Market research (OCR GCSE Business): Revision Notes
2.2 Market research
The purpose of market research
The purpose of market research is to identify and understand customer needs. This is useful for businesses as it can help them learn more about what new products and services customers may like and how to promote them.
Primary research methods
Primary research is carried out by the business itself and is specific to them.
● Questionnaires ● Interviews ● Trialling ● Focus groups
Questionnaires
Questionnaires are a set of questions that are given to customers to conduct market research.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Only needs to be created once, which saves time | Customers may dispose of printed questionnaires |
| Easy to compare and analyse responses | Dicult to get more detailed opinions |
Interviews
Interviews are where businesses talk to customers face-to-face to gather feedback and opinions.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Easier to get more detailed opinions | Very time consuming |
| Customers may be more likely to participate | Customers may not be completely honest |
Trialling
Trialling is where businesses invite a small group of customers to test a product and give feedback before it is launched.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Customers can try before they buy | Opinions could still be biassed |
| Opinions are less likely to be biassed | Customers may only want to participate because the trial is free |
Focus groups
Focus groups are where a group of customers are brought together to answer questions about a product.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Opinions are less likely to be biassed | Difficult to measure results as opinions may not represent whole demographic |
| Customers can share a variety of opinions | Very time consuming |
Secondary research sources
Secondary research is research carried out by other people or businesses
● Newspapers and magazines ● Census ● Websites ● Internal data
Newspapers and magazines
Newspapers and magazines are useful for learning about people's opinions, especially of competitors.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Content is up-to-date and a good source of ideas and inspiration | The information is not specific to the business and therefore may not be useful |
Census
The census is a huge survey on the entire UK population run by the government every ten years.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Information is already recorded and analysed by experts which saves the business time | The information is not specific to the business so it may be dicult to find useful data |
Websites
Looking at other websites is a free and easy way for businesses to look at what competitors are doing, how much they charge and how they are advertising.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Information is up-to-date and easy to find about competitors | May be dicult to interpret and use the information in a useful way |
Internal data
Internal data includes documents, reports and other data that the business has collected in the past.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Information is readily available and tailored to the business already | Data is from the past so it may not be useful or accurate for the business anymore |
Qualitative and quantitative data in market research
Qualitative data is data like opinions and feedback that isn't in numerical form.
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Audio recordings
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Customer photos
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Interview transcripts Quantitative data is data such as statistics that are in numerical form.
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Costs and money
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Time spent or taken
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Age of customers