________ is less expensive, faster, and more flexible than other methods of data collection.

Despite the data glut that marketing managers receive, they frequently complain that they lack ________.

enough information of the right kind 

A marketing information system (MIS) consists of people and procedures to assess information needs, ________, and help decision makers analyze and use the information.

develop the needed information

The real value of a company’s marketing research and information system lies in the ________.

quality of customer insights it provides 

The marketing information system can serve ________.

• The company's marketing managers
• Suppliers
• Resellers
• Marketing services agencies

A good MIS balances the information users would ________ against what they really ________ and what is ________.

likely to have; need; feasible to offer 

Marketers must weigh carefully the costs of additional information against the ________ resulting from it.

Four common sources of internal data supplied to internal databases include the accounting department, operations, the sales force, and the _____.

Marketing information from which type of database usually can be accessed more quickly and cheaply than other information sources?

_____ is the systematic collection and analysis of publicly available information about consumers, competitors, and developments in the marketing environment.

Which of the following statements regarding marketing intelligence is true?

Marketing intelligence is publicly available information 

Which of the following is not considered a source of marketing intelligence?

• suppliers
• resellers
• key customers
• casual research
• activities of competitors

Which of the following is not a potential source for marketing intelligence?

a.  competitors’ garbage

b.  buying competitors’ products

c.  monitoring competitors’ sales

d.  primary data

e.  purchasing agents

Through which of these sources of information is a competitor least likely to reveal intelligence information?

a.  annual reports

b.  trade show exhibits

c.  Web pages

d.  press releases

e.  internal marketing meetings

internal marketing meetings 

Which of the following is an example of a free online database that a company could access in order to develop marketing intelligence?

US security and exchange commission's database 

To combat marketing intelligence efforts by competitors, Unilever Corporation is now providing ________ to employees.

competitive intelligence training 

_____ is the systematic design, collection, analysis, and reporting of data relevant to a specific marketing situation facing an organization.

What is the first step in the marketing research process?

defining the problem and research objectives 

Which of the steps in the marketing research process has been left out of the following list: defining the problems and research objectives, implementing the research plan, and interpreting and reporting the findings?

developing the research plan 

Causal research is used to ________.

test hypotheses about cause-and-effect relationships

Managers often start with ________ research and later follow with ________ research.

Your colleague is confused about using the marketing research process, as he knows that something is wrong but is not sure of the specific causes to investigate. He seems to be having problems with ________, which is often the hardest step to take.

defining the problem and research objectives 

The objective of ________ research is to gather preliminary information that will help define the problem and suggest hypotheses.

In the second step of the marketing research process, research objectives should be translated into specific ________.

A plan for primary data collection spells out the specific research approaches, contact methods, ________, and instruments that researchers will use to gather data.

Secondary data consists of information ________.

that already exists somewhere and was collected for another purpose

Information collected from online databases on the Internet is an example of ________ data.

Which form of data below can usually be obtained more quickly and at a lower cost than the others?

Secondary data are ________.

Your assistant wants to use secondary data exclusively for the current research project. You advise him that the use of secondary data has some potential problems. Which of the following is

one of them?

a.  It may not exist.

b.  It may not be relevant

c.  It may not be useable.

d.  It is generally more expensive to obtain than primary data

e.  It may not be current.

It is generally more expensive to obtain than primary data 

For primary data to be useful to marketers, it must be relevant, current, unbiased, and ________.

Which method could a marketing researcher use to obtain information that people are unwilling or unable to provide?

Ethnographic research ________.

is gathered where people live and work 

Survey research, though used to obtain many kinds of information in a variety of situations, is best suited for gathering ________ information.

Fredia Pellerano has just discovered the major advantage of survey research. She reports to her supervisor that the advantage is its ________.

Survey research is least likely to be conducted through which of the following?

a.  the Web

b.  the mail

c.  the telephone

d.  observation

e.  person-to-person interactions

Experimental research is best suited for gathering ________ information.

Which of the following contact methods has the poorest response rate?

1.    Which of the following contact methods is generally the least flexible?

a.    telephone interviewing

b.    personal interviewing

c.    mail questionnaires

d.    online questionnaires

e.    online panels

Which form of marketing research is flexible, allows for explanation of difficult questions, and lends itself to showing products and advertisements?

Focus group interviewing has become one of the major marketing research tools for getting insight into consumer thoughts and feelings. However, if the sample size is small, it may be difficult to ________.

generalize from the results

Which of the following is not an advantage of Web-based research?

a.  speed

b.  low costs

c.  almost instantaneous results

d.  dynamic, personal approach

e.  easy to administer

dynamic, personal approach 

Judy Hammerschmidt regularly conducts online marketing research at work. She has found that it has several advantages over traditional methods. Which of these is not an advantage?

