APPLIED MARKETING

Applied Marketing

Applied Marketing

Part 1: Types of Research

The focal point of research refers to analyzing various aspects of information pertaining to any particular field of interest, or topic under consideration. In order to avail maximum understanding of any topic through research, it is imperative that a certain sort of researching technique is used. There are various researching types, the most commonly known and used being qualitative research and quantitative research. Both of these researches have a different orientation towards finding the information. The former seeks to identify the 'Why' aspect, whereas the later seeks to explore the 'How' portion of gathering information. Brief introductions about these types are discussed below.

Qualitative Research

As mentioned above, qualitative research seeks to explore the 'Why' aspect of any information. This way, the researcher is able to identify the motive behind the occurrence of any activity. The researcher looks into the mindset of the target audience and goes over and beyond to fully understand the dynamics of the decision making process. For e.g. the marketers might use this tool to understand why a group of consumers prefer to buy Brand "A" over Brand B. The specific feature which entices the consumer to opt for a particular brand is what Qualitative research seeks to explore.

Since this involves understanding how the target audience's mindset works, thus the tools used to collect information for such a sort of research include consumer panels, one-to-one interviews, experiments, observations or even analyzing the results of various pictures or graphical illustrations (Myers, M. D., 2007). These tools allow the researcher to explore the person's understanding of a subject from a range of viewpoints. Therefore, the information collected usually seems to be in a rather unstructured manner which tends to deviate from person to person. One of the reasons why this mode of research has been gaining popularity over the period of time is because of the comprehensive information which can be generated out of the approaches adopted in it.

Quantitative Research

This type of research seeks to find the 'How' aspect of the information. That is, any information, which is in a numerical form, is a part of it. It was initially designed to assist the study of various natural phenomena's in the field of natural sciences, but over the years it developed and diversified to other fields as well (Myers, M. D., 2007). In order to collect information, it makes use of questionnaires; various statistical data test tools, laboratory experiments and even surveys (Gary & Airasian, 2003). Unlike the quantitative research which seeks to explore the reasons behind any action, this research sheds light on measuring things. For example, how many cans of Pepsi do a household consume in a month's time? Thus, in order to ensure that measurement is done as perfectly as possible, the researches usually keep close ended questions. This means that the person answering the questions does not have the leverage to answer anything they want, but it is necessary for them to stay within the boundaries set by the ...