Market research (BUSM&L 758)
winter 2012
Market research (BUSM&L 758)
Instructor:
Office:
Phone:
Email:
Office hours:
Course website:
Nino Hardt
562 Fisher Hall
614-688-2996
hardt.8@osu.edu
W 2pm-5pm (or by appointment)
https://carmen.osu.edu/
Class Schedule (location)
MW 7.30-9.18
(305 Schoebaum Hall)
MW 9.30-11.18
(305 Schoebaum Hall)
Course Materials
1. McDaniel and Gates, 2011, “Marketing Research”, 9th edition, Wiley1
ISBN-10: 1118074610, ISBN-13: 978-1118074619
2. Other course material put up on CARMEN (https://carmen.osu.edu/)
Course Objectives
Companies need to make decisions. Marketing research aids the decision making process by
collecting and analyzing data.
Students will learn how the market research process is carried out conceptually, from
translating managerial concepts to concrete information about a firm’s customers and
competitors. Students will also learn how the market research works in practice through a real
life project.
The main sections of this course include the following: problem definition, research design,
measurement and data collection, data analysis and reporting.
Having successfully passed this class, students should be capable of
- stating a management decision problem and a market research problem
- conducting a marketing research project
- performing analysis of marketing data using SPSS (mostly descriptive)
- interpreting statistics and making sense of data
1
The previous edition should also be fine. If you intend to use the old edition, please tell me. I will try to have one
copy on reserve in the library.
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The Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business
Market research (BUSM&L 758)
winter 2012
Course Format
The course will cover various aspects of marketing research. It will involve lectures, class
discussions, computer classes, and tests. The will be individual and team assignments.
You are expected to read the designated chapter(s) in the text book prior to the corresponding
class session. In class, we will go through key aspects of the designated topics. There will be
room for classroom discussion and questions, as research has shown that discussion is very
effective in supporting the learning process. Class thus complements (NOT: substitutes)
reading the chapters.
Investing a reasonable amount of time on a regular basis is therefore the safest and most
efficient way to get a very good grade.
Course Requirement and Grading
Final grades consist of the following components:
Exams
Mid-term
Final
Project
Questionnaire/MDP/MRP/
progress report
Report
Class
Includes quizzes and lab
participation
assignments
25%
25%
15%
20%
15%
Class Participation
15% of your grade is set aside for this component. Regular attendance is expected and you will
be tested on the material covered in class. Student participation is actively encouraged. There
will be quizzes on Carmen every now and then covering several lectures. In addition, I will ask
you to hand in lab assignments that will help you earn credits for this component of your grade.
Exams
Both exams will include material from the textbook (indicated chapters only), classroom
discussion, slides or other supplemental material provided by the instructor. You are
responsible for all material in the text, even if we do not cover it explicitly in class. The more
emphasis is placed on concepts, the more likely it is those will be on the exam.
Project
In addition, we will conduct a ‘real-life’ project with consider biking (www.considerbiking.org/).
Their goal is to establish a bike sharing system in Columbus. While such systems already exist in
other cities, a business plan for Columbus still needs to be developed.
As this is a live projected, the schedule might change depending on the client. Therefore, please
make sure you check your email regularly (see also: communication, p.6 of this document).
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The Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business
Market research (BUSM&L 758)
winter 2012
Motivation
A ‘real-life’ consulting project gives you hands-on marketing research experience, develops your
analytical skills, and makes you ‘think on your feet’, while working with the client. Teamwork is
vital to succeed. It will be a great talking-point on (job) interviews too.
Outline
The first step is to state the management decision problem (MDP). Therefore your first
assignment is to write a research inquiry (draft), stating
1) the actual management decision problem and
2) the information you think is useful in order to make a good decision.
This task will help you to understand the client’s perspective on the problem. In order to get
you involved with this project as quickly as possible, this draft is already due on Jan 11th
(pass/fail, part of participation grade). You should also provide some notes justifying you
problem definition.
Our guest speaker will then give his view on the decision problem and challenges involved.
The project will finally put you in the position of consultants who assist the client’s decision
making process.
You need to form groups of 5. As a team, you will work together to
- develop a questionnaire (until beginning of February)
- collect survey responses (mid February)
- analyze the data (until end of February)
- write a report (until due date)
Based on the results, you should create a report which helps the client to make the right
decisions. You need to work on this project with great diligence, as it might influence if and how
Columbus gets a bike share system.
The report should consist of an executive summary and a detailed report of your results from
the data analysis.