It is easy to control who responds to surveys.

Marketing researchers usually draw conclusions about large groups of consumers by studying a small ________ of the total consumer population.

What is a major drawback of probability sampling?

What are the two main types of research instruments used to collect primary data?

questionnaires and mechanical devices 

The most common research instrument used is the ________.

Which of the following is good advice about creating research questionnaires for Mark Hammel, research specialist at New Wave Data, to follow?

Use care in the wording and ordering of questions.   

1.    Which of the following was not mentioned in your text as a mechanical instrument used to conduct market research?

a.  checkout scanners

b.  people meters

c.  eye cameras

d.  telephones

e.    MRI scans

In marketing research, the ________ phase is generally the most expensive and most subject to error.

AMF Research Group must guard against problems during the implementation phase of marketing research for its clients. Which of the following is not a problem that should be anticipated during this phase?

interpreting and reporting the findings

Typically, customer information is buried deep in separate databases, plans, and records of many different company functions and departments. To overcome such problems, which of the following could you try?

customer relationship management 

What is the purpose of a data warehouse?

to integrate information a company already has 

In CRM, findings about customers discovered through ________ techniques often lead to marketing opportunities.

Marketing information has no value until it is used to ________.

make better marketing decision 

What source of marketing information provides ready access to research information, stored reports, shared work documents, contact information for employees and other stakeholders, and more?

The marketing information system is not limited to use by the company it serves. It may also provide information to ________.

When managers use small convenience samples such as asking customers what they think or inviting a small group out to lunch to get reactions, they are using ________.

Small organizations can obtain, with minimal effort, most of which type of data available to large businesses?

A common problem in international marketing research is the availability of ________.

Because of the scarcity of good secondary data, international researchers often must collect their own primary data. An initial problem with this collection is developing good ________.

What do many researchers encounter when conducting market research in foreign countries?

a.  Some countries have few telephones, limiting access to respondents.

b.  Some countries have poor mail services.

c.  Some countries have poor roads that limit personal contacts.

d.  Some cultures may not value marketing research.

Cultural differences, especially those involving language, can add to research costs in foreign markets and can increase the ________.

Anna Gregory just completed reading a marketing research report about the top 25 countries that purchase American products. What might the report say about international research with these countries?

Despite the costs of international research, the costs of not doing it are higher.

According to your text, what are two current major public policy and ethical issues in marketing research?

intrusions on consumer privacy and misuse of research findings

Behavioral targeting, the practice of ________, is being used by more and more companies.

tracking consumers’ online movements and using this information to target ads to them

It has been shown that consumers will gladly provide research information when researchers provide ________.

To consumers, research studies may appear to be little more than vehicles for ________.

pitching a sponsor's products 

Many major companies have created the position of ________ to address concerns about the privacy of customers.

Most marketers today believe they still lack a sufficient quantity of research data to make high-quality decisions.

The real value of marketing research and information lies not in quantity but in the customer insights provided.

Today, marketing managers view research information not only as an input for making internal decisions but also as an input for external partners.

An effective MIS assesses information needs, develops needed information, and distributes the information to help managers use it in decision making.

Too much marketing information can be as harmful as too little.

When you glean information from your company’s accounting and sales records stored in the computer, you are developing an internal database.

You have just extracted sales and cost data used by the accounting department for preparing financial statements. Most likely, this information is complete and in useable form to build an internal marketing database.

It is important to note that data age quickly, so keeping the database current requires a major effort.

Major suppliers and resellers are not important sources of intelligence information for marketing decision making.

Your manager asked you to go through three of your competitors’ garbage bins to gather marketing intelligence from their discarded paperwork. One of them caught you in the act and has summoned you to court. The judge will most likely rule this to be an illegal activity and fine you and your company.

Good sources of marketing intelligence information include competitors’ annual reports, business publications, trade show exhibits, press releases, advertisements, and Web pages.

Your firm faces determined marketing intelligence efforts by competitors. Managers are likely to instruct employees on how to take steps to protect information.

After conducting formal marketing research for your department, you make an oral presentation with notes to management. You are following normal marketing research steps.

Marketing research is the systematic design, collection, analysis, and reporting of data directly relevant to a specific marketing situation facing an organization.

Once the research problems and objectives have been defined, researchers must determine the exact information needed and present it to management.

Marketing researchers can conduct their own searches of secondary data sources today by using commercial online databases.

Secondary data provide good starting points and often help to define problems and research objectives, though most companies must also collect primary data.

