Managing

Marketing Information
to Gain Customer
Insights
 Choose a business near Mills College at Northeastern (if you cannot think of a business in
Oakland or the Bay Area then choose a national chain that people know):

• 1. Company Background

• How do you think they segment their market? What is their target market segment?

• What is their position in the market? What is their value proposition, and how do they
Homework
HW2: Research

differentiate themselves from the competition?

• 2. Research plan

• Identify and explain a simple marketing question or problem you think might be facing
the business.

• Identify some form of data that could help answer this question. Consider:
 Is it primary or secondary data?
 What is the population of interest? What is the sampling plan they should use or are
most likely to use?
 What research approach or method would make the most sense to collect the data?

• Identify how this data would inform the business's decision making.

• 3. Example data

• Collect some example data points. This could mean surveying or interviewing a few
people, observing customers, collecting online reviews, or whatever makes sense given
what you have suggested.
 This is not enough data to draw actual conclusions. I'm interested in seeing that you
understand what the data looks like, not in seeing that you can collect a lot of it.
Marketing Research

1 2 3 4 5

Explain the Define the Outline the role of Explain how Discuss the special
importance of marketing marketing companies analyze issues some
information in information research and the and use marketing researc
gaining insight system and discuss steps in the marketing informa hers face,
about the its parts. marketing tion. including public
marketplace and research process. policy and
customers. ethics issues.
First Stop: Marketing
Research at P&G:
Creating Irresistibly
Superior Experiences

To gain deep customer

insights, P&G employs a wide
range of marketing research
approaches—from traditional
large-scale surveys and small-
scale focus groups to real-time
social media listening, mobile
surveys, and big data
analytics.
Marketing
Information
• Customer needs and motives for
buying are difficult to determine.
• Required by companies to obtain
customer and market insights
• Generated in great quantities
with the help of information
technology and online sources
• Big data refers to the huge and
complex data sets generated by
today’s sophisticated
information generation,
collection, storage, and
analysis technologies.
 Customer
Insights
• Fresh marketing information-
based understandings of
customers and the marketplace
 Become the basis for creating
customer value, engagement,
and relationships

• Customer insights teams collect

customer and market information
from a wide variety of sources

• Your own Marketing Information

System can produce very valuable
insights

• Original and counter-intuitive

insights are most valuable

This Photo by Unknown author is lic ensed under CC BY.

The Marketing • Information needed can be obtained from
• Internal databases
Information • Competitive marketing intelligence
System • Marketing research
Assessing
Marketing
Information Needs
• A good MIS balances the
information users would
like to have against
 What they really need
 What is feasible to offer
• Obtaining, analyzing,
storing, and delivering
information is costly.
 Firms must decide whether
the value of the insight is
worth the cost.
Internal
Databases
Internal databases are
collections of consumer
and market information
obtained from data sources
within the company network.

Through skillful customer

database development and
use, Stitch Fix has built high
levels of customer satisfaction
and loyalty.
Micromarketing
Micromarketing is the use of
community-, store-, or individual-
level data to personalize the
value proposition to improve
targeting. Marketing
intelligence and/or market
research is used to collect
the necessary data.

Personalized recommendations,
coupons based on purchase
history, offers based on length
since last purchase, etc. are all
examples of micro-marketing.
Competitive Marketing Intelligence
Systematic monitoring, collection, and analysis of
information
• About consumers, competitors, and developments in
the marketing environment
Techniques
• Observing consumers firsthand
• Quizzing the company’s own employees
• Benchmarking competitors’ products
• Conducting online research
• Monitoring social media buzz
• What you did for your SWOT analysis homework is an
example of Market Intelligence gathering
Marketing
Research
• Systematic design,
collection, analysis, and
reporting of data relevant to
a specific marketing
situation facing an
organization
• Approaches followed by
firms:
 Use own research
departments
 Hire outside research
specialists
 Purchase data collected by
outside firms
Defining the Problem and Research
Objectives
Exploratory research
• Used to gather preliminary information
• Helps to define problems and suggest hypotheses
Descriptive research
• Used to better describe the market potential for a
product or the demographics and attitudes of
consumers
Causal research
• Used to test hypotheses about cause-and-effect
relationships [experiments, A/B tests, etc.]
Research Approaches
Observational research
• Gathering primary data by observing relevant people,
actions, and situations
Ethnographic research
• Sending trained observers to watch and interact with
consumers in their natural environments

Survey research
• Asking people questions about their knowledge,
attitudes, preferences, and buying behavior

Experimental research
• Selecting matched groups of subjects, giving them
different treatments, controlling related factors, and
checking for differences in group responses
Secondary Data
• Information that already exists
• Collected for another purpose
• Sources:
 Company’s internal database
 Purchased from outside suppliers
 Commercial online databases
 Internet search engines
• Advantages:
 Low cost
 Obtained quickly
 Cannot collect otherwise
• Disadvantages:
 Potentially Irrelevant
 Inaccurate
 Dated
 Biased
Primary
Data
Collected for a specific
research task.

Example: Ethnographic
research: Under Intuit’s
“follow-me-home” program,
teams of Intuit employees
visit customers in their homes
or offices to watch them use
the company’s products in
real life.
Online Behavioral and Social
Tracking and Targeting
Online listening
• Provides valuable insights into what consumers are
saying or feeling about a brand
Behavioral targeting
• Uses online consumer tracking data to target
advertisements and marketing offers to specific
consumers
Social targeting
• Mines individual online social connections and
conversations from social networking sites
Qualitative vs.
Quantitative
Sampling Plan (for
quant research)
• A sample is a segment of the population
selected to represent the population as a
whole.

