|
Marketing
Research
Spring 2010
Dr. Mary Wolfinbarger
California State University Long Beach
There are three kinds of lies: Lies, damned lies and
statistics. -- Disreali
|
|
|
|
Textbook:
Essentials of Marketing Research
Joseph H. Hair, Jr., Mary Wolfinbarger, David J. Ortinau and Robert P.
Bush, 2nd Edition.
Description of the Course: Marketing research is a pervasive function of
modern organizations. If, in fact, the "marketing concept" is to
be implemented, marketers must have a way of determining what it is that
customers desire. As the complexity of the problems facing the marketing
manager has increased in recent years, so has his or her need for
information -- about the market environment, about the competition and
particularly about the customers. It is now a virtual certainty that every
marketing manager (and many managers in other functional areas and in
general management) will come in close contact with marketing research
frequently through his or her career in business.
Marketing research techniques can broadly be separated into
qualitative and quantitative approaches. Qualitative techniques include
many methods, such as focus groups and in-depth interviews. Quantitative
methods are numerous; although we will discuss qualitative techniques, in
this class we will focus on experimental and survey research.
We will focus
especially on survey research. Students will learn to develop a
questionnaire, code and enter data, to analyze data, and finally, to
prepare a managerial report that concisely and clearly summarizes results.
Students are not expected to become statisticians; they are, however,
expected to learn how to successfully use and interpret statistics. The
uses, as well as the limitations of specific statistics, and "hard
data" in general, will be explored. Students will learn how to use the
statistical package most widely used by marketing research firms, SPSS.
Course Goals:
-
To improve the student's
ability to critically and conceptually analyze research results.
-
To develop the student's
ability to critically evaluate alternative research designs and to
develop and select the most appropriate one for a particular problem
situation.
-
To provide the
student with the necessary skills to implement a research design
-
To provide the
student with an introduction to the various data analysis procedures
that are most frequently used in marketing research.
-
To provide the
student with an introduction to the statistics program SPSS.
In
brief, this course is designed to make the contacts between management and
marketing research as productive as possible by making each student an
intelligent user and consumer of marketing research. Four learning vehicles
will be used in the course: a) readings, b) lectures, c) discussion and
assignments of problems and readings and d) analysis of a data set e)
preparation of a research report based on data analysis and d) tests.
Group Mini-Project: The
objective of the research project is to provide you with some experience in
applying the concepts and methods of marketing research to a real marketing
problem. The project will be implemented and a report (made up of
PowerPoint slides) will be written by self-selected three- or four-person
teams. The report will be a PowerPoint presentation. Sample Presentation -- Midas (This sample is much,
much longer than your project will be.)
For the summer class, you will use an already existing data
set. These sections will appear in your final report:
- Key findings: similar to an
executive summary, it contains a brief background of the project, and
major findings.
- A fuller background of the
project and a description of the research design, questionnaire and
sample.
- Graphs with text below them
describing (briefly and directly) your analyses and findings. The
graphs should be easy to understand quickly and make straightforward,
easy-to-understand points.
- Limitations of the research
(be careful -- write these honestly, but in a way that develops some
confidence in the findings).
- Conclusions and
recommendations: Interpret results and outline how these may be used
by decision maker(s).
- Appendix: Survey instrument
and any technical details and output of interest not included in the
body of the report in which a specialist may be interested. These
do not have to be part of the PowerPoint slides, but may be attached
to them as part of the hard copy you turn in.
Grading
3 tests..................…………………………..60%
Final Project......................... .................20
Qualitative Project ...............................15
Survey (Group Project)...….................. 5
Total.........................................................100%
Course Schedule
|
|
Week 1
January 26-28: The Marketing
Research Process
Lecture to download
Read: Ch. 1 (the ethics section is especially important to me -- pp. 11-15)
Also read Ch.2 (all -- exhibit 2.5 is a favorite of mine), Ch. 3 (pp.
50-64).
________________________________________________________
Week 2
Feb 2-Feb 4: Exploratory and/or
Qualitative Methods
Lecture to download
Read: Chs. 4(pp. 75-88) and 9 (entire chapter)
In-class group assignment: In groups, develop an in-depth
interview guide to assess textbook buying and usage among business students. You
should investigate in-depth the following research questions (you are not
asking these exact questions -- you are writing questions to address these
issues):
-
What do
CBA students think about textbooks?
-
What
factors lead to buying or not buying a textbook for a class?
-
What
makes a "good" and "bad" experience with a textbook in class?
-
What
could be done to improve textbooks?
-
Would
CBA students be interested in "licensing" their textbooks instead of
buying them?
Over the weekend, each person in the group should interview two CBA majors.
Each person should either conduct the interviews in "chat" format so that the
entire interview can be saved OR record and transcribe the interviews.
Write questions that elicit in-depth information -- avoid superficial
information and answers. Probe answers to get more in-depth information. You
are required to use some questions that are designed to elicit less filtered
or rationalized answers, e.g. "if textbooks were an animal, what kind
of animal would it be?" Also, follow-up answers to get more detail.
You want to have enough information to analyze for the rest of the project.
Next week,
you will bring the interviews to share with your group members. You
will eventually turn in the interview guide and the interviews, and they
will be part of your grade. Careful: This assignment is NOT a
survey, I am looking for qualitative information, not quantitative
findings.
|
|
Week 3
Feb. 9
Finish
qualitative methods and analysis lecture.
