Direct vs Indirect data
“Questions are never indiscreet, answers sometimes are.” Oscar Wilde. When dealing with
marketing analysis there is going to be a constant quest for reliable useful data. In order to
be able to properly navigate the marketing research, you must be able to properly analyze
the data that you receive. This is done by a frame work of questions that will produce data
that truly reflects the attitudes of the segment in a way that is measurable, reliable, and
valid. “Sound questions are critical to effective survey research. Such questions are
unambiguous, concise, appealing, and relevant to the research problem.” These questions
will reveal two types of data, metric and non-metric.
Non-metric data is from the analysis of the qualitative properties of the respondents. These
are nominal data, which will tell you discreet information about the respondent, or ordinal
data, which is preferential information based on a given set. These types are much harder
to put into a measurable form. As stated, “If the data are qualitative, you’re looking at
people’s open-ended and rambling responses to questions.” This is not as conducive to
problem solving as quantitative data.
Metric data is a quantitative form of data about the segment that you are surveying. This
will be ratio or interval data that is on a measurable scale. Ratio gives a natural zero point,
while interval is on a numeric scale that allows for comparison. This data being
“quantitative you’re looking at close-end data, which are far easier and more
straightforward to analyze.” This allows for proper problem identification and leads to
proper decision making. “Good business decisions depend on trustworthy empirical
analyses” and metric data provides the best way of getting measureable, reliable, and valid
answers to those decisions.