Marketing Research

Instructions:
Marketing research aims to provide accurate information that reflects a true state of affairs, and thus should be conducted impartially. While research is always influenced by the researcher’s research philosophy, it should be free from the personal or political biases of the researcher or the management.

Marketing decisions should be research-based. Decisions based on high-quality information should produce better outcomes. One reason small businesses fail is because owners do not consistently make fact-based decisions.

Directions:
For this assignment, you will complete a market research project. It will be helpful to review Section 10.2 Steps in the Marketing Research Process (https://open.lib.umn.edu/principlesmarketing/chapter/10-2-steps-in-the-marketing-research-process/) as you complete this assignment.

Assume you have decided to make your lifelong dream of becoming an entrepreneur a reality. You want to open a retail brick-and-mortar business (any retail business of your choosing), but you are not sure of the best location for your business. Use the 7-step marketing research process to determine the ideal location for your retail business. Identifying a specific street address is not required, but you should at a minimum identify the best zip code for your retail business.

7-Step Marketing Research Process
Step 1: Define the Problem (Hint: The problem is you need to determine the ideal location for your new brick-and-mortar business.)

Step 2: Design the Research

Step 3: Design the Data Collection Forms

Step 4: Specify the Sample

Step 5: Collect the Data

Step 6: Analyze the Data

Step 7: Write the Research Report and Present Its Findings

Formatting:
The body of your APA-formatted report must be at least 500 words. An abstract is not required. Your report must include the following: (1)

*Title Page. The title page explains what the report is about, when it was conducted and by whom, and who requested it.

*Table of Contents. The table of contents outlines the major parts of the report, as well as any graphs and charts, and the page numbers on which they can be found.

*Executive Summary. The executive summary summarizes all the details in the report in a very quick way. Many people who receive the report—both executives and non-executives—won’t have time to read the entire report. Instead, they will rely on the executive summary to quickly get an idea of the study’s results and what to do about those results.

*Methodology and Limitations. The methodology section of the report explains the technical details of how the research was designed and conducted. The section explains, for example, how the data was collected and by whom, the size of the sample, how it was chosen, and whom or what it consisted of (e.g., the number of women versus men or children versus adults).

*Findings. The findings section is a longer, fleshed-out version of the executive summary that goes into more detail about the statistics uncovered by the research that bolster the study’s findings. If you have related research or secondary data on hand that back up the findings, it can be included to help show that the study did what it was designed to do.

*Recommendations. The recommendations section should outline the course of action you think should be taken based on the findings of the research and the purpose of the project. For example, if you conducted a global market research study to identify new locations for stores, make a recommendation for the locations (Mersdorf, 2009, as cited in University of Minnesota, 2010).