The Stages of Marketing Research in Line with Positioning a New Phone - Essay Example

Marketing Research This paper explores the stages of marketing research in line with positioning a new phone which featuresattributes such as usefulness, ease of use, innovativeness, visual appeal, and self expression. This hinges on exploratory research which seeks to clarify ambiguous situations or discover ideas that may comprise business opportunities. Introduction Market research avails essential information that can be used to refine and appraise marketing actions, examine marketing performance, and enhance the understanding of marketing as a process in itself. The three types of marketing research include exploratory, descriptive, and causal (Zikmund & Babin 44). One of the primary goals of marketing research is identifying and assessing how the varying elements of the marketing mix impact on customer behavior. Marketing research falls into two categories depending on target market: consumer marketing research and business-to-business marketing research. Discussion The marketing research process covers a round of stages such as collection, organization, and interpretation of data. The designing of a research plan is a multifaceted endeavor as it involves decisions such as the data sources to employ, approaches to take, how to minimize distortions to the data collected, the research instruments to employ, the configuration of the sampling plan, methodology, and adherence to research ethics. A marketing research planning process incorporates a series of interconnected stages and each stage has an impact on the stage preceding or subsequent to it. Stages of a Marketing Research Plan Stage 1: Defining Research Problem The first stage in a marketing research plan involves identification of the problem or marketing issue (need). This stage comes after review of the business situation (Wild & Diggines 50). The starting phase of the research plan spotlights the reason or the research problem. When defining the problem, the researcher ought to construct an appropriate marketing research design. The problem should not be too narrow but should embrace the pertinent issues that the research seeks to capture. It is critical to obtain coherent insight into the nature, scope, and intensity of the problem prior to the formulation of the problem. The stated problem should reflect the organization’s resources and should be expressed in a manner that plainly identifies the sought opportunity (Housden 71). The problem in this case encompasses positioning of the new phone in the market. Outlining the Research Objective The researcher should justify the need for research as well as defining the objective of the research (Prasuraman & Krishnan 26). Outlining the research objective is crucial and the researcher needs to evaluate what he or she seeks to find out and why. In addition, the researcher should identify the data needed as well as the data sources. This entails scrutinizing the research purpose and highlighting the data required to complete the purpose (Prasuraman, Grewal, & Krishnan 33). Research objective entails goals to be achieved by conducting research. One of the objectives may be exploring some new product in the market. Diverse research objectives lead to diverse research designs (Wild & Diggine 51). Stage 2: Planning Research Design The second stage encompasses determining the research design to be employed. Picking out of the appropriate methodology is crucial to the overall success of the marketing research. The research method to be adopted depends on the research philosophy that has been employed. The designing of the research instrument is also crucial (Zikmund & Babin 51). Stage3: Planning Sample The third stage of a research plan incorporates defining the sample. The identification of the sample incorporates specifying who or which units should avail the data needed (Prasuraman & Krishnan 37). This stage lays the ground for designing of the sample. The stage encompasses instituting a problem solving framework and analytical models guided by the defined audience. The sample should reflect the target client base or the product. Sample planning is guided by the audience’s preferences, attitudes and behaviors. Stage 4: Sampling and Data Collection The fourth stage of a marketing research involves determining the sampling method to be used and data collection process. Once the sample design is ready, the subsequent stage involves data collection. Data collection includes fieldwork such as interviewing the persons. This implies that the researcher has to be precise on the sample size and how to locate the sample (Wild & Diggine 51). The tools of the sampling must fit together with the research problem. The researcher can employ typical research methods such as surveys (Zikmund & Babin 54). The methodology selected acts as a blueprint of the research process and may feature the several steps. These steps include methods for collecting and preparing quantitative information, evaluating the need for the information, scaling and quantifying procedures, and designing of sample questionnaire. In launching a new product, the research could employ survey as a method of collecting data. Stage 5: Data Tabulation and Analysis Another stage of the research plan incorporates data preparation, tabulation and analysis. The processes of analysis and interpretation of the data rely on the nature of the data which can be affected by factors such as data collection method used (Prasuraman & Krishnan 37). Data is subjected to editing and validation after collection in the field. This stage bears a lot of significance in marketing research plan since findings stem from data analysis. The researcher should verify the authenticity of the collected data. This stage may as well incorporate coding of open end questions and usage of advanced statistical techniques. Stage 6: Preparing Report The final stage of a marketing research process entails report generation from the results. The whole process is documented according to the organizational standards so as to enable referral in future decision making scenarios or alteration or modification of module. This requires creation of graphs, charts, and text to communicate the findings (Housden 72). Recommendations based on the findings ought to be actionable in line with the defined problem. This stage incorporates using the findings to make the decision. Conclusion Market research undeniably plays a critical role in exploring the business as well as reducing uncertainty concerning business decisions. Marketing research can materially aid in predicting and correlating customer needs. Similarly, marketing research can model or modify business strategies accordingly. The researcher should be wary of examining the wrong problem in research. This is because the research findings will be misleading and the marketing effort will ultimately be a failure. Works Cited Housden, Matthew. Cim Coursebook 05/06 Marketing Researcher and Information. Burlington: Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann, 2005. Print. Parasuraman, Grewal, & Dhruv Krishnan. Marketing Research. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2007. Print. Wiid, Jan, & Colin Diggines. Marketing Research. Cape Town: Juta and Company, 2009. Print. Zikmund, William, & Barry Babin. Essentials of Marketing Research. Mason: South-Western Cengage, 2010. Print. Read More