Page 113 - DMGT509_RURAL MARKETING

Rural Marketing

Notes and persons observing the polluting vehicles. Cameras and other signal gathering devices can
be used like the smoke detectors, speed sensors for knowing the average speed of vehicles
passing through a particular point.

Personal Interviews

In this method you with your team meet a number of users personally, ask them questions as
per a predetermined questionnaire and get first hand information from them. The information
collected is then used to extrapolate for the entire customer group to get the real answers. These
surveys are time consuming and expensive, but more accurate. These Questionnaire methods
will be discussed at length later on.
Mail surveys are conducted by sending the questionnaire to a number of customers with request
for filling them and returning to the surveyor. The method is not expensive, but it may not give
accurate results as the rate of getting replies from the customers is poor. Also the information
which comes in may be skewed as people when replying to such questionnaires, tend to give
inflated figure.
Telephone surveys are a low cost easy method of gathering information. The problem in such
surveys is the fact that people replying to the call may not be the right persons.

Marketing Research Methods

There are two basic methods of doing Marketing Research
1. Primary Research
2. Secondary research
As normally secondary research is done first, we will discuss it first. Sources of secondary data
are as follows:
1. Firm’s internal source, include, P/L Statements, inventory levels, sales visit reports,
previous MR Reports.
2. Incoming staff members who may be coming from competitive firms.
3. Government publications and notifications, like from Directorate of audio visual publicity,
Research organizations.

4. Trade publications; each trade has its own journals which carry information about the
historical business and projections. Magazines on Computers, IT, Electronics, Cinema,
TV, Agriculture, Science and Technology, Dress designing, Interior Decoration, practically
every possible area of business are in the market.
5. Competitors balance sheets.

6. Publications of Industry Associations like FICCI, CII, ASSOCHAM.
7. All India Management Association journal.
8. Trade and Business newspapers and magazines like Financial times, Business Today,
Business India.
9. Internet.
10. Market Research Organizations, like ORG-Marg, who sell MR Reports at a price.
11. Sales statistics of product’s dealers.
12. Publications of Reserve Bank of India; Financial Institutions like, IFCI, IDBI, ICICI, UTI.

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