Response rates are higher as the personal element in face to face interview makes refusal to respond less likely. Such interviews can be self-administered, completed by the respondent himself, or administered by the researcher. In sample surveys, personal interviews are used frequently. Probing of the respondent is easier with face to face interviews. Clarifying probes help interviewers to understand what the interviewee is saying. Exploratory probes stimulate interviewees to give full answers. Probing is possible but restricted due to time pressures and the less personalized situation in telephonic interviews. Visual aids can also be used in face to face interviews.

However, interviewer bias may creep in during selection of respondents and administration of the questionnaire. Preparing a structured questionnaire can eliminate some element of interviewer bias. Experimental design testing effectiveness of a stimulus would normally be conducted by this method rather than by a mail survey where there is high non-response rate and lack of control over who completes the questionnaire that would invalidate the results. Use of many open-ended questions in a mail survey would lower response rates, and time restrictions for telephone interviews limit their use for conducting interviews.

Telephone Interviews:

Telephonic interviews have response rates and cost in between face to face interviews and mail surveys. Telephonic interviews allow some degree of flexibility when interviewing, as there is a two way flow of information between the interviewer and the respondent, which is absent in mail surveys, but this flexibility is lesser than in personal interviews. Use of visual aids is not possible. There are limits to the number of questions asked before the respondent either terminates the interview or gives quick and sometimes invalid answers to speed up the process.

Mail Surveys:

These are least expensive and can cover widely dispersed population. Response rate is very low and there is danger of unrepresentative sample. The questionnaire is fully structured and probing is not possible. Control over who fills the questionnaire is low. Visual aids can be supplied and because of self completion, the interviewer bias is less. Response rate can be increased by prior notification by telephone, monetary and non-monetary incentives, by providing stamped return envelopes, granting anonymity to respondents, close and questions in the questionnaire and follow up telephone calls.

Descriptive research, describe something. Such research may be, for instance, meant to describe customers’ beliefs, attitudes, recall of advertisements and knowledge about its content. Experimental research establishes cause and effect. It involves setting up of control procedures to isolate the impact of a factor like money-off on a dependent variable like sales. The key is elimination of other explanations of changes in the dependent variable. Random sampling may be used. Money-off may be applied in a random selection of stores with the remaining stores selling the brand without money-off. Statistical significance testing can be used to test whether differences in sales are caused by money-off or are simple random variations.

Sample Size and Sample Section:

Next, it is important to determine the sample size. This involves arriving at the number of respondents who must be surveyed to yield a representative sample of all demographic subgroups of respondents who are being studied. After selecting the sample size, it must be determined as to how the sample would be selected for response. The sample can be selected by using either the probability methods or by using the non probability methods. The probability method is when every sampling unit has an equal probability of being selected.

Simple random sampling and Stratified random sampling:

In this method each individual in the sampling frame is given a number, and numbers are drawn at random until the sample is complete. Population is broken down into groups, such as those on the basis of age, gender or income, and the random sample is drawn from each group. Each group gets representation in the sample.

Cluster Sampling: The population is divided into mutually exclusive groups, such as residential blocks, and the researcher randomly selects residential blocks to be interviewed.

Convenience Sample: The researcher selects the most easily available sampling units or respondents from the population and interviews them.

Judgment Sample: The researcher uses judgment to select population members from whom appropriate information can be obtained.

Exploratory research is the preliminary exploration of the research area prior to main quantitative data collection and after the acceptance of the proposal by the client. But it can also take place before the client-agency briefing meeting and submission of the proposal. Exploratory research allows the researcher to understand the people who are to be interviewed in the main data collection stage and the market that is being researched.

Secondary Research:

Secondary data is compiled by other people and for other purposes and is not meant specifically for the research in question. Internal records and reports of previous research carried out by the company, external sources like government, trade associations, newspapers, magazines, internet may be sources of obtaining secondary data. Secondary data is easy to access and obtain, and is relatively inexpensive.

Qualitative Research:

Focus groups involve unstructured or semi-structured discussions between a trained moderator, who is often a psychologist, and a group of consumers. The moderator has a list of areas to cover within the topic and leads the discussion, but allows the group considerable freedom to discuss issues which are important to them. By arranging groups of people to discuss their beliefs, attitudes, motivations, behaviors and preferences a good deal of knowledge is gained about the consumer. The resultant data from focus group discussions is interpreted by experts. The data obtained from discussions is helpful when designing the questionnaire for conducting quantitative research, which will focus on what is important to the respondent.

The instrument is thus worded in the language that the respondent uses and understands. Depth interviews involve interviewing consumers individually for one or two hours about a topic. The objectives are similar to the group discussions, but depth interviews are used when presence of other people could inhibit honest answers and viewpoints, when the topic requires individual treatment like in finding an individual’s decision-making process, and where organization of a group is not feasible as is the case with busy executives.

Marketing information is formally gathered, stored, analyzed and distributed to managers in accordance with their informational needs at a regular interval on a planned basis. The system is built upon an understanding of the informational needs of marketing, and supplies that information when, where and how the managers require it. Data are derived from the marketing environment and transferred into information that marketing managers can use in their decision-making.

Internal Continuous Data and Internal ad-hoc Data:

MIS can convert financial data like profitability of a particular product, customer or a distribution channel into a form usable by marketing department. This is done by means of disaggregating the database of sales of products to customers. Information like allocation of discounts and transport costs to products and customers etc. are stored in the MIS. The detailed description of transaction with the customers and the associated costs allow marketers to carry out analysis of their marketing activities.

Sales force are monitored by means of recording sales achieved, number of new accounts opened, size of orders, number of calls made etc. This can be recorded in total or broken down by product or customer. This data can provide information on sales force effectiveness. The data of customer transactions and associated costs can also be used for specific purpose. Management may look at how sales have reacted to a price increase or change in advertising copy. Capturing data on MIS allows specific analysis to be conducted when needed.

Environmental Scanning and Marketing Research:

Environmental analysis whereby economic, social, legal, technological forces are monitored should be considered part of MIS. These are the forces that shape the context within which suppliers, company, distributors and the competition do business. Environmental scanning provides an early warning system for the forces which may impact a company’s products and markets in the future. Scanning enables an organization to act upon rather than react to opportunities and threats. The focus is on the longer term perspective allowing a company to be in the position to plan ahead. It is a major input into strategic decisions.