Marketing Research, 11th Edition

CHAPTER 6Traditional Survey Research

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

1. Understand the reasons for the popularity of survey research.
2. Learn about the types of errors in survey research.
3. Distinguish the types of surveys.
4. Gain insight into the factors that determine the choice of particular survey methods.

Survey research is the use of a questionnaire to gather facts, opinions, and attitudes; it is the most popular way to gather primary data. What are the various types of survey research? As noted previously, not everyone is willing to participate in a survey. What kind of errors does that create? What are the other types of errors encountered in survey research? Why have Internet and mobile survey research become so popular, and what are their drawbacks? These questions are answered in this chapter.

Popularity of Survey Research

Millions of Americans have been interviewed at some point in their lives. Surveys, both digital and off line, have a high rate of usage in marketing research compared to other means of collecting primary data, for some very good reasons:

• The need to know why. In marketing research, there is a critical need to have some idea about why people do or do not do something. For example, why did they buy or not buy a particular brand? What did they like or dislike about it? Who or what influenced them? We do not mean to imply that surveys can prove causation, only that they ...