MKT Marketing Research

470 An I ntroductory Overview

Marketing Research Process
Research Process - Planning Stage
Preparing the Research Proposal

 Abstract
 Executive Summary Abstract Executive
Summary
Preparing the Research Proposal

Problem Statement (Introduction)

 Define the managerial or marketing-decision-

related problem to be investigated.

 Describe specific objectives of proposed

research.

 Provide background info on the problem.

 Explain importance of proposed research.

Preparing the Research Proposal
Literature Review

Often Skipped in Applied Marketing Research

 Review of past studies in your research area

 Discusses what has been done and what needs Literature Review
to be done.

 Identifies gaps in existing research.

Types of Literature Review

Exhaustive literature review

 A comprehensive review of all

relevant past research.
E.g., Used in theses and
dissertations.

Exemplary literature review

 A review of the key studies in the

past. E.g., Used in journal articles
and conference papers.
Finding articles for literature review

 Search for scholarly journal articles

in the library’s online databases
and on the Internet.

 Guidelines provided in the

handout.
Writing the Literature Review

Article-by-article approach

 A series of extended abstracts

organized one after the other.

 Provides a descriptive and

evaluative summary of each
past study.

 Used by beginning scholars.

Writing the Literature Review

Thematic approach

 Identifies key themes, issues, and

concepts in past research.
Identify Organize
themes abstracts
 Organizes the abstracts under
multiple themes.

 Used by experienced scholars.

Theoretical Framework

 Relationship of your research

problem to existing theories.

 Establishes a theoretical
context for your proposed
study.

 Skipped in applied marketing

research.
Research Questions or Hypotheses

 Develop research questions

or hypotheses or both.

 A rationale is provided for

each question or hypothesis.

 A hypothesis is an informed
guess or assumption about a
certain problem or set of
circumstances.
Research Method

 Explain types of research needed

 Describe sampling method
Types of

 Explain data collection method research

 Describe measurement instrument Sampling

method
Data collection
method

 Explain proposed data analysis method Research

Method

 Develop outline of budget and timeline Measurement

Data analysis
instrument

 Develop outline of responsible persons

Budget
for each task for the project. Timeline

 Plan fieldwork logistics, if needed

Data Collection Stage

 Prepare research materials.

 Train interviewers, coders, observers. Research

Training
materials
 Collect data

 Organize data Collect Organize

data data
Data Application Stage

 Analyze the data

Analyze Write
 Write research report data report

 Present research report

Present Apply
report data
 Apply data and make decisions