Market Research: Foundations and Applications

Introduction

Strategic Marketing Planning will help you answer the challenges facing your business which have resulted from financial turmoil, climate change, globalization of markets, scarcity of natural resources, and rapid technological developments. It provides a powerful, formalized, market-led Ten Step Planning Methodology to guide you and give you the confidence to meet the changes. The practical and graphical methodology is an effective medium to analyze, determine your short and medium-term strategies and then communicate them internally to your management and peers.

Objectives

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:

• Understand and meet your business needs by using advanced and new research methods such as Behavioural Economics, Heuristics, Emotional Resonance, Influencer Research, Semiotics and Design Thinking
• Illustrate the difference between Qualitative and Quantitative Research, the pros and cons, and how they should work together – not in isolation
• Build your Research and insight around the core business motivators – the customer experience and purchase funnel
• Construct a great Market Research Brief/Insight Brief
• Craft meaningful springboard insights derived from your research observations and measure the success of any program against the Net Promoter Score (NPS) at any stage of the customer experience
• Apply your learning to create an agency selection criterion to meet your brief and choose the best partner
• Understand which vital elements comprise an effective and powerful market-led business strategy and its consequent plans
• Employ the most suitable market-led business planning tools for your business and products
• Outperform your competition – directly and indirectly –by creating and implementing dynamic, professional, true market-led business strategies
• Become an effective market leader by enhancing the image of your products and/or services and boosting your market recognition
• Develop your market-led thinking to become more analytical, innovative and strategic
• Implement practical action plans to improve your profitability and potentially dominate your markets
• Use powerful analysis tools to better understand your customers’ perceptions, needs and desires, and how they rate your and your competitors
• Understand and effectively use customers’ buying needs and define differential value propositions
• Understand the many different pricing strategies and how to choose the most appropriate and profitable ones for your organization

Training Methodology

This is an interactive course. There will be open question and answer sessions, regular group exercises and activities, videos, case studies, and presentations on best practices. Participants will have the opportunity to share with the facilitator and other participants what works well and not so well for them, as well as work on issues from their own organizations. The online course is conducted online using MS-Teams/ClickMeeting.

Who Should Attend?

This course is designed for managers who have either direct or indirect responsibility to determine or contribute to their organization’s marketing strategies and plans, and their implementation and execution. This masterclass will benefit:

• The country, sector, product, and brand managers
• Marketing directors and managers
• Business planning managers
• Experienced sales managers

Course Outline

Introduction

• Course introduction and aims
• The Ten Steps research & Planning Methodology
• Strategy and what it means
• Pareto’s Law
• Branding and brand management
• What is Guerrilla Marketing?

What’s The Point of Market Research?

• Plenary discussion on definitions
• Explanation on the need for research to answer business questions
• Review of all the possible ways it can help

Qualitative Research

• Introduction to the most common Qualitative method – focus groups
• The vital considerations – Brief, moderator, and questionnaire flow, recruitment, etc.

Quantitative Research

• Introduction to the most common Quantitative method – Surveys
• How to use Google to calculate statistical significance
• Choice modelling principles
• Concept testing principles and best practice

Market Research Brief

• Introduction to a best practice brief and the principles

Test and Learn

• The principles of design thinking and dynamic insight
• Introduction to insightful behaviours needed to succeed
• (Questioning, Listening, Exploring, and Connecting)

Insight Definition

• The difference between insight, observations, facts and data
• How insight can inform businesses

Introducing the Customer Experience Framework and the Purchase Funnel

• Customer experience framework

Net Promoter Score (NPS)

• How it works, the ultimate way to measure performance
• How Market Research is fundamental
• Net promoter score calculations
• Customer experience mapping
• Briefing on grouping and theming

Selecting the Right Agency

• Thinking backwards – using skeleton decks
•  ‘How to’ question crafter
• Briefing on mining and using the 5 Whys
• 5 Whys framework
• Crafting an insight

Updating the Marketing Concept

• What is marketing and how is it perceived in business today?
• Why there are now six ‘P’s and an S’ and no longer the classic four ‘P’s in the Marketing Mix
• Where the Marketing Mix fits in short, medium and longer term business planning

