E. census data
77. When conducting a research study attempting to understand what features were most important to automobile consumers, Gary’s Research
Company used a questionnaire containing __________ questions, with a predetermined set of response options.
78. Quincy had no idea how consumers would respond to a survey about attitudes toward a program opening up space travel to private citizens. He
could use __________ to allow respondents to answer in their own words.
79. The owner of A. C. Flora Ford Dealership wanted to know why consumers chose his company to purchase a car. He was fairly sure that most
customers had one of three reasons—service, reputation, or location—but wanted to know which was revealed as the most frequent reason for
purchasing. A. C. Flora will probably use a survey with __________ questions to address his research problem.
80. All of the following are guidelines for developing a marketing research questionnaire except
81. In questionnaire design, a question such as “When was the first time you went to a dentist?”
82. In questionnaire design, a question such as “Marketing is the best part of the business program, isn’t it?”
83. In questionnaire design, a question such as “Do you like Wendy’s hamburgers and fries?”
84. In questionnaire design, a question such as “Do anti-lock braking systems reduce car accidents?”
85. Charles wants to survey recent customers about the quality of service they received at his small auto service dealership. He has customers’ mailing
and e-mail addresses. Charles will likely use an online survey primarily because it offers
86. __________ research is a type of quantitative research that manipulates variables to help determine cause and effect.
87. Each time you go to the grocery store and have your purchases scanned while using a loyalty or bonus reward card, you are contributing to a
database that can help marketers determine all of the following except
88. Supermarkets collect information about individual customers through their use of loyalty cards, and then analyze the data to look for patterns in
purchases. This is an example of
89. When a research team has gathered data for specific research needs, this is known as
90. Which of the following statements best describes secondary data?
91. Which of the following types of research would be considered quantitative research?
92. Imagine that you currently operate a clothing boutique, and you want to add another boutique in a new location. You need to obtain data to
determine the size of your potential market. Which data source would you use?
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93. With more than 200 million active customers and billions of pieces of shopping data, Amazon qualifies as a
94. All of the following are guidelines provided by the American Marketing Association for conducting marketing research except
95. The number of participants who discontinue their use of a service divided by the average number of total participants is called
96. All of the following data sources would be considered external secondary data except
97. Which of the following types of data would be the best choice for Wendy’s fast-food restaurants if the headquarters office wants to know how many
hamburgers versus chicken sandwiches it has sold in past years?
98. A restaurant chain is working on improving the quality of its food and service. To track its progress it recruits customers who agree to respond to
customer satisfaction surveys once every three months over the next two years. What kind of data is the restaurant chain collecting?
99. Which of the following is an unstructured question?
101. Coca-Cola’s experiments using ____________ record participants’ faces as they watch advertisements or prototypes, then assess how their eyes
moved, when they smiled or frowned, and so on.
102. What is neuromarketing?
103. McDonald’s introduced a Favorites Under 400 Calorie Menu as part of an attempt to reverse the perception that McDonald’s sells only unhealthy
food. Suppose that McDonald’s, as a follow-up, collects and analyzes social media posts from Facebook, Twitter, and similar sites, hoping to understand
whether or not consumer perceptions are improving. This would be an example of
104. How might a book publisher use blogs in its marketing research efforts?
105. What type of interview contains a small group of participants and a trained moderator that guides the conversation?
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106. Which of the following is an example of secondary research?
107. Digital billboards embedded with ________ software can identify passersby and then display ads targeted to them, based on their age, gender, and
attention level.
108. Mary‘s Bakery is trying to determine what price to charge for its cookies, so Mary places a low price on them and raises it each week, keeping track
of how many she sells. Then she determines what her cost was for the cookies and determines which price was the most profitable. What form of
research was Mary conducting?
109. Qualtrics, SurveyMonkey, and Zoomerang are examples of
110. Which of the following is an example of an unstructured question?
111. A typical focus group has ________ members.
112. Nadia stood outside the mall and asked people which stores they visited and if they bought anything. If they said yes, she asked them what they
bought and how they came to the decision to buy that item. What form of research was Nadia most likely conducting?
113. Firms that are engaged in sentiment mining are analyzing data collected from
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114. The term _______ refers to the enormous amount of information that firms now have access to but cannot handle using conventional data
management and data mining software.
115. Mattel wanted to determine if a new toy would appeal to preschoolers, so it put six 4-year-olds in a room with several toys and waited to see which
ones they played with. What form of research is this?
116. If a cable television company had 100 million subscribers at the end of the year, and 2 million of its subscribers left its service, it would have a
churn rate of
117. Before deciding on a new promotional campaign, Jeffrey’s Muffins looked at its customers’ buying patterns over a 15-year period as determined by
their use of a loyalty card. What method did Jeffrey’s use to make sense of the data that were available?
118. Scanner data are used in quantitative research obtained from scanner readings of Universal Product Code (UPC) labels at checkout counters. The
data from these purchases are likely to be acquired by leading marketing research firms such as ___________, which use this information to help
leading consumer packaged-goods firms (e.g., Kellogg’s, Pepsi, Kraft) assess what is happening in the marketplace.
119. Both major political parties have developed proprietary databases that contain vast information about voters, broken down by demographic and
geographic information. This kind of information is
120. Marketing executives at Diet Pepsi want to analyze the number of Diet Coke customers who switch to its product when Diet Pepsi is offered at a
deep discount. What data would likely show this information?
121. ______is a disadvantage of secondary research, while ________ is a disadvantage of primary research.
Essay Questions
122. During a recent budget cutting session, the finance manager at Eastern Shore Bank proposed eliminating the marketing research budget. You are
the marketing director. What general arguments would you use to defend expenditures on marketing research?
