Customer Insight & Marketing Research

Customer Insight

• It is defined as knowledge about the customer valuable to a firm, distinct from basic customer information.
• Requires transformation of information to generate insight.

Marketing Information Systems (MkIS)

• A system encompassing internal market information, environmental scanning, market intelligence, and marketing research.

Big Data

• Enables aggregation of buying information.
• Relies on Volume, Velocity, Variety, and Veracity which are the 4 V's:
  • Volume: Scale of data.
  • Velocity: Analysis of streaming data.
  • Variety: Different forms of data.
  • Veracity: Uncertainty of data.

Marketing Research Defined

• Marketers require information to make decisions about markets, customers, competitors, and the marketing mix.
• It is a systematic design, collection, analysis, and reporting of data relevant to a specific marketing situation.
• A broader term than market research, includes product, pricing, and promotional research.
• Involves comprehensive analysis of the marketing mix to develop effective strategies.
• Encompasses a wider range of activities to support decision-making in marketing.

Importance of Research

• Companies gather information to establish:
  • Who their customers are.
  • What their needs are.
  • What products/services they should offer.
  • How much they should charge.
• Research identifies problems and opportunities.
• Aids and improves decision-making by reducing risk and uncertainty.
• Increases profitability through customer satisfaction.
• Provides first-hand information on customers.
• Acts as a link between the firm and its environments and customers.

Forms of Marketing Research

• Ad Hoc: Focuses on a specific marketing problem, collecting data at one point in time from one sample.
• Continuous Research: Conducts the same research with the same sample over time.
• Custom & Syndicated Research: Single organization research to address a special question or research collected for sale to other firms.

Types of Marketing Research

• Product/Services Research: Determines what to add to augment a product and the importance of related services.
• Pricing Research: Assesses what the market will take and what competitors are charging.
• Promotion Research: Identifies effective promotion types, using creative and copy testing to assess consumer understanding.

The Marketing Research Process

• It is a set of stages undertaken to gather valid and reliable information for decision-making.
• Stages are interdependent and overlap.

Stages in the Marketing Research Process

• The stages are:
  • Initial Contact
  • Research Brief
  • Research Proposal
  • Data Collection
  • Analysis & Interpretation
  • Report Writing & Presentation

Data Collection

• Stage involves two main techniques: quantitative and qualitative.

Qualitative Data Collection Techniques

• Focus Groups:
  • Advantages include synergism, snowballing, stimulation, security, and scientific scrutiny.
  • Disadvantages include potential lack of representativeness and subjective analysis.
• In-Depth Interviews:
  • Take place on a one-to-one basis
  • Can be semi-structured or unstructured.
  • Duration is generally 45 minutes to 1 hour.
  • Appropriate when detailed probing is necessary from an expert.
  • Advantages: Versatile
  • Disadvantages: Expensive and exhausting.
• Projective Techniques:
  • Designed to obtain data indirectly about consumer feelings and beliefs.
  • Explore the "whys" of behavior.
  • Use indirect questioning to encourage respondents to freely project beliefs and feelings about the topic.
  • Advantages include helping penetrate the barrier of awareness.
  • Disadvantages include being expensive and requiring highly trained researchers.
• Other qualitative techniques include ethnography, surveys and questionnaires.