1. The Marketing Research Process
Chapter 2
The Marketing
Research Process

2. The Marketing Research Process: 11 Steps
Step One: Establishing the Need for Marketing Research
Step Two: Defining the Problem
Step Three: Establishing Research Objectives
Step Four: Determining Research Design
Step Five: Identifying Information Types and Sources
Step Six: Determining Methods of Accessing Data

3. The Marketing Research Process: 11 Steps cont…
Step Seven: Designing Data Collection Forms
Step Eight: Determining Sample Plan and Size
Step Nine: Collecting Data
Step Ten: Analyzing Data
Step Eleven: Preparing and Presenting the Final Research Report

4. The Marketing Research Process
Step One: Establish the Need for Marketing Research
Marketing Research is not needed when the:
required information is already available
decisions need to be made now
organization can’t afford the research
costs outweigh the value of the research

5. The Marketing Research Process Step Two: Define the Problem
The most important step in the marketing research process is defining the problem. (Ch. 4)

6. The Marketing Research Process
Step Three: Establish Research Objectives
What information is needed in order to solve the problem?

7. The Marketing Research Process Step Four: Determine Research Design
Exploratory Research: collecting information in an unstructured and informal manner
Descriptive Research: refers to a set of methods and procedures describing marketing variables
Causal Research (experiments and other approaches): allows isolation of causes and effects

8. The Marketing Research Process
Step Five: Identify Information Types and Sources
Secondary Data: information that has been collected for some purpose other than the research at hand
Primary Data: information that has been gathered specifically for the research objectives at hand

9. The Marketing Research Process
Step Six: Determine Methods of Accessing Data
Secondary Data: accessing data through sources such as the Internet and library
Primary Data: collecting data from participants through methods such as telephone, mail, online, and face-to-face (quantitative), and observation studies and focus groups (qualitative)

10. The Marketing Research Process
Step Seven: Design Data Collection Forms
The design of the data collection form that is used to ask or observe and record information in marketing research projects is critical to the success of the project.
It is easy to write a set of questions but very difficult to construct a questionnaire.
General types of “instruments” (forms)
Questionnaires
Observation Study forms (protocols)

11. The Marketing Research Process
Step Eight: Determine Sample Plan and Size
Sample plan: refers to the process used to select units from the population to be included in the sample
Sample size: refers to determining how many elements (units) of the population should be included in the sample

12. The Marketing Research Process Step Nine: Collect Data
Sound data collection is very important because, regardless of the data analysis methods used, data analysis cannot “fix” bad data. 12
Nonsampling errors may occur during data collection. These are related to poor design and/or execution of the data gathering.
Sampling errors may occur based purely on chance

13. The Marketing Research Process
Step Ten: Analyze Data
Data analysis: involves entering data into computer files, inspecting data for errors (data cleaning), running tabulations (frequencies), and conducting various statistical tests

14. The Marketing Research Process
Step Eleven: Prepare and Present the Final Research Report
Findings are presented, often by research objective, in a clear and concise way.
The need for a good report cannot be overstated. It is the report, and/or its presentation, that properly communicates the results to the client.