Marketing Research Is the Heart of Marketing

Marketing is a business practice that is designed to create awareness of a product, service or any notion for which people have to be familiarized or to make them aware of new products and services. Marketing is the process by which organizations create and develop a name for themselves, establish their competitive advantage, and acquire new customers. Marking, promotion, and advertising are the most important aspects of marketing. It is also the most costly and time consuming. In addition, marketing involves various forms of communication.

Marketing Research is the process of collecting information about potential customers, analyzing customer behavior, analyzing market conditions, developing a marketing plan, and testing and tracking the plan to determine the effectiveness of the marketing strategy. Market Research is conducted to gain knowledge about the attributes of competing products and services so as to determine whether similar but cheaper products would serve the same purpose. This enables marketers to find appropriate marketing approaches. For example, if an organization sells health products, it conducts market research to determine the demand for such products among existing users and to assess the profitability of marketing such products through various channels. The other important aspect of marketing research involves analyzing marketing strategies using consumer response to estimate the Return on Marketing Investment (ROMI).

Marketers conduct market research to find out about customers’ preferences, develop marketing plans and campaigns, learn about consumers’ purchasing patterns, and identify the marketing objectives. After this stage, marketers use surveys and questionnaires to learn about customers’ buying decisions, customer service preferences and other important factors. Marketers also conduct interviews and focus group discussions to find out about the marketing ideas and strategies that bear fruit in terms of customer satisfaction. Marketing then employs marketing plans, advertisements, quality and quantity control, distribution, price and other payment methods, and various other techniques to attract customers.