Research Techniques

Type of research


Quantitative Research - One of the two main types of research is based on measurable facts and information that can be counted. Also, producing numericial ans statistical data.


Qualitative Research -  This kind of research is different as its based on opinions, attitudes and preferences rather than hard facts and figures.


Primary Research -

Primary research consists in research to collect original primary data. It is often undertaken after the researcher has gained some insight into the issue by collecting secondary data. This can be through numerous forms, including questionnaires, direct observation and telephone interviews amongst others.
When marketers conduct research to collect original data for their own needs it is called primary research. This process has the marketer or someone working for the marketer designing and then carrying out a research plan. As we noted earlier, primary research is often undertaken after the researcher has gained some insight into the issue by collecting secondary data.
While not as frequently used as secondary research, primary research still represents a significant part of overall marketing research. For many organizations, especially large consumer products firms, spending on primary research far exceeds spending on secondary research.
A good example relating to media is questionnaires, surveys, and other subsidiaries and to go into more detail here are some examples of what audiences preferences are when it comes to media products research you would use for questionnaires: The primary research market consists of marketers carrying out their own research and an extensive group of companies offering their services to marketers. These companies include:

-What music the certain age group likes

-What gender

- Artists, agents, journalists, Photographers, music companies, gigs, tickets, festivals

- Ethnic group

- How often people go to gigs, festivals

• Full-Service Market Research Firms – These companies develop and carryout the full research plan for their clients.  Qualitatative research for Full- service market firms consist of Individual & paired depth interviews, Depth interviews by telephone, Group discussions (Focus groups), Mini-groups and triads, Web usability studies, Diaries, Immersion Sessions, Gang surveys. Quantitative research for Full-service market firms show Basic market surveys (such as Usage and Attitude surveys), Product tests, Advertising research surveys, Customer satisfaction surveys. The image above is a really good example of what a Full-service market firm is.

• Partial-Service Market Research Firms – These companies offer expertise that address a specific part of the research plan, such as developing methods to collect data (e.g., design surveys), locating research participants or undertaking data analysis.

• Research Tools Suppliers – These firms provide tools used by researchers and include data collection tools (e.g., online surveys), data analysis software and report presentation products.

Primary research is collected in a research “instrument” designed to record information for later analysis. Marketing researchers use many types of instruments from basic methods that record participant responses to highly advanced electronic measurement where research participants are connected to sophisticated equipment.

Secondary Research -

Secondary Research (also known as desk research) involves the summary, collation and/or synthesis of existing research rather than primary research, where data is collected from, for example, research subjects or experiments. Such secondary research uses the primary research of others typically in the form of research publications and reports.

Definition: Market research that's already compiled and organized for you. Examples of secondary information include reports and studies by government agencies, trade associations or other businesses within your industry. Secondary research uses outside information assembled by government agencies, industry and trade associations, labor unions, media sources, chambers of commerce, and so on. It's usually published in pamphlets, newsletters, trade publications, magazines, and newspapers. Secondary sources include the following:

• Public sources - These are usually free, often offer a lot of good information, and include government departments, business departments of public libraries, and so on.
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• Commercial sources - These are valuable, but usually involve cost factors such as subscription and association fees. Commercial sources include research and trade associations, such as Dun & Bradstreet and Robert Morris & Associates, banks and other financial institutions, and publicly traded corporations.
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• Educational institutions -These are frequently overlooked as valuable information sources even though more research is conducted in colleges, universities, and technical institutes than virtually any sector of the business community.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Research Methods


Primary Research - 

Advantages:

• Addresses specific research issues as the researcher controls the search design to fit their needs great control; not only does primary research enable the marketer to focus on specific subjects, it also enables the researcher to have a higher control over how the information is collected. Taking this into account, the researcher can decide on such requirements as size of project, timeframe and goal.

Disadvantages:

• Compared to secondary research, primary data may be very expensive in preparing and carrying out the research. Costs can be incurred in producing the paper for questionnaires or the equipment for an experiment of some sort.

• In order to be done properly, primary data collection requires the development and execution of a research plan. It takes longer to undertake primary research than to acquire secondary data.

• Some research projects, while potentially offering information that could prove quite valuable, may not be within the reach of a researcher.

• By the time the research is complete it may be out of date.

• Low response rate has to be expected.

