Marketing Research Final

Explain why marketing qualitative research is used in marketing research

Qualitative research plays major role in supporting marketing decision making. Primarily as an exploratory design but also descriptive design. Research mainly used to gain preliminary insights into decision problems and opportunities. It can involve observation of research subjects without asking any questions

Used to identify motivations, attitudes and personality factors that influence market place behaviour e.g. complex phenomena

Used to start the process of building theories about the marketplace

Understanding consumer purchase behaviour

Can specify attitudes in a way quantitative research can’t

Deep insight

Researcher’s preferences/experiences

Research user’s preferences/experiences

Sensitive information

Subconscious feelings

Complex phenomena

What it is

RO: discovery of new ideas, feelings, preliminary insights and understanding on objects and attitudes

Type of research: usually exploratory

Type of questions: open-ended, semistructured, unstructured, deep probing

Execution: relatively short time frame

Representativeness: Small samples, limited to the sampled respondents

Type of analysis: Debriefing, subjective content, interpretive, semiotic analysis

Researcher skills: interpersonal communications, observations, interpretive skills

Generalisability of results: very limited, only preliminary, insights and understanding

Researchers rely on theory to determine:

– Important variables

– Operationalisation of variables

– Research design and sample

– Organisation and interpretation of findings

2. To understand the differences between the various qualitative techniques

Advantages - Economical and timely data collection, Richness of the data, Accuracy of recording marketplace behaviours, Preliminary insights into building models and scale measurements

Disadvantages - Lack of generalisability, Inability to distinguish small differences, Lack of reliability and...