Questionnaire/progress report
Monitoring the progress is important, because the final report will be delivered to the client.
You will get feedback which will help you to create an excellent final report and a very good
presentation.
On February 6th you need to hand in the following:
- A proposed questionnaire. The best items will go into the actual questionnaire which
will be used for data collection.
- Management Decision Problem. You need to document that you understand, what the
actual client’s problem is (see p.64).
- Market Research Problem. Show that you understood your task as market research
consultants.
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The Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business
Market research (BUSM&L 758)
winter 2012
Progress report on you research using secondary data or other resources you deem
relevant.
You should carry out a focus group interview to 1) get a better understanding of the problem
and 2) make a better questionnaire, which focusses on relevant items. Instructions for the focus
group will be given in class.
-
Final report
The final report should consist of an executive summary and a detailed report of your results
from the data analysis. The executive summary should summarize all decision-relevant results
as to facilitate executive decision making.
The detailed report should contain all information necessary to reproduce results of any
analysis carried out. The main components are:
- The MRP/MDP (handed in earlier, revise using my feedback)
- Description of data used
- Methodology employed (for example t-tests or regression analysis)
- Results
- Conclusion, discussion, recommendations
- Appendices (especially all relevant SPSS outputs)
Chapter 19 of the textbook will also guide you in preparing the report.
Presentations
Apart from the final report, the client also wants you to present your findings. Presentations are
scheduled for March 7th during class time. Presentations should not take longer than 15
minutes.
Due to time restrictions, only 5 groups will be asked to present. Presenting groups will be
selected based on the quality of the final report. If all reports are equally excellent, groups will
be randomly selected.
Peer evaluation
At the end of the term, team members will rate one another in terms of their relative
contribution in team projects. Peer evaluations will be treated confidential and will not be
disclosed to students. As such, shirking team responsibilities is by far the easiest route to
oblivion.
Tentative Schedule
#
1
Day
Mon
Wed
Date
2-Jan.
4-Jan.
Assignment
9-Jan.
Topics
No class
Welcome, course overview, introduction,
project outline
Overview marketing research process
2
Mon
3
Wed
11-Jan.
Guest speaker
Research
inquiry/MDP draft
Read ch 1
Read ch 3
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The Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business
Market research (BUSM&L 758)
winter 2012
4
Mon
Wed
16-Jan.
18-Jan.
School holiday, no class
Exploratory research and qualitative analysis
Read ch 4+5
5
Mon
23-Jan.
Survey methods
Read ch 6+7
6
Wed
25-Jan.
Measurement and attitude scaling
Read ch 10+11
7
Mon
30-Jan.
Questionnaire design
Read ch 12
8
Wed
1-Feb.
Review of basic statistical knowledge, part I
Read ch 14, 15
9
Mon
6-Feb.
Review of basic statistical knowledge, part II
10
Wed
8-Feb.
11
Mon
13-Feb.
12
Wed
15-Feb.
Computer lab I (same room, mobile lab)
Simple descriptives using Excel
Introduction to SPSS
Hand in: computer lab assignment
Questionnaire will go live
Computer lab II (same room, mobile lab)
Descriptives in SPSS
Hand in: computer lab assignment
EXAM I (midterm)
Read ch 14, 16
MDP/ MRP/
questionnaire /
progress report
lab assignment
13
Mon
20-Feb.
14
Wed
22-Feb.
15
Mon
27-Feb.
16
Wed
29-Feb.
17
Mon
5-Mar.
Bivariate statistics: cross tabs / frequency
tables
Bivariate statistics: correlations and
differences between groups
Brief Intro to multivariate statistics, multiple
regression
Computer lab III (same room, mobile lab)
Hand in: computer lab assignment
Work on Project
Walk in computer lab (same room, mobile lab)
Finalize Project
Observation and Experiments
18
Wed
7-Mar.
presentations
lab assignment
Sessions 2—9
Read ch 15, 16
Read ch 16, 17
lab assignment
Final Report
Read ch 8,9
Final exam2:
7.30 session - March 15th, 7.30-9.18
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9.30 session - March 14th, 9.30-11.18
Please verify: http://registrar.osu.edu/scheduling/SchedulingContent/WI12Finals.pdf
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The Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business
Market research (BUSM&L 758)
winter 2012
Communication
The best way to contact me outside class is via email. If you come to see me during my office
hours, you do not have to make an appointment. If you need to see me at another time, please
ask for an appointment via email.