Secondary Research -

Advantages:

• There are many advantages to using secondary research. This includes the relative ease of access to many sources of secondary data. In the past secondary data accumulation required marketers to visit libraries, or wait for reports to be shipped by mail. Now with the availability of online access, secondary research is more openly accessed. This offers convenience and generally standardized usage methods for all sources of secondary research.

• The use of secondary data has allowed researchers access to valuable information for little or no cost to acquire. Therefore, this information is much less expensive then if the researchers had to carry out the research themselves.

• The use of secondary research may help the researcher to clarify the research question. Secondary research is often used prior to primary research to help clarify the research focus.

• The use of secondary data collection is often used to help align the focus of large scale primary research. When focusing on secondary research, the researcher may realize that the exact information they were looking to uncover is already available through secondary sources. This would effectively eliminate the need and expense to carry out there own primary research.

• In many cases, the originators of secondary research include details of how the information was collected. This may include information detailing the procedures used in data collection and difficulties encountered in conducting the primary research. Therefore, the detailed difficulties may persuade the researcher to decide that the potential information obtained is not worth the potential difficulties in conducting the research.

Disadvantages:

• There are some disadvantages to using secondary research. The originators of the primary research are largely self-governed and controlled by the marketer. Therefore, the secondary research used must be scrutinized closely since the origins of the information may be questionable. Moreover, the researcher needs to take sufficient steps to critically evaluate the validity and reliability of the information provided. For example certain statistics arent always what they resemble as justification plays a major roll in Secondary researchs' disadvantages.

• In many cases, secondary data is not presented in a form that exactly meets the researcher’s needs. Therefore, the researcher needs to rely on secondary data that is presented and classified in a way that is similar to their needs.

• In many cases, researchers find information that appears valuable and promising. The researcher may not get the full version of the research to gain the full value of the study. This is because many research suppliers offer free portions of their research and then charge expensive fees for their full reports.

• When using secondary research, one must exercise caution when using dated information from the past. With companies competing in fast changing industries, an out-of-date research reports many have little or no relevance to the current market situation.

Qualititative Research -


Advantages:

Qualitative research is useful during the early stages of a study when the researcher may be unsure of exactly what will be studied or what to focus on. This type of research does not need a strict design plan before it begins. This gives the researcher freedom to let the study unfold more naturally. Another advantage to qualitative research is the researcher gains more detailed and rich data in the form of comprehensive written descriptions or visual evidence, such as photographs. This type of research looks at context and social meaning and how it affects individuals, which is advantageous particularly in the social sciences.

Disadvantages:

The researcher of a study using qualitative research is heavily involved in the process, which gives the researcher a subjective view of the study and its participants. The researcher interprets the research according to his or her own biased view, which skews the data gathered. Another disadvantage is that this research method is very time consuming and can last for months or even years.

Quantitative Research -

Advantages:

Quantitative research allows the researcher to measure and analyze data. The relationship between an independent and dependent variable is studied in detail. This is advantageous because the researcher is more objective about the findings of the research. Quantitative research can be used to test hypotheses in experiments because of its ability to measure data using statistics.

Disadvantages:

The main disadvantage of quantitative research is the context of the study or experiment is ignored. Quantitative research does not study things in a natural setting or discuss the meaning things have for different people as qualitative research does. Another disadvantage is that a large sample of the population must be studied; the larger the sample of people researched, the more statistically accurate the results will be.

To evaluate my understanding of primary research, audience research, marketing research and production research.

Primary research in media begins with looking into who your audience is and how to show what they want. To do this I started by looking into questionnaires and surveys and how to get the audiences attention and why they would would interested. For example when to release the product and what information to provide the viewer/readers with.

Secondly, the audience research preferably referes to marketing research through seeing what different things the viewers/readers want. As well as there being other products released at the same time we will want to see want audiences expect and seeing what they want will visualise what to put into the product. Also, you have to take into account capitalisation as to where nationally you want to sell the product and how to transport these products and the costs of transport. Then I looked into Production research and what franchisers to sell your product to and how to transport these products.
How much the cost of
City or Country of where you want to produce the product, What stores to sell it too, where most readers expect to buy it from,  the cost of printing, how much it would be to sell, how many copies,  the cost for journalists, photographers, writers and other job roles.