Lecture International marketing (14/e) - Chapter 8

Chapter 8 - Developing a global vision through marketing research. After studying this chapter you will be able to understand: The importance of problem defi nition in international research, the problems of availability and use of secondary data, sources of secondary data, quantitative and qualitative research methods, multicultural sampling and its problems in less-developed countries, using international marketing research.

I n t e r n a t i o n a l M a r k e t i

n g

Developing a Global

Vision Through Marketing Research

What Should You Learn?

• The importance of problem definition in

international research

• The problems of availability and use of

secondary data

• Quantitative and qualitative research methods

• Multicultural sampling and its problems in less

developed countries

• Sources of secondary data

Discussed questions

• What is Marketing Research?

• What is research problem vs managerial

problem?

• What are the major requirements for Marketing

Research?

• What are the Marketing Research Process?

• What are the main factors influencing Marketing

Research Quality?

• What make international Marketing differ?

– Among these MBA programs, who are the major competitors of IU MBA?

– What are the perceived quality of these programs (major competitors only? What are their strengths and weaknesses?

• Design a research plan (proposal) to answer the director’s questions,

including:

– The Director ask you to design 2 proposal: 1 you have only 3 days to do without any budget, 2 you have 2 months and 30 millions VNĐ to do

– Type of research (qualitative or quantitative)

– Techniques used of each type

Option 1

1 How many MBA programs in HCMC? What are their offers (program

characteristics, structure, price, professors, quality, students segments)?

2 Among these MBA programs, who are the major competitors of IU MBA?

3 What are the perceived quality of these programs (major competitors only?

What are their strengths and weaknesses?

Methodology:

• Internet: q1, MBA websites

• Secret shoppers: q3 (partially), q1, q2

• Secondary data: related research (if any): 1,2,3,

newspapers

• Expert interviews: MBA Managers, staffs,

Option 1

1 How many MBA programs in HCMC? What are their offers (program

characteristics, structure, price, professors, quality, students segments)?

2 Among these MBA programs, who are the major competitors of IU MBA?

3 What are the perceived quality of these programs (major competitors only?

What are their strengths and weaknesses?

Option 2: 1 month + 20M VND

• How many MBA programs in HCMC? What are their offers (program

characteristics, structure, price, professors, quality, students segments)?

• Among these MBA programs, who are the major competitors of IU MBA?

• What are the perceived quality of these programs (major competitors only? What are their strengths and weaknesses?

Methodology:

• What is high context vs low context culture?

• What is M-time vs P-time system?

• What is Marketing Research?

• How does Marketing Research help making

marketing decisions?

• What is qualitative research vs quantitative

research?

Global Perspective Japan – Test Market for the World

• Enterprises with international scope of

operations

– Need for current, accurate information magnified

• Marketing research

– The systematic gathering, recording, and analyzing of data to

provide information useful in marketing decision making

• International marketing research involves two

complications

– Information must be communicated across cultural boundaries

– The environments within which the research tools are applied

are often different in foreign markets

Breadth and Scope

of International Marketing Research

• Types of information needed by research

– General information about the country, area, and/or market

– Information to forecast future marketing requirements

► By anticipating social, economic, consumer, and industry trends within specific markets or countries

– Specific market information used to make and develop

Breadth and Scope

of International Marketing Research

• Unisys Corporation’s planning steps for

collecting and assessing the following types

of information

1 Economic

2 Cultural, sociological; and political climate

3 Overview of market conditions

4 Summary of the technological environment

5 Competitive situation

Top 20 Countries for Marketing

Research Expenditures (millions of dollars)

Exhibit 8.1

The Research Process

• Research process steps

1 Define the research problem and establish research objectives

2 Determine the sources of information to fulfill the research

objectives

3 Consider the costs and benefits of the research effort

4 Gather relevant data from secondary or primary sources, or both

5 Analyze, interpret, and summarize the results

6 Effectively communicate the results to decision makers

• Research steps are similar for all countries

– Variations and problems can occur in implementation

► Differences in cultural and economic development

Defining the Problem and Establishing Research Objectives

• The major difficulty is converting a series of

often ambiguous business problems into tightly

drawn and achievable research objectives

• The first, most crucial step in research is more

critical in foreign markets because an unfamiliar environment tends to could problems definition

• Other difficulties in foreign research stem from

failures to establish problem limits broad enough

to include all relevant variables

Problems of Availability and Use of Secondary Data

• U.S government provides comprehensive

statistics for United States

• Marketing data not matched in other countries

– Quality

– Quantity

– Exceptions are Japan and several European countries

• Continuing efforts to improve data collection

– United Nations

– Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

(OECD)

Availability and Reliability of Data

• Most countries simply do not have governmental

agencies that collect on a regular basis the kinds of

secondary data readily available in the U.S.

• Researchers’ language skills impede access to

information

– Requires native speaker of language

• Official statistics are sometimes too optimistic, reflecting

national pride rather than practical reality, while tax

structures and fear of the tax collector often adversely

affect data

– Less-developed countries prone to optimism

Comparability of Data

• Issues with data (especially in less developed,

countries)

– Data can be many years out of date

– Data collected on an infrequent and unpredictable schedule

• Too frequently, data are reported in different

categories or in categories much too broad to be

of specific value

Validating Secondary Data

• Questions to judge the reliability of secondary data

sources

– Who collected the data?

– Would there be any reason for purposely misrepresenting the facts?

– For what purposes was the data collected?

– How was the data collected?

– Are the data internally consistent and logical in light of known data sources

or market factors?

