Random sampling – this method gives every member of the population an equal chance of being chosen. In other words the sample is selected at random, rather like picking number out of a hat.
My sampling method for market research will be random because walkers crisp is something that of all ages eat. Walkers are the market leader they have a range of crisps out there which the majority of the people enjoy eating.
Qualitative data
Qualitative research is in-depth research into the motivations behind the attitudes and buying habits of consumers. It does not produce statistics such as 52% of chocolate buyers like orange chocolate; instead it gives clues as to why they like it (is it really because its orange, or because its different/a change?). Qualitative research is usually conducted by psychologists, who learn to interpret the way people say things as well as what they say.
Quantitative data
Quantitative research asks pre-set questions on a large enough sample of people to provide statistically valid data. Questionnaires can answer factual questions such as ‘how many 16-20-year olds have heard of Chanel No 5?’ there are three key aspects to quantitative research:
- Sampling, e.g. ensuring that the research results are typical of the whole population has been interviewed
- Writing a questionnaire that is unbiased and meets the research objectives
- Assessing the validity of the results.
Quantitative data rely on measuring variables and comparing groups on those variables, or examining the strength of the relationship between two or more variables. The belief here is that objectively in the data collection process is paramount. Whoever was repeating this study or using the same instruments and methods would get approximately the same numbers. I will be collecting quantitative data because my aim was to find out how many people want new flavours introduced which concerns the number of people as in quantity.
Secondary Research
Secondary research is another way of conducting marketing research; however it differs from primary research as the information found has already been put together by someone else. Some people think of it as “second-hand” information.
Sources of secondary data – internet, books, www.statistics.gov.uk (Woking college info), newspapers etc. I will be using the internet to help me write up my questionnaire by looking at sample questionnaires.
Advantages for Secondary data:
There are many advantages for using secondary data e.g. it’s often obtained without cost, gives a good overview of a market, and usually based on actual sales figures, or research on large samples.
Disadvantages for Secondary data:
There are many disadvantages of using secondary data e.g. the data may not be updated regularly, not tailored to your own needs, and expensive, but reports on many different marketplaces.
Primary research involves the collection of new information e.g. market surveys, telephone questionnaires and focus group research in direct contact with customers. Sources of primary data – surveys (telephone, online and in person) test marketing, focus groups, loyalty card, interviews (qualitative).
These are the main 5 methods of primary research with advantages and disadvantages:
Telephone survey – this is a quantitative data, some of the benefits of using telephone surveys is cost effective method of achieving robust sample allowing generalisation to be made, responses are pre-coded certain groups do not have access to the telephone – so may be excluded form the sample, it works well with employers.
Postal survey – this is a quantitative data, there are many benefits of using postal surveys e.g. the cost is low, response rate can be poor, answers may be incomplete. Postal questionnaires are cost effective for large-scale programmes, enabling one to invite all customers to participate in the survey.
Face-to-face survey – this is a quantitative data, can include both open questions as pre-coded. Can achieve robust sample allowing generalisation if sufficient numbers are surveyed, can be expensive and time consuming to the administrator, its also ideal for gathering sensitive information or exploring complicated issues.
Focus group – this is a qualitative data, a group discussion with around 8-12 people, usually lasts between 1 and 3 hours, capitalises on interaction between participants, participants are not representative of wider population which does not allow for generalisation, its also very useful for gathering sensitive data, requires careful and unbiased analysis.
In-depth interview – this is a qualitative data, using a in depth interview rich and detailed information can be gathered, interviewers are allowed more flexibility, answers to open questions can be difficult and time-consuming to analyse, its also very expensive and time consuming to administrator.
I will be using surveys as my primary market research; this is because a more honest response may be gained from respondents as they are able to write their answers rather then give them to an interviewer. Sometimes respondents taking part in a telephone survey may feel that they should give the ‘right’ answer or what they think them interviewer wants to hear, rather than an honest answer. Below are my results for the questionnaire carried out for 40 people as my sample target.
Questionnaire for Walkers Crisp
- Do you eat Walkers crisps?
Yes No
- How do you like eating your crisps? If you ticked other, then please state below. (Tick the box applicable to you)
With a dip sharing it with someone mixing it with other flavours other
3. How often do you eat walkers crisp? (Tick the box applicable to you)
Everyday once a week once a month once every 3 months
4. Which one is your favourite? (Tick the box applicable to you)
Max Quavers Wotsits Doritos French fries other
5. Tick the ones you don’t enjoy eating (you can tick more than one box)
Max Quavers Wotsits Doritos French fries other