A. WHERE ARE WE NOW?

Defining Our Market Segments, Products and Services

• Market segmentation and product definitions: defining hierarchically our target customer and product/services groupings (an often forgotten task)
• The six common bases for defining our market segments and products and services
• A simple yet effective ten-step process to define them
• Introducing the course case study

Case Study – Applying the market definition techniques to the case study, both for market segments and products, to form an initial business appraisal

Updating the Product Life Cycle (PLC)

• The PLC and how it affects the marketing mix
• How the PLC can be combined with the risk model (to be covered later in the course)
• Five practical uses of the PLC to enhance your control and increase internal communications

A Powerful and Simple Revenues/Resources Matrix

• Defining this largely operational planning tool and explanation of the process
• Introducing the four major categories and their generic
• strategies
• How the “R” Matrix can help provide an initial focus, and lessons learnt from the status quotations
•  What typical tasks can be achieved by using the “R” Matrix

Market Trends and Assumptions: 

• What are the major trends in our marketplace and our business?
• Why is it important to also define our major assumptions?
• How to produce a trends and assumptions form that includes your priorities, the implications of these and comments. Linking them to later strategies and actions

The Innovation Curve and the Innovation Grid

• Understand why your different buyers adopt your existing, newer and very new products and services over time
• The ideal characteristics of the five buyer types
• Using the Innovation Grid to match your markets, major customers, your products and your top competitors’ products and then to do something about it
• How to complete the grid and its typical uses?

The Growth/Risk Model

• Many managers try and do too much with their scarce resources and subsequently fail. This simple yet powerful risk tool explains why
• How the Growth/Risk Model can help you on new product development
• Building a medium term balanced plan in terms of risk
• Using the Growth/Risk Model for gap reduction and a better focus

The Attractiveness/Strengths Matrix

• A simple yet powerful analytical tool to analyse and then priorities your markets segments, your products and services, your geographies, your major accounts and your channels
• Choosing the weighted criteria to define your own definitions of attractiveness and strengths
• What to do with the matrix when it is completed

The Value Wheel and the Value Matrix

• What do your major customers and prospects expect from you and your top competitors, and how do they rate you and your competitors against these expectations?

Practical Principles of Marketing Research

• Marketing research is often not performed well: a five step process to improve the results of this expensive, but very important, task
• The primary and secondary sources in marketing research
• explained
• Building effective questionnaires, both offline and online

Competitive Planning and Positioning

• A practical approach to planning using the concept of the ‘Strategic Squares’
• How to bring together the marketing mix, market segmentation and competitive positioning to build and maintain a true competitive edge

Building Effective Value Propositions and Brands

• A discussion of ‘perception’ and the value of brands in business today
• How to build a good value proposition using the Customer Perception Model
• Choosing and justifying your differential message using a simple ‘Why You?’ form and the Perception Mountain to define your brand(s)

Pricing Strategies

• The six major factors influencing your pricing decisions
• Setting pricing objectives and then choosing the right pricing strategies
• The common methods of price setting once your strategy is determined
• A multi stage approach to your pricing re your strategies and price setting

Marketing Communications Strategies

• Initial considerations and the barriers to communication
• The major elements in the Marketing Communications
• Plan and their relative importance
• Some considerations on using the internet for marketing communications
• Managing and controlling the marketing communications plan

Guerrilla Marketing and the Ten Step Methodology

• Introduction to Guerrilla Marketing
• How Guerrilla Marketing and the Tens Steps Methodology fit together
• Guerrilla Marketing strategies and actions
• Guerrilla Marketing strategies and the Internet

Developing and Producing an Effective Marketing-Led Plan

• The planning process and factors affecting its successful production
• The different types of plan and what should be in them
• The Market-led Business Plan detailed format within the
• Ten Steps Methodology
• Some thoughts on the practical implementation of the plan
• Comments on the specific tools

Implementing the Marketing-Led Plan

• A possible chronological sequence
• The different types of plan and what should be in them
• Choosing the right people and projects
• Using the Plan Success Matrix to manage the implementation