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A research problem must be accurately and precisely defined, otherwise the task of designing a good research difficult.
Marketing problems may be difficulty-related or opportunity-related. For both, the prerequisite of defining the problem is to identify and diagnose it.
Conduct situation analysis. It provides the basic motivation and momentum for further research.
Get the right answer to the question: What exactly does the firm want (or need) to know? The basic question to address is: How to know that there is a problem? Problems may become apparent from:
deviation from the business plan, company records and reports, customer complaints and grievances, conversations with company employees, and observation of inappropriate behavior or conditions in the firm; the success of the firms competitors, and published materials reporting issues such as, changes in market or environmental trends, new government regulations, anticipated changes in the economy, etc.)
In the initial stage, a problem may be recognized in a very broad and general form only. This may restrict the research program from being comprehensively designed. Both the researcher and the marketing manager (or the research client ) need to work together to formulate the problem into a precise and definite statement. This fact-finding exercise helps the researcher to refine his educated guess to a more accurate problem statement.
Research objectives are related to and determined by the problem definition. In establishing research objectives, the researcher must answer the following questions:
i) What specific information should the project provide? ii) If more than one type of information will be developed from the study, which is the most important? and finally, iii) What are the priorities? When specifying research objectives, development of hypotheses, might be very helpful. When achieved, objectives provide the necessary information to solve the problem.
Research Objectives
Research objectives can be stated as Questions Researchable statements Hypotheses
A hypothesis is a conjectural statement about a relationship between two or more variables that can be tested with empirical data.
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refrigerator. Determine whether, with a built-in refrigerator in the SUV, consumers would need additional cup holders; if so, identify the most convenient locations in the vehicle. Estimate consumer demand for an SUV with Video/TV system at different price points: (i) $1500, (ii) $2000 or (iii) $2500. Identify the characteristics of consumers who would buy the video system.
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