Marketing and Market Research

Faculty of Academic StudiesSchool of Business and Professional BTEC Level 3 in Business – 90 Credit Diploma (QCF) Unit 3 Introduction to Marketing Assignment 1 Scenario You work for a professional organisation for marketers. One of the activities that the organisation undertakes is to evaluate the marketing activities of different companies and produce a list of ‘A’-classed marketers. You are asked to carry out research into two possible contenders for inclusion on the list. You need to complete the following tasks as part of your research project. Task 1 Describe how marketing techniques such as branding and relationshipmarketing are used to market products in two organisations. You need to choose one product or service from each organisation to undertake the task. (P1) 2Compare, discussing the similarities and differences, the marketing techniques described in Task 1 used for the product or service chosen in each organisation. (M1) 3Evaluate the effectiveness of the use of techniques in marketing products or services in one of your selected organisations. You need to judge the effectiveness by weighing up the pros and cons of the techniques used. D1) 4Describe the constraints and limitations under which marketers operate, making use of examples to explain your points. (P2) Task 2 Choose one of your selected organisations and investigate its use of market research. You need to complete the following tasks as part of the continuation of your research project. 1. Describe how your selected organisation or any other organisation uses market research to contribute to its development plans. (P3) 2. Explain the limitations of the market research used to contribute to the development of your selected organisation’s marketing plans. (M2) 3.

Make three justified recommendations for improving the validity of the marketing research used to contribute to the development of your selected organisation’s marketing plans. (D2) 4. The results of a questionnaire given to 200 customers of a local fresh sandwich bar to find out about the current range of sandwiches on offer and the standard of service included findings that: • 75% want more children’s sandwiches • 82% want the shop to open longer • 65% said that the staff were unfriendly • 50% said that the contents of the sandwiches should be fresher • 80% said they would prefer more wraps.

Use the results of this market research to produce part of the marketing plan in terms of objectives to be set. (P4) Task 3 Explain how and why groups of customers are targeted for selected products. Select six different groups for products or services of your choice for example, Saga holidays for the over 50s. At least two of your choices must be from the Business-to-business market; remainder can be from the consumer market. Describe the customer profile for each of the six target groups and then explain how and why these groups are targeted. (P5) Task 4

Choose one of your selected organisations and investigate its use of market research. You need to complete the following tasks as part of the continuation of your research project. 1. Develop a coherent marketing mix for a new product or service. (P6) 2. Develop a coherent marketing mix that is targeted at a defined group of potential customers. (M3) Grading tips: Pass Grade P1 – Make sure you understand the various techniques that are listed in the content section of the specification. Try to find out if the companies you choose use any of these techniques.

P2 – Try to find examples of where these laws have been contravened (broken to any degree). Useful websites are those belonging to Trading Standards and the Advertising Standards Authority. P3 – Remember that market research covers a wide area and you can include everything the business does to collect information about its marketplace. P4 – You need to demonstrate that you can apply the results of market research to marketing plans. The statistics are telling certain information that could result in objectives being formulated.

P5 -Make sure that you understand the main bases for segmentation. The better a business can describe its target market, the better chance there will be of success. P6 – Make sure you understand what the elements are of the marketing mix, and how these can be altered to service the targeted market. Merit Grade M1 – For this task you need to find out the similarities and differences that exist between these techniques and discuss these in relation to the two products. Try to stay focused on answering the question and do not end up writing all you know about the techniques.

M2 -You need to understand that the various laws and codes of practice are there predominantly for the protection of the consumer. Try to imagine what it would be like if there were no laws to protect the consumer – this may make it easier for you to answer the task. M3 – Look at the marketing mixes of various products. You may like to research this on the Internet and see how some successful products are managed in terms of their marketing mixes. This research should help you in developing a marketing mix for a selected product. Distinction Grade

D1 -Evaluation is about considering in detail the advantages and disadvantages of something, and coming to conclusions as a result of this analysis. All the techniques can be criticised concerning their usefulness. Find out what these are and then make judgements about the effectiveness of the techniques used. D2 -You need to know that it is important to try to make your market research as valid as possible. This could mean making the sample of sufficient size or making sure that questionnaire answers are not ambiguous, as that could lead to misleading results.