Market Research: Types of Data
What is Market Research? Market research is the collection, analysis, and interpretation of information used to develop a marketing strategy or to solve a marketing problem This research provides hard data (information based on supportable fact)
What isn’t Market Research? Asking your friends or relatives what they think of your idea Not systematic Minimal analysis Very limited amount of data
Who does Market Research? Marketing research firms are hired to collect, analyze, and interpret the data that is relevant to a specific business’s marketing effort These companies work with two types of information: Secondary data Primary data
Primary Data Unanalyzed, current information collected by a researcher for a specific purpose Pros vs. Cons More on this later...
Secondary Data Information collected and published by others Secondary Research: searching for secondary data, then analyzing and interpreting it Pros vs. Cons
What kind of Data? Recall friday’s class: Conduct a Survey Conduct a Focus Group Purchase Data from a Research Firm Hire Consulting Firm Watch the media
Sources of Secondary Data Books Periodicals Indexes Databases Internet Consultants Market Research Professionals
Books
Periodicals
Indexes and Databases CanCorp provides financial and management information extracted from the corporate documents of over 13,000 Canadian companies http://www.lib.uwo.ca/business/cancorpdesc.html
Internet Search Engines Listservs Problems with info from web? http://www.ualberta.ca/~slis/guides/market/guide.htm#Listservs/Newsgroups Problems with info from web?
Consultants
Market Research Professionals
Review What are 5 sources of secondary data? Why is secondary data useful as a marketing research tool? What are its limitations?
Article What service does GutCheck offer? What kind of research does it specialize in? What kind of research is it not geared towards? What is a focus group? What demographic aspects can the user select for participants with GutCheck?