Introduction To Marketing Essay

Describe how a selected organisation uses merchandise enquiry to add up to the development of its marting plans In this section of the unit the investigation of the merchandising look into used by Kelloggs allow be shown through sodding(a) search and evaluation to a fault how it links in to the development of Kelloggs marketing plans.The Purpose of Market ResearchMarketing point is what informs businesss make decisions by helping it to understand the changing dynamics of its market. This involves key outing out more just about customers, competitors and the overall marketing environment. The purpose of doing this is to gather entropy on customers and potential customers. The pure definition of market research is systematically gathering, recording and analysing info and also about the issues relating to marketing harvest-festivals and services. There are ii types of researchs that can be conductedPrimarySecondaryThese research can then be formed into either quantitativ e or softPrimary ResearchPrimary research is data and development that the business has ga in that locationd first-hand and has not been gathered before.Internal primary research data sources implySales figures for the businesss own productsCustomer data held on a central database.External primary research methods includeQuestionnaires and SurveysInterviews and Focus Groups conundrum Shoppers,And other observation techniques.Secondary ResearchSecondary research uses data and information that has been collected before, either from within the organisation which can also be seen as internal data or by another organisation which is mostly regarded to as external data.Secondary research is sometimes referred to as desk research and sources includeReports from sales and regional representativesPrevious marketing research (internal)Trade journals and websites (external)Books and newspapers (external)Industry reports from industry associations and government departments (external)Census data and public records (external).This nowM2-Explain the limitations of marketing research used to contribute to the development of a selected organisations marketing plans For this sector of the report I will be identifying and explaining the limitations of the market research methods used in the Kelloggs investigation. This should give a clear overview of how Kelloggs develop. In the case study I throw off been studying I have acknowledged Kelloggs uses four junctures of market research to ensure they have examined a product collectively which enable Kelloggs to develop theyre products best and to better the product to suit its target audience. Firstly, we have a very important sector of market research which is seen as discovery, it is vital to identify a set of new food ideas that would be suitable for developing a new Crunchy Nut product. Secondary research was conducted from Mintel and Datamonitor and was used to find out about innovation trends in the cereal market. It was also used to find out about new products, flavours and foods from around the world. Food developers at Kelloggs used this information to come up with a number of new food ideas.Although secondary data is easy to access there are some limitations Kelloggs motivation to take into good will, this could be for instance the age of the documents and when the research had been operated. Also the size of the group the research was taken and how many plenty were winding. I have also accredited secondary research can be very vague and general this would prove difficult for Kelloggs to make a decision. In market research there are different aspects a business can branch into, many in which are very beneficial. The next form of research Kelloggs had fore taken was selecting the best concept for their product they ensured they could do this by overseeing a quantitative survey. This had then created specific statistical information that indicated that a new Crunchy Nut Bites idea was perceiv ed as the most appealing amongst all the ideas tested. Although Kelloggs manage to use the quantitative dataefficiently there can be drawbacks to using quantitative data, the principal(prenominal) hindrance of quantitative research is the context of the study is ignored.Quantitative research does not study things in a natural setting or discuss the meaning things have for different people as qualitative research does. Another shortcoming is that a large exemplar of the population must be studied the larger the sample of people researched, the more statistically accurate the results will be. Once the conception was formed Kelloggs then had a job conform and construct the concept into a new product this involved usage of qualitative research which helped Kelloggs food technologists to explore the taste and texture of the new food idea in more detail. Kelloggs needed to understand the eating perplex of the consumer before a decision could be made about how to develop the recipe in more detail. Kelloggs needed to take in to consideration even though the qualitative would help theyre market research they may be some downfalls, for example the researcher of the study is heavily involved in the process, which gives the researcher a subjective view of the study and its participants. The researcher interprets the research according to his or her own biased view, which skews the data gathered.Another injustice is that this research method is very time consuming and can last for months or even years. Finally, it is always important to ensure the financial side of the product are understood and the product brings in a good profit also it is a good idea to set promotional prices to enable the customer to have a taster of the product. This meant Kelloggs were required to predict a forecast of the product, Kelloggs do this by undergoing one final test anterior to the new product launch. This is called the In Home Usage Test. The consumers are given the product to try for several days and this enables Kelloggs to capture how consumers interact with the product for the first time. As well as this being a very good technique to understand the consumer they can be negatives to this the obvious fuss Kelloggs would be facing is that markets are unpredictable. Any sales forecast, however rigorous its analysis of conditions, can be flat-out wrong.Sales forecasts fall into two elementary categories, each of which has distinct disadvantages. In this case this is a qualitative forecast so sales forecasts rely on experts opinions to predict upcoming sales performance. Which may be detrimental to Kelloggs because qualitative approaches is subjective therefore opinions, even well-informedones, can be wrong, especially if they weart take into flier relevant economic data. After overseeing Kelloggs market research although the major drawbacks Kelloggs can face, market research is very important for Kelloggs as it previews what Kelloggs can stumble upon when launching a new product. However market research that is gathered by any organisation could prove to be irrelevant and inappropriate.D2-Make justified recommendations for improving the validity of the marketing research used to contribute to the development of a selected organisations marketing plans. After tone at all the limitations that effect Kelloggs this has entitled me to make justification and recommendation for improving the validity of the marketing research used in Kelloggs. accordingly I will be making three comprehensive recommendations with justifications to improve validity of the market research used to contribute to the development of Kelloggs marketing plans. Market research is used by many organisations and is very fatal tool however the data collected can sometimes not be as valid for various reasons, resulting in a business to make the wrong decision and highly affecting its market plans. The first recommendation I would like is to discuss to enhance the vali dity of the market research is for an organisation like Kelloggs to choose the right amount of people to question.Kelloggs main objective is to improve their current product and to continue to create new products in order to carry this out they would have to carry research to find out what they lack in and what they need more of however if the amount of people questioned is too small the results would be invalid and will not do any justice to statistic therefore Kelloggs should make the sample random and larger this will increase the accuracy of the information leading to the right decisions, Kelloggs also need to be aware of setting themselves a goal and objective they would like to reach when choosing a people to take part in their research this increase validity as it gives and aim of what is required from conducting this research Secondly, I would like to recommend if Kelloggs ask specific and objective questions, the people Kelloggs survey should represent a cross-section of th eir target groups. This can extend the results to the whole group as long as Kelloggs sample is representative.Key factors in this matching process are sampling time and number of peoplesurveyed. For example if they were to launch a new product of a similar range they need to question what they feel is missing from the existing products they can do this by asking feedback of existing customers this will make the data more valid and reliable because the right questions have been asked. Finally I would like to propose to Kelloggs to avoid self-selection and use a valid samples with a representative view of Kelloggs target group are based on random selection. If Kelloggs allow survey respondents to decide whether to answer a survey, Kelloggs cant be sure the respondents represent a random sample. You have to pick survey respondents at random and classify those who dont answer the questions as did not respond.If the non-responsive group is substantial, reducing it by adding people who v olunteer adds self-selection bias to the result because the volunteers are likely to share characteristics not demonstrative of your whole target group. Kelloggs may have to change how you conduct the survey to get enough samples from a random selection. All of the supra suggestions are to improve the validity and reliability of market research used by Kelloggs however Kelloggs should also make sure that the question it uses match its research objectives to ensure that information collected contributes to the development of its marketing plans. Recommendations mentioned above will improve the validity of the research and accuracy of the information that will help the business make the right decisions based on the information collected and results of the research.