Techniques & types of Qualitative Market Research

Qualitative Market Research is an array of procedures for collecting social data and using it for social media marketing of a product. Generally the information is collected from a comparatively small cluster of respondents who are not variants, means the data collected is mainly of a group of natives that are somewhat similar in various aspects like age, gender, geographical location etc, for example a small research done on the employees of a small office. It can be useful in making further experiments or for taking a decision or for implementing some organizational or governmental policy. In normal circumstance the main objectives that are obtained by Qualitative Market Research are; seeking and answer to a question, using a systematic set of questionnaires that is common for all the respondents, collecting proofs and substantiations, and finally applying the results wherever applicable. The main conclusion of the Qualitative Market Research is the answer to the question ‘What next’?

Qualitative market research has its own importance because it has the aptitude to provide us the complicated data of human experiences and thinking in a textual form. It provides us with the ‘Human side of the problem. There are few types of Qualitative market researches that are done keeping in mind the objective of the research. The first if the ‘Depth Interview’, as the name itself suggests the research is done in the form of personal interview of each individual, duration of which is about 30-45 minutes. This type of research reveals the personal opinions, values & beliefs of an individual so the information obtained is rich and deep. It is flexible as the questions asked to each individual may vary, but it requires a very skilled and intelligent interviewer who is aware of the laddering technique of interviewing. It is a technique which refers to starting the interview with off topic or external questionnaires and then slowly moving onto the inner aspects of the interviewee. The main objective of such research is obtaining the ‘In-depth’ information.

A loosely structured technique of qualitative market research is the ‘Focus Groups’ technique where a group of 10-15 individual discuss a group in a topic and there is a free inward flow of ideas. This whole discussion is recorded and later on the required data is extracted out of it. Another style of extracting data out of individual is the Projective technique, which is also flexible and interesting. It also involves groups of individual who are prompted or encourage the respondent to quickly reveal their project their core motivations, attitudes, beliefs, or feelings against an uncertain situation.

Market research involves different attitudes of various human brains hence while conducting qualitative market research some morals should be followed so as to obtain desirable results. Some researches might be open and clearly disclose the objective to the participants while other may be hidden, some researches may require privacy and hence they are executed by the research firms under their protection and guidance. This way the data collected is safe and handed over only to the sponsor. Researches done in this way also ensures the privacy of both the sponsors and the respondents.

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