Marketing Information and Research

Managing Marketing Information

• Customer Insight is where consumer interests meet brand features.
• Secondary data is existing information collected for another purpose.
• Primary data is information gathered for a specific research plan.

Marketing Research Approaches

• Observational research involves gathering primary data by watching relevant people, actions, and situations.
• Ethnographic research involves sending trained observers to interact with consumers in their natural environment.
• Survey research is the most used method and is best for descriptive information like knowledge, attitudes, preferences, and buying behavior
• Experimental research is best for gathering causal information and cause-and-effect relationships.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

• CRM involves managing detailed customer information and touch points to maximize loyalty.

Questionnaires

• Questionnaires are the most common marketing research instrument.
• They can be administered in person, by phone, or online..
• Questionnaire research must have careful wording and ordering of questions.
• Closed-end questions include all possible answers and subjects make choices, it is easier to interpret and tabulate
• Open-end questions allow respondents to answer in their own words and are useful in exploratory research.

Consumer Markets and Consumer Buying Behavior

• Consumer Markets refers to the marketplace where individuals purchase goods and services for personal use, not resale
• Consumer Buyer Behavior refers to the actions and decision processes of individuals or groups to satisfy their needs and wants

Types of Consumer Markets

• Food and Beverages includes grocery stores, restaurants, cafes, and fast-food outlets.
• Retail covers everything from supermarkets to clothing stores, both offline and online.
• Consumer Products encompasses convenience goods (like milk and sugar), shopping goods (like electronics), specialty goods, and unsought goods.
• Transportation includes personal vehicles, bicycles, and public transportation services.

Factors Influencing Consumer Buyer Behavior

• Cultural Factors include culture, subculture, and social class
• Social Factors include reference groups, family, roles, and status.
• Personal Factors include age, occupation, lifestyle, personality, and self-concept.
• Psychological Factors include motivation, perception, learning, beliefs, and attitudes.

Types of Consumers Buying Behavior

• Complex Buying Behavior occurs when consumers are highly involved and perceive significant differences among brands.
• Dissonance-Reducing Buying Behavior happens when consumers are highly involved but see little difference among brands.
• Habitual Buying Behavior involves low consumer involvement and few perceived brand differences.
• Variety-Seeking Buying Behavior occurs when consumers have low involvement but perceive significant brand differences.

Consumer Market

• Consumer Market consists of the personal consumption of final consumers.
• Culture includes the learned values, perceptions, wants, and behavior from family and other important institutions.
• Subculture consists of groups of people within a culture with shared value systems based on common life experiences and situations.
• Opinion leaders are called influencers, bloggers, and brand ambassadors.
• Family is the most important consumer-buying organization in society.
• Lifestyle is a person’s pattern of living as expressed in their psychographics.
• Motive is the inner drive that motivates a person to act or behave in a certain manner.
• Perception is how people select, organize, and interpret information.

Psychological Factors

• Selective attention is the tendency to screen out most of the information.
• Selective distortion is the tendency to interpret information to support existing beliefs.
• Selective retention is the tendency to remember good points about a favored brand and forget competing brands.

Information Search/Sources of Information

• Personal sources include family and friends.
• Commercial sources include advertising and the Internet.
• Public sources include mass media and consumer organizations.
• Experiential sources comes from handling, examining, and using the product

Customer Satisfaction and Adoption

• Customer satisfaction is key to building profitable relationships, keeping/growing consumers, and reaping customer lifetime value.
• Adoption process is the mental process an individual goes through from first learning about an innovation to regular use.

Customer-Driven Marketing Strategy

• Market segmentation involves dividing a market into smaller segments with distinct needs, characteristics, or behaviors, which might require separate marketing strategies or mixes.
• Segmentation divides the total market into smaller segments.
• Targeting involves selecting which segments to enter.
• Differentiation involves differentiating the market offering to create superior customer value.
• Positioning means positioning the market offering in the minds of target customers.

Segmenting Consumer Markets

• Geographic segmentation divides the market into different geographical units like nations, regions, states, counties, or cities.
• Demographic segmentation divides the market into groups based on variables like age, gender, family size, family life cycle, income, occupation, education, religion, race, generation, and nationality
• Psychographic segmentation divides buyers into different groups based on social class, lifestyle, or personality traits.
• Behavioral segmentation divides buyers into groups based on their knowledge, attitudes, uses, or responses to a product.
• Multiple segmentation is used to identify smaller, better-defined target groups.
• Inter-market segmentation divides consumers into groups with similar needs and buying behaviors even if they are in different countries.
• Target market consists of a set of buyers who share common needs or characteristics that the company decides to serve.

Target Marketing Strategies

• Undifferentiated marketing targets the whole market with one offer.
• Differentiated marketing targets several different market segments and designs separate offers for each.
• Micromarketing involves tailoring products and marketing programs to specific individuals and locations.
• Local marketing tailors brands and promotion to the needs and wants of local customer groups.
• Individual marketing tailors products and marketing programs to individual customer needs and preferences.

Product Position and Strategy

• Product position is how consumers define the product on important attributes.
• Competitive advantage is an advantage over competitors gained by offering greater value through lower prices or more benefits.
• Product differentiation involves distinguishing a product from others.
• Service differentiation distinguishes a service offering from others.
• Channel differentiation looks at how the firm distributes/sells its products.
• People differentiation is a competitive advantage through better-trained people.