• Checking the consistency of one set of secondary

data with other data of known validity

Gathering Primary Data – Quantitative and Qualitative Research

• Primary data

– Data collected specifically for the particular research project

• Quantitative research

– Usually a large number of respondents

– Respondents answer structured oral or written questions using a specific response format (such as yes/no) or to select a

response from a set of choices

– Responses can be summarized in percentages, averages, or

other statistics

► Toto – a Japanese firm with the premiers quantitative research on bathroom and toilet technology

• Qualitative research is helpful in revealing the

impact of sociocultural factors on behavior

Gathering Primary Data – Quantitative and Qualitative Research

Problems

of Gathering Primary Data

• Hinges on the ability of the researcher to get

correct and truthful information that addresses

research objectives

• Problems in international marketing research

– Stem from differences among countries

– Range from inability or unwillingness of respondents to

communicate their opinions

– Inadequacies in questionnaire translation

Ability to Communicate Opinions

• Formulating opinions about a product or concept

– Depends on the respondent’s ability to recognize the usefulness

of such a product of concept

– Product or concept must be understood and used in community

• The more complex the concept, the more

difficult it is to design research that will help the respondent communicate meaningful opinions

and reactions

– Gerber has more experience in trying to understand consumers

Willingness to Respond

• Cultural differences provide best explanation for

unwillingness or inability of many to respond to research surveys

• The role of the male, the suitability of personal

based inquiries, and other

gender-related issues can affect willingness to respond

• Less direct measurement techniques and

nontraditional data analysis methods may also

be more appropriate

Sampling in Field surveys

• Problems in sampling stem from the lack of

adequate demographic data and available lists

from which to draw meaningful samples

• Affected by a lack of detailed social and

economic information

– No officially recognized census information

– No other listings that can serve as sampling frames

– Incomplete and out-of-date telephone directories

– No accurate maps of population centers

Language and Comprehension

• The most universal survey research problem in

foreign countries is the language barrier

• Literacy poses yet another problem

• Marketers use three different techniques to help

ferret out translation errors ahead of time

– Back translation

– Parallel translation

– Decentering

Multicultural Research –

a Special Problem

• As companies become global marketers and

seek to standardize various parts of the

marketing mix across several countries,

multicultural studies become more important

• Multicultural research involves dealing with

countries that have different languages,

economies, social structures, behavior, and

attitude patterns

• In some cases the entire research design may

Research on the Internet –

a Growing Opportunity

• One billion users in more than 200 countries

– One-sixth in U.S.

• International Internet use is growing almost twice as

fast as American use

• Uses for Internet in international research

– Online surveys and buyer panels

– Online focus groups

– Web visitor tracking

– Advertising measurement

– Customer identification systems

– E-mail marketing lists

– Embedded research

Estimating Market Demand

• To assess current product demand and forecast

future demand

– Requires reliable historical data

• When the desired statistics are not available, a

close approximation can be made

– Using local production figures plus imports, with adjustments for exports and current inventory levels

• Two methods of forecasting demand

– Expert opinion

► The key in using expert opinion to help in forecasting demand is triangulation

Personal Computer and Mobile Phone

Diffusion Rate (per 1,000 people)

Exhibit 8.2

Personal Computer Mobil Phone

Problems in Analyzing and Interpreting Research Information

• Accepting information at face value in foreign

markets is imprudent

• The foreign market researcher must posses

three talents to generate meaningful marketing information

1 The researcher must posses a high degree of cultural understanding of the market in which research is being conducted

2 A creative talent for adapting research methods is necessary

3 A skeptical attitude in handling both primary and secondary data is

Responsibility for Conducting

Marketing Research

• A company in need of foreign market research

can rely on an outside foreign-based agency or domestic company with a branch in that country

• A trend toward decentralization of the research

function is apparent

– Local analysts appear to be able to provide information more

rapidly and accurately

► Control rests in hands closer to the market

– Disadvantage lies in ineffective communications with

home-office executives

► Unwarranted dominance of large-market studies in decisions about global standardization

Responsibility for Conducting

Marketing Research

• A comprehensive review of the different

approaches to multicountry research suggests

– Ideal approach is to have local researchers in each country,

– Close coordination between the client company and the local

research companies

• Two stages of analysis are necessary

– Individual-country level

– Multi-country level

Communicating with Decision Makers

• Gathered information must be given to decision

makers in a timely manner

• Decision makers should be directly involved not

only in problem definition and questions

formulation, but also in the fieldwork

• Even when both managers and customers

speak the same language and are from the

same culture, communication can become

garbled in either direction

Managing the Cultural Barrier

in International Marketing Research

Exhibit 8.3

• Country information at:

– CIA World Fact Book

– US State Department and

US State Department Country Commercial Guides

– The Economist

– Eldis: Development Information

– Asian country information

– Central and South American country information

– Eastern European country information

– Middle Eastern country information

– African country information: Africa Guide and Africa

Online

• Department of Commerce:

– International Trade Administration

– Hoover's Online

– The Public Register's Annual Report Service

– The Annual Reports Library

• International Business and Exporting Links at:

• The basis objective of the market research

function is providing management with

information for more accurate decision making

• Customer attitudes about providing information

to a researcher are culturally conditioned

• Foreign market information surveys must be

carefully designed to elicit the desired data and

at the same time not offend the respondent’s

sense of privacy

• Many foreign markets have inadequate or

unreliable bases of secondary information

• Three keys to successful international marketing

research

– The inclusion of natives of the foreign culture on research teams– The use of multiple methods and triangulation

– The inclusion of decision makers, even top executives, who

must on occasion talk directly to or directly observe customers in foreign markets