Marketing Research and Market Demand Forecasting

Every marketing department has to put in place marketing information system.

Marketing information system consists of people, equipment, and procedures to gather, sort, analyze, evaluate, and distribute needed, timely and accurate information to marketing decision makers. (Kotler)

Internal records on orders, sales, prices, inventory levels, receivables, payables etc. are part of the marketing information system and they have to be organized for providing information to marketing personnel. The internal records provide information about the actual results.

Marketing intelligence system is a set of procedures and sources used by marketers to obtain every day information about pertinent developments in the marketing environment (Kotler)

Marketing intelligence focuses on current happenings.

Marketing research is formal study of future opportunities and current problems.

Kotler's definition of marketing research
"Marketing research is the systematic design, collection, analysis, and reporting of data and findings relevant to a specific marketing situation facing the company.

Kotler emphasised market research, research into a particular market is only one component of marketing research activities.

The Marketing Research Process

Five steps are involved in marketing research

1. Defining the problem and research objectives
Research can be exploratory. In exploratory research preliminary data is gathered to shed light on the nature of the marketing situation. Research projects can also be descriptive. In this type of study, magnitudes can be estimated. How many persons will you a particular product? Research studies can also find cause-effect relations which investigate the response of people to certain actions given as stimulus. Marketers are interested to know the response of users to increased advertisement, sales promotion etc.

2. Developing the research
Research plan development includes decisions on data sources, research approaches, research instruments, sampling plan and contact methods.

3. Collection of the information
Data is collected using the instruments developed for the project.

4. Analysis of the information
The information is tabulated and measures that give the desired answer are calculated.

5. Presentation of the findings.
The research report is to be prepared for circulation to various decision makers.

The Characterstics of Good Marketing Research

Kotler listed seven characteristics

1. Research creativity
Research is done to help in marketing decision making. Right from defining the objective of research to the submission of the report, effort has to be made by people involved, to come out with ideas that would help the firm in a significant way. Creativity means generation of number of alternatives so that the best way of doing a project or task of a project is selected and pursued.

2. Scientific method

3. Multiple methods: Business decisions involve expenditures to get expected profits. Using multiple methods to confirm a finding is preferred rather than stopping with a method that gives a positive answer.

4. Interdependence of models and data: The model chosen for doing the research determines the data to be collected based on the concepts involved in the model.

5. Value and cost of information: Marketing researchers have to understand the value of the information and come out with designs that cost less than the value of the information.

6. Healthy skepticism: Researchers should not accept opinions and conclusions made by marketers about the marketing issues and have to develop research studies that test these opinions and conclusions. This is healthy skepticism.

7. Ethical marketing: Good marketing research has to benefit both the sponsoring company and consumers. Self serving research studies increase consumer resentment. Marketing research companies have to develop unbiased approach to doing marketing research studies.

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