Chapter 3

A situation that makes some potential competitive advantage possible

market opportunity

A situation that makes some significant negative consequence more likely Problems are inferred from symptoms—observable cues that serve as a signal of a problem because they are caused by that problem

market problem

Clarify ambiguous situations Discover potential business opportunities

purposes of exploratory research

Establishing the relationship between advertising and sales in the beer industry.

Causal Research

Rules for interpreting, categorizing, recording, and transferring data to the data storage media

Coding

Application of reasoning to understand the data collected

Data analysis

Identifying target market demographics for a shopping center located in Omaha, Nebraska.

Descriptive Research

Seeks to diagnose reasons for market outcomes Focuses specifically on the beliefs and feelings consumers have about and toward competing products

Diagnostic analysis

Checking the data for omissions, legibility, and consistency

Editing

Exploring attitudes about service satisfaction.

Exploratory Research

T/F. A formal, logical explanation of some events that includes descriptions of how things relate to one another is called a hypothesis.

False

Recognizing the nature of the problem or opportunity Identifying how much information is currently available and how reliable it is Determining what information is needed to better deal with the situation

Research's role in the decision makingprocess

Procedure that involves making decisions based on measurements from a portion of the population.

Sampling

certainty

The decision maker has all the information needed to make an optimal decision

uncertainty

The manager grasps the general nature of desired objectives, but the information about alternatives is incomplete

Ambiguity

The nature of the problem itself is unclear such that objectives are vague and decision alternatives are difficult to define

A statement such as: "Consumers with more favorable attitudes toward our advertising will exhibit more favorable attitudes toward the brand advertised" is an example of a(n):

Hypothesis

ØThe process of developing and deciding among alternative ways of resolving a problem or choosing from among alternative opportunities

decision making