123. Marketing researchers have access to a great deal of information about consumers. What kinds of pressure might be brought to bear on a marketing
researcher that might cause ethical dilemmas?
124. Why would a researcher want to change the sequence of steps in the marketing research process?
125. In 2005, a new federal law allowed consumers once-a-year free access to their credit reports. Many consumers who accessed their credit reports
were surprised by the amount of information collected. What can marketers and marketing researchers do to minimize consumers’ privacy fears?
126. Marketing researchers should assess the costs and benefits of conducting research as they define objectives and research needs. What are key
benefits and costs?
127. The CEO of a bank in Montana approaches the marketing director, explaining that the bank is considering expanding into Wyoming. The CEO
asks the marketing director to design a research project to collect demographic data about Wyoming residents by county and zip code. What is an
inexpensive option for collecting this data?
128. The text lists a number of major syndicated data services including Nielsen and IRI. Obviously, these firms provide value to marketers or they
would go out of business. What advantages do syndicated data services provide relative to marketers conducting primary research to address their
research needs? What are the disadvantages associated with using syndicated data services?
129. What kinds of internal information might be of value to a marketing researcher?
130. With a huge influx of Hispanic consumers into his marketplace, Bill Deal, owner of Columbia Ford Motor Dealership, wants to know if Hispanic
consumers make car purchase decisions differently from his other customers. Assuming that the information does not already exist, which primary data
collection method would you recommend and why?
131. What are some of the problems with using secondary data?
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132. In what type of research situations would marketing researchers use in-depth interviews?
133. Thomas has just conducted a focus group for Apple, asking participants their opinions regarding new features Apple is considering for its iPhone.
Apple’s marketing manager wants to use the results of this focus group to justify immediate product changes and new promotional strategies. As the
marketing researcher, how would you respond?
134. How can developing a questionnaire be part art and part science?
135. Why are more and more marketing researchers using online surveys?
136. What are the most important elements in the presentation of marketing research results?
137. Robert was extremely embarrassed. He was giving a presentation on the research findings to the senior executives of the company. The CEO of the
company stopped him in the middle of the presentation and said, “This is not what I asked for or needed. This meeting is over. Reschedule the meeting
when you’re prepared.” What do you suppose could have gone wrong, and what should Robert do?
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138. Marketers often have huge amounts of information about their customers. What ethical issue should marketers include in their decisions regarding
how to use this information?
139. If senior management already has made its decision, should marketing research be conducted? What questions should be considered?
It depends. If you are directed to do the research, you will need to produce something. However, if management has made up its mind, in theory there is
no need for research. Marketers should ask themselves these three questions: (1) Will the research provide insights beyond what managers already
know? (2) Is management committed to the project and willing to abide by the results? (3) Should the research project be large or small?
140. If your manager asked you to review invoice data for the last six months to look for any trends or changes, what kind of marketing research activity
would you be engaged in? List and fully define the process.
141. Chesnee is analyzing census data, looking for demographic segments that she can target for her new insurance products. For Chesnee, what are the
advantages of using census data?
142. What is the major advantage of primary data collection, compared to the use of secondary data?
143. In-depth interviews are expensive and time-consuming. Why do marketing researchers sometimes use in-depth interviews in spite of these
disadvantages?
144. T’Lene is putting together a focus group to discuss students’ concerns about the business curriculum. What should her focus group include?
145. What is the difference between data and information?
146. Define qualitative research and list two examples of qualitative data collection techniques.
147. Imagine that you are a marketing executive at a major food conglomerate that is preparing to launch a new line of diet food products to women.
Using the information presented in the text regarding Kraft’s South Beach product line, describe how would you obtain information regarding women’s
frustrations and difficulties in managing their weight.
148. How might Dell Computer use sentiment mining to identify ways to improve its customer service?
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149. McDonald’s introduced its Favorites Under 400 Calories menu, attempting to change consumers’ negative views of McDonald’s as a seller of
unhealthy food. It would like to survey customers to see if attitudes are changing, but it would like to collect some qualitative data first. Suggest two
approaches—one offline, and one online—that McDonald’s could use to collect qualitative data before designing a survey.
150. George decided to open a health club. His girlfriend Lydia, a marketing manager at a small company, tried to convince him to do some marketing
research, but he said, “I know what I don’t like about health clubs; that’s all the information I need. Besides, I can’t afford an expensive research project.”
He opened the club in a shopping center about 15 miles from his home. Six months later, his club had very few members and he was running out of cash.
List some key types of primary and secondary data George could have collected before opening his club that might have helped him be more successful,
keeping in mind his limited budget.
Category # of Questions
AACSB: Analytical Thinking 96
AACSB: Ethics 8
AACSB: Knowledge Application 36
AACSB: Reflective Thinking 2
AACSB: Technology 8
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation 121
Blooms: Apply 40
Blooms: Create 1
Blooms: Remember 28
Blooms: Understand 81
Difficulty: 1 Easy 29
Difficulty: 2 Medium 83
Difficulty: 3 Hard 38
Learning Objective: 10-01 Identify the five steps in the marketing research process. 34
Learning Objective: 10-02 Describe the various secondary data sources. 32
Learning Objective: 10-03 Describe the various primary data collection techniques. 65
Learning Objective: 10-04 Summarize the differences between secondary data and primary data. 5
Learning Objective: 10-05 Examine the circumstances in which collecting information on consumers is ethical. 15
Topic: Ethical Issues in Marketing Research 14
Topic: Information Technology and Data Mining 10
Topic: Marketing Metrics 6
Topic: Marketing Research Process 30
Topic: Primary Data 65
Topic: Secondary Data 27