Marketing Research

Marketing research is the thing that assists the management function called ‘marketing’, it helps to fi ne-tune the marketing mix, and it embraces all activities that lead to meeting customer requirements. It helps to match supply with demand; it matches suppliers with customers in the broadest sense. You should accept, however, that the two terms—market research and marketing research—are often used interchangeably (Bradley, 2013).

According to American Marketing Association (Aaker et al., 2013) Marketing research is the function that links the consumer, customer, and public to the marketer through information—information used to identify and define marketing opportunities and problems; generate, refine, and evaluate marketing actions; monitor marketing performance; and improve understanding of marketing as a process. Marketing research specifies the information required to address these issues, designs the method for collecting information, manages and implements the data collection process, analyzes, and communicates the findings and their implications.

Marketing research is the systematic and objective identification, collection, analysis, dissemination and use of information for the purpose of improving decision making related to the identification and solution of problems and opportunities in marketing.

The American Association of Marketing define marketing management as the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion and distribution of ideas, goods and services in order to create, exchange and satisfy individual and organizational objectives (Grönroos, 1989).

REFERENCES

Aker, David A., Kumar, V., Leone, Robert P., Day, George S. (2013), Marketing Research, Wiley, USA.

Bradley, Nigel (2013), Marketing Research: tools and techniques, Oxford University Press, UK

Nargundkar, Rajendra (2008), Marketing Research text and cases, Tata McGraw Hill Education, New Delhi.

International Marketing of Services: Accessibility Strategies for Service Firms. In Luostarinen, R., ed., Dynamics of International Business, Vol. 2. Proceedings of the XVth International Conference of the European International Business Association. Helsinki School of Economics, December 17-19, 1989