Feb. 11
In class
-- Share
your interviews with group members, and develop a ten-minute presentation to
summarize your results in front of the class. We will go to the lab
to work on the presentation during class. You will
make the presentation on Thursday, Tuesday the 16th and turn in both the PowerPoint slides
and the individual interviews.
Important:
Your
presentation must include at least one data display. Check exhibits 9.6-9.10
for several ideas. Also, there is a sample short qualitative report and data
display in Appendix A. You must make specific recommendations for follow-up
quantitative research (for example, which of your topics need research to
determine the exact frequency of the attitudes uncovered in your qualitative
research). You must have a limitations and methodology slide.
|
|
Week 4
February 16
In-class presentations
February 18
Exam #1
Exam #1-- What's on the exam?
Essay, Medium Answer, Short Answer
Topics:
*Ethics (from Chapter 1)
*Secondary data
(from Chapter 3)
*3-4 medium answer questions in which I describe a research problem and you
suggest an EXPLORATORY research approach for that problem. You will
defend your choice as providing the information needed for the budget you
are spending (e.g. if you choose an expensive method, you must defend the
need for it).
*The process for analyzing qualitative data (steps in Ch. 9)
*Marketing Research Process (from lecture and Chapter 2)
Sample Exam (covered more material than this
exam)
You may bring a 5 x 7 card with notes to use for the test. You may not copy
and reduce; they must be hand written
|
|
Week
5
February 23
Survey Design
Read: Chs. 7 and 8
Lecture to
download
Febrary 25:
Finish Survey Design
Evaluate Hallmark Q (in-class group assignment, Time permitting)
Each class group will begin writing a survey to collect data from students
regarding textbook attitudes. These surveys will be based on in-depth
interviews conducted earlier.
_________________________________________________
Week 6
March 2-4
Turn in survey developed by group.
Sampling
Read: Chapter 6
Lecture
to download
May or may not start this topic:
Data Processing -- Data Entry, Hypothesis Testing, Data Entry in SPSS, Basic
Data Presentation -- Bar Charts, Pie Charts, Tabulation,
Descriptive statistics --
Data Processing Lecture to download
|
|
Week 7
March 9
Exam #2-- What's on the exam?
Essay, Medium Answer, Short Answer
Topics:
*Everything about survey design
*Evaluation of a questionnaire -- tell me what's good and bad about it and
how to fix what needs to be fixed.
*Sampling topics for test:
--Sampling terms -- population (universe), sample, sampling frame, element,
parameter, sampling frame
--You should know the difference between probability and non-probability
samples
--You should know all non-probability samples and probability samples we
covered in class: convenience sampling, judgment (purposive)
sampling, quota sampling, simple random sampling, systematic random
sampling, stratified random sampling (disproportionate and proportionate)
and cluster sampling. Know how to use the sample size formula
March 11
Finish Data Processing -- learn data entry and basic tabulation in lab
Read: Read Ch. 10 and Ch 11 -- pp. 259-270
Introduction to project, and data set
Complete Ad
Attitudes file to download for project
Download Sample SPSS Data Set, Topic:
German/American Service Quality (in class examples, not your project
files)
______________________________________________________
Week 8
March 16-March 18
Start
Crosstabs.
Lecture: Crosstabulation/Crosstabulation in SPSS
Lecture to download (no tables, but faster download)
Crosstabs lecture notes -- FAT file, slow,
but complete, tables should print
Read: Ch. 11, pp. 273-278
Learn Crosstabs in lab
______________________________________________________
Week 9
March 23 (March 25 is a furlough day)
ANOVA
Lecture to download
Analysis of Variance/Analysis of Variance in SPSS
Read: Ch. 11, pp. 281-top of 288
|
|
Week 10
April 6:
Furlough day
April 8: Finish ANOVA, learn
ANOVA in lab
__________________________________________________
Week 11
April 13 -April 15
Work on project
in lab
_______________________________________________________
Week 12
April 20-April 22
Correlation and Regression Analysis
Read: Chapter 12 (all)
Lecture to download
Regression in SPSS
Work on regression assignment in lab
________________________________________________________
Week 13
April 27-April 29
Communicating Research Findings (May 6 is a furlough day)
Read: Ch. 13 (Strongly suggest reading the entire chapter -- it will help
you assemble your project)
Work on project in lab
_________________________________________________________
Week
14
Experimental Design
Read: Ch 5 (119-122)
__________________________________________________
Week
15
May 11 and May 13
Work on project in lab
__________________________________________________
Week of May 17: Final Exam
(Crosstabs, ANOVA, Correlation/Regression) and Experimental design
Final will cover:
*A crosstabs and/or ANOVA calculation (a critical tabled value will be
provided as necessary)
*You will see computer output for all statistical techniques, including
crosstabs, ANOVA (with single and multiple IVs), correlation and
regression. You may be asked to come up with hypotheses, tell me whether a
hypothesis is supported (or not), how you determine whether or not a
hypothesis is supported. You will also occasionally be asked to summarize
the research in words (as you've been doing in your project -- for example,
"college men are more likely than women to say they enjoy sex appeals
in ads." I might also ask for managerial implications of findings .
Your understanding of business and marketing can be used to develop more
insightful implications for managers.
*You
may use a 5 x 7 piece of paper/card for notes during the exam.
*Cheaters
will be rewarded with a zero on this exam.
|
|