Marketing research is "the process or set of processes that links the consumers, customers, and end users 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 the results, and communicates the findings and their implications.
The five main functions of marketing research
(MR) are:
- Description,
- Evaluation,
- Explanation,
- Prediction,
and
- Aid in decision
making.
Now let's discuss these prominent functions of
marketing research.
- Description
: Marketing research gives full description about the consumers. It
describes their age, sex, education, income, etc. It also gives a
description about the competitors and the market situation. This
description is used to take marketing decisions and solve marketing
problems.
- Evaluation
: Marketing research helps to evaluate the company's performance. It helps
to evaluate the company's production
and marketing policies. It finds out the customer reaction to the quality
of the product, price, packaging, advertising, sales, promotions'
techniques, etc. If the consumer reactions are bad, then the company must change
its policies. It also compares the company's policies with the
competitors' policies.
- Explanation
: Marketing research gives explanations (answers) for all the marketing
problems. For example, it answers in detail, why are the sales falling,
why are the retailers giving negative reaction, etc. It gives all the
causes or reasons for the problem. It also tells how to solve the problem.
- Prediction
: Marketing research also gives predictions. Predictions mean to forecast
or guess about the future. It gives a prediction about the future sales,
future market opportunities, future risks, future marketing environment,
future consumer behavior, etc. All the prediction may not be correct.
However, these predictions help the company to make future plans and policies.
It helps to take advantage of future opportunities. It also helps to avoid
future risks.
- Aid
in decision making : Marketing research helps the marketing
manager to take decisions. It provides all the concerned data, which is
necessary to take decisions. Decision making means to select a course of
action from two or more alternatives. Decision making requires up-to-date
and correct data. MR helps the marketing manager to take decisions. It
provides all the data, which is necessary to take decisions. It also
provides alternative course of action. It gives the merits and demerits of
each course of action. It also helps the marketing manager to choose the
best course of action. It helps the marketing manager in all aspects of
distribution, selection of sales promotion techniques, selection of media
for advertising, etc. So, MR helps to take quick and correct marketing
decisions. It also helps to implement the marketing decisions.