I might use Carmen to contact you. Please make sure that you receive emails sent by the
Carmen system. You should also check your email frequently in case other group members or I
need to contact you.
SPPS
To obtain the SPSS license codes, you need to fill out the following form:
http://oit.osu.edu/site_license/Licenses/spsslicensestud.pdf.
Once completed, you can manually walk it over or scan/fax the signed document to the IT
Services Desk (Fax: 614-292-3299 or Email: 8help@osu.edu). The IT service desk is located in
025 Central Classrooms.
Once the codes are received, you can download the software on the OCIO Site Licensed
Software Downloads website, at http://osusls.osu.edu/. Windows and Mac OS X versions are
available. If you use linux, I could look into alternative solutions – just contact me.
Additional information regarding this process and system requirements may be found here:
http://oit.osu.edu/site_license/slwin.html#spss
BE A PROFESSIONAL IN CLASS
A part of your grade will be determined by your contribution to class. Along with actively
participating in class discussions, it will not hurt you to be “a professional” in class. For instance,
come to class on time, do not engage in side conversations during class, and turn off cell
phones or other communication devices. Inappropriate behavior, such as being rude or
disruptive, may result in a lower grade for the class participation component.
Honor Code
Academic integrity is essential to maintaining an environment that fosters excellence in
teaching, research, and other educational and scholarly activities. Thus, The Ohio State
University and the Committee on Academic Misconduct (COAM) expect that all students have
read and understand the University’s Code of Student Conduct and that all students will
complete all academic and scholarly assignments with fairness and honesty. Students must
recognize that failure to follow the rules and guidelines established in the University’s Code of
Student Conduct and this syllabus may constitute “Academic Misconduct.”
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The Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business
Market research (BUSM&L 758)
winter 2012
The Ohio State University’s Code of Student Conduct (Section 3335-23-04) defines academic
misconduct as: “Any activity that tends to compromise the academic integrity of the University,
or subvert the educational process.” Examples of academic misconduct include (but are not
limited to) plagiarism, collusion (unauthorized collaboration), copying the work of another
student, and possession of unauthorized materials during an examination. Ignorance of the
University’s Code of Student Conduct is never considered an “excuse” for academic misconduct,
so I recommend that you review the Code of Student Conduct, specifically, the sections dealing
with academic misconduct.
If I suspect that a student has committed academic misconduct in this course, I am obligated by
University Rules to report my suspicions to the Committee on Academic Misconduct. If COAM
determines that you have violated the University’s Code of Student Conduct (i.e., committed
academic misconduct), the sanctions for the misconduct could include a failing grade in this
course and suspension or dismissal from the University.
In this course, it is also expected that each student will behave in a manner that is consistent
with the Fisher Honor Statement, which reads as follows:
“As a member of the Fisher College of Business Community, I am personally committed to the
highest standards of behavior. Honesty and integrity are the foundations from which I will
measure my actions. I will hold myself accountable to adhere to these standards. As a future
leader in the community and business environment, I pledge to live by these principles and
celebrate those who share these ideals.”
If you have any questions about the above policy or what constitutes academic misconduct in
this course, please contact me.
STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES
Any student who feels she/he may need an accommodation based on the impact of a disability
should contact me privately to discuss specific needs. Please contact the Office for Disability
Services at 614-292-3307 in room 150 Pomerene Hall to coordinate reasonable
accommodations for students with documented disabilities. It is your responsibility to discuss
this with me well in advance of an assignment due date or an exam.
Additional materials
(not required, look at it based on interest)
If you are looking for additional material on basic statistics, I would recommend the following
textbook:
Anderson, Sweeney and Williams, 2008, “Essentials of Statistics for Business and
Economics“, 5th Edition, South-Western College Pub
If you want to learn more about SPSS and multivariate data analysis, the following textbook
provides an excellent and very easy-to-understand guide, which is also perfect for independent
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The Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business
Market research (BUSM&L 758)
winter 2012
study. The book has proven to be a life-saver for students writing empirical theses in various
disciplines.
Field, “Discovering Statistics Using SPSS”, 3rd Edition, Sage Pub, 2009
Another great textbook on Market Research (competing with the textbook we use in class) is
Marketing Research: An Applied Orientation, 6th Edition, Prentice Hall, 2009
If you need to be motivated to learn more about statistics, the following article is for you (“I
keep saying the sexy job in the next ten years will be statisticians.”):
Varian, “Hal Varian on how the Web challenges managers”, McKinsey Quarterly, January
2009
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The Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business