Videoconferencing and Internet technology have changed how focus group interviews can be observed.

Focus groups use no interviewer to bias the answers, may produce more honest answers, and can be used to collect large amounts of data at a low cost per respondent.

You have decided upon a method of collecting research data with flexible interviewing, whereby trained interviewers can explain difficult questions and explore issues as the situation requires. Audio-visual aids can also be used. We refer to this as personal interviewing.

The most important issue facing online researchers is the lack of a broad cross section of consumers who have access to the Internet.

ABC Interior Designs wants to collect research data through mechanical observation. The three typical methods are video cameras, checkout scanners, and Internet surveys.

Ideally, a sample should be representative so that the researcher can make accurate estimates of the thoughts and behaviors of the larger population.

You want to calculate confidence limits for sampling error. It would be best to use nonprobability samples.

Questionnaires are the most common research instrument.

Open-ended survey questions are particularly useful in exploratory research.

The researcher interprets findings, draws conclusions, and reports those conclusions to management. Ideally, researchers should present important findings that are useful to the major decisions faced by management to avoid overwhelming them with data.

Interpretation of market research data should be the responsibility of the researchers, not the marketing managers.

You have just identified the “touch points” of the 400 best customers in your database. At this point, you want to manage detailed information about each of them to maximize customer loyalty. You should use customer relationship management (CRM).

Secondary information relevant to international marketing must usually be obtained from different sources on a country-by-country basis, making the data difficult to combine or compare.

Diana Dion is currently researching data sources from within her company to make marketing decisions. Diana is making use of ________ databases.

Your marketing department is attempting to improve strategic decision making, track competitors’ actions, and provide early warning of opportunities and threats. Your department would do well to use ________.

Harvard University is systematically designing, collecting, analyzing, and reporting data in order to market its programs to minority students. What do we call this?

You are about to test hypotheses about decreasing sales in certain markets and their causes. You are involved in what type of research?

Which type of research would be best suited for identifying which demographic groups prefer diet soft drinks and why they have this preference?

Nathan Zabalas owns a regional chain of drug stores. Before expanding nationwide, Nathan is conducting marketing research to determine the best options for opening new stores. He plans to start by collecting secondary data. Which of the following is not a source of secondary data that Nathan might use?

Wal-Mart sends a trained observer to watch and interact with customers as they shop in a Wal-Mart store. This is an example of ________.

Carls Jr. comes out with a new hamburger and releases it in two different cities with two different price points. This is an example of ________.

Maryann Rose is conducting research to determine consumers’ personal grooming habits. Because of the personal nature of the survey questions about this topic, Maryann wants to select the contact method that is most likely to encourage respondents to answer honestly. Which contact method should Maryann select?

Tasoula Jeannopoulos has a limited budget for the market research she needs to conduct; however, the sample size for her research is quite large. Which of the following methods of contact would provide Tasoula with the most cost-effective way to reach a large sample of potential customers?

You want to find out whether Americans between 21 and 40 years of age tend to vote Democratic and whether Americans between 41 and 70 tend to vote Republican. You will most likely use ________ to collect your data.

Loft Industries sells roof trusses to contractors and builders and would like to conduct research to determine how customers assess customer service. Which of the following research instruments would be best for this firm?

ABC Company has decided to use mail questionnaires to collect data. Management recognizes this method has all the following advantages

which one?

has an average response rate 

Michael Quinones is a customer service agent for a national car rental business. He has access to the company’s intranet, which provides performance reports, shared work documents, contact information, and detailed information about customers. Which of the following is this access most likely to enable Michael to do during interactions with customers?

reward customer loyalty with an update or discount 

As a small business consultant, you recommend to your clients that they use no-cost methods of observation to gather market research. Which of the following are you not likely to recommend your clients do?

Hire additional staff to observe extensively

Juanita Petino operates a dress shop in a suburban mall. Her research budget is very small, and thus she utilizes low-cost or no-cost methods to gather research data. One method that works very well for her is to change the themes in her local newspaper and radio advertising and watch the result. Juanita is using ________ to gather data for marketing decisions.

For a small business manager deciding where to relocate within the city, relevant research will

likely include ________.

ways to repackage the company's products 

Marialba Hooper is conducting marketing research for a company that is investigating the possibility of entering multiple international markets. As Marialba plans her research in 30 different countries, upon which of the following is she least likely to rely?

Which data collection method for marketing research is flexible?

Which type of data is most likely and most recommended to start collecting first?

Which approach of collecting primary data is the least structured?

Which of the following best describes data that has already been collected for some other purpose?