Remember for the exam:
2.2.3 Data types
Quantitative (numerical) data — Information you can measure or reduce to a number. “How often do you go to the cinema a week?”.
Qualitative (opinions) data — Information that is about people’s feelings, judgements, attitudes and opinions. “What is your favourite colour?”.
Sample — a selection of individuals representing a specific group or target market. For example, when researching pushchairs, the sample will likely be representative and made up of young parents, not OAPs.
| Qualitative | Quantitative | |
|---|---|---|
| • Focus groups • Interviews • News articles • Trade journals • Social media | • Government statistics • Questionnaires using closed questions • Data from published Market research reports | |
| Advantages | + Good for understanding consumer behaviour, feelings and reasoning through detailed answers. | + Quick and easy to collect and analyse. + Easy to repeat and compare results. + Easier to collect and analyse a large sample size. |
| Disadvantages | – People are less likely to respond if they have to write or say lots of information. – Longer to collect, read and analyse. – Hard to get a large sample size. | – Consumer behaviour, reasoning, logic and understanding is hard to collect. – Missing the human element – hard to research & understand human emotions – Rating scales are hard to gather actual opinions as the difference between them may not be the same. – Unhappy or dissatisfied customers are likely to put very negative answers whereas happy is likely to be less extreme. |
2.2.4 Market types
Niche markets are when a business concentrates its entire efforts and resources on serving one segment of the market e.g. vegan chocolate.
Mass markets have a large value of sales by volume e.g. chocolate.
Niche Market
- low sales volume
- small number of competitors
- aimed at a small section of the market
- specialised products
- high profit margins
- e.g. speedboats, luxury sports cars, organic foods
Mass Market
- high sales volume
- large number of competitors
- aimed at a large percentage of the market
- non-specialised products
- low profit margin
- e.g. flow produced chocolate or foods, Amazon & most products sold at superstores
Market Types Quiz
2.2.5 Orientation types
Orientation refers to where new ideas come from.
Where do the Product ideas come from?
- Market orientation – new products are developed based on customer needs and want which are found through market research (customer-led & high levels of market research). Customer & market research led.
- Product orientation – ideas are developed from scientific research and development within the company (focus on business strengths with low levels of customer engagement). Product-led, first to market (first to come out with a new innovative product, competitors will copy).
Apple is famously known for using product orientation and ignoring customer needs and creating what they consider the ‘best’ products regardless. In 2016 Apple removed the headphone jack, causing an uproar. However, in 2020 Apple still had the third-largest market share at 14% of total market sales, up from 12%.
Amazon is known for using Product Orientation to create products that focus on customer needs and wants.
