form of a company wide"Management Information System" (MIS) of which the MkIS is an integral part, is an
indispensable resource to be carefully managed just like any other resource that the organization may have e.g. human
recources, productive resources, transport resources and financial resources.
a)
b) Attitude measurement techniques A Likert scale ( /ˈlɪkərt/[1]) is a psychometric scale commonly
involved in research that employs questionnaires. It is the most widely used approach to scaling
responses in survey research, such that the term is often used interchangeably with rating scale, or
more accurately the Likert-type scale, even though the two are not synonymous. The scale is
named after its inventor, psychologistRensis Likert.[2] Likert distinguished between a scale proper,
which emerges from collective responses to a set of items (usually eight or more), and the format in
which responses are scored along a range. Technically speaking, a Likert scale refers only to the
former. The difference between these two concepts has to do with the distinction Likert made
between the underlying phenomenon being investigated and the means of capturing variation that
points to the underlying phenomenon.[3] When responding to a Likert questionnaire item, respondents
specify their level of agreement or disagreement on a symmetric agree-disagree scale for a series of
statements. Thus, the range captures the intensity of their feelings for a given item,[4] while the results
of analysis of multiple items (if the items are developed appropriately) reveals a pattern that has
scaled properties of the kind Likert identified.
6- What is Continuous research and Quantitative research?
7- What is Qualitative research and Consumer panels?
Ans. Qualitative research is a method of inquiry employed in many different academic disciplines, traditionally in
the social sciences, but also in market research and further contexts.[1]Qualitative researchers aim to gather an in-depth
understanding of human behavior and thereasons that govern such behavior. The qualitative method investigates
the why and how ofdecision making, not just what, where, when. Hence, smaller but focused samples are more often
needed than large samples.
In the conventional view, qualitative methods produce information only on the particular cases studied, and any more
general conclusions are only propositions (informed assertions).Quantitative methods can then be used to seek empirical
support for such research hypotheses. This view has been disputed by Oxford University professor Bent Flyvbjerg, who
argues that qualitative methods and case study research may be used both for hypotheses-testing and for generalizing
beyond the particular cases studied.