• Decisions required for sampling design:

 Sampling unit - People to be studied
 Sample size - Number of people to be studied
 Sampling procedure - Method of choosing the
people to be studied
 Types of Samples
Bl a
nk

Probability Sample
Simple random sample Every member of the population has a known and equal
chance of selection.
Stratified random The population is divided into mutually exclusive groups
sample (such as age groups), and random samples are drawn from
each group.
Cluster (area) sample The population is divided into mutually exclusive groups
(such as blocks), and the researcher draws a sample of the
groups to interview.
Bl a
nk

Nonprobability
Sample
Convenience sample The researcher selects the easiest population members
from which to obtain information.
Judgment sample The researcher uses his or her judgment to select
population members who are good prospects for accurate
information.
Quota sample The researcher finds and interviews a prescribed number
of people in each of several categories.
 Biological and neurological measures: Online
New Research travel giant Expedia’s “Usability Lab” uses
biometrics and observation to learn about the
Instruments deep-down tensions and delights customers
experience during their trip-planning journeys.
Implementing the Research Plan
Data collection
• Researchers should guard against various problems.
 Techniques and technologies
 Data quality
 Timeliness

Processing the data

• Check for accuracy
• Code for analysis

Analyzing the data

• Tabulate results
• Compute statistical measures
 Customer Relationship
Management (C R M)

• Managing detailed
information about
individual customers
• Carefully managing
customer touch points to
maximize customer loyalty
• Consists of software and
analysis tools that
 Integrate customer
information from all sources
 Analyze data in depth
 Apply the results

This Photo by Unknown author is lic ensed under CC BY-ND.

Big Data and
Marketing Analytics
• Marketing analytics consists of the
analysis tools, technologies, and processes
by which marketers dig out meaningful
patterns in big data to gain customer
insights and gauge marketing performance.
Customer
Relationship
Management (C R M)
Netflix, big data, and CRM:
While members are busy
watching Netflix videos,
Netflix is busy watching
them—watching them
very, very closely. Then it
uses the big data insights
to give customers exactly
what they want.
Group Activity
(5 minutes)
You are considering introducing a new
product

You do NOT have a prototype yet.

Come up with at least two types of research

you may want to carry out to support this
task. Justify your answer.
Intrusions on Consumer Privacy

• Failure to address privacy issues results in

 Angry, less cooperative consumers
 Increased government intervention
• Best approaches for researchers:
 Asking only for the information needed
 Using the information responsibly to provide
customer value
 Avoiding sharing the information without the
customer’s permission
Consumer Data Consumer data protection: Consumer data
breaches can erode consumer trust and damage
Security and hard-won customer–brand relationships.
Companies must take consumer data security
Protection very seriously.
What is
marketing?
Marketing is....
Engaging customers and managing profitable customer
relationships
Marketing creates value for customers to capture value
from customers

The marketing concept emphasizes delivering customer

satisfaction in order to create loyalty...
...and thus capture customer lifetime value (CLV)...
...and in turn ensure customer equity
2 Key Questions
• 1. What is the value proposition? 2. Who is
the target customer?

• What is the value proposition? (The reason

to purchase)
 Positioning
 Point(s) of differentiation (USP)
 The marketing mix (aka the 4Ps)

• Who is the target market?

 Market segmentation and targeting
 How do these customers behave?
 How can we learn about them?
• Positioning •Differentiation
 Does your product occupy a •What is your USP? Unique Selling
clear, distinctive, Proposition
and desirable place relative •Does the
to competing products product actually provide greater value
in customers’ minds? and can target customers tell?
 How does your product •What makes it stand-out from the
compare to the competition? competition?
Customer
Value and
Maslow's
Hierarchy of
Needs
Segmentation
• Market segmentation is the process of dividing
up a market into segments of like-minded
customers

Characteristics
 Geographic
 Demographic
 Psychographic

Behavioral
 Occasion
 Usage and loyalty
 Benefit
Targeting
Market targeting is the process of evaluating each market
segment’s attractiveness based on:

i. Interest in the value proposition

ii. Profitability of the segment

• Special targeting strategies:

 Undifferentiated – mass
 Differentiated – segmented
 Niche – concentrated
 Micromarketing – local and individual (customer intimacy)
Customer
Journey

• What does their Customer

Journey look like? – What
are their needs, wants, and
demands? – What does
their Buyer Decision
Process look like?
AIDA
Market Research
• What kind of market research is useful for studying this target
market?

• What is the research problem and question?

• What information or data needs to be obtained?

 Primary vs. secondary

• What research method(s) are to be used?

 Research approach
 Sampling plan

• How will the research be implemented, and how will results help
decision making?
• What methodology is/was used
to collect the data?

• What variables were collected?

 Demographic
 Psychographic
 Usage Data

• Observational research
(qualitative)
 Ethnographic research
 Online and offline tracking

• Survey research
(quantitative)
 Questionnaire and interview
research
 Experimental research
(A/B testing, taste test)

• Marketing analytics

• Machine learning
How will the Quiz
Work?
• You will be able to access the quiz. I will post an
announcement when it goes live.

• Your quiz must be completed by [_________________ let's

decide together]

• Once you choose to start the quiz, you will have 90 to 120
minutes to complete it.

• Open book and open notes

• Questions are a combination of multiple choice (sometimes

with justification) and very short answer

• You should expect to be able to…

 Evaluate a real business example
 Generate your own examples
 Recognize and apply course concepts
 Understand how course concepts intersect

• You can't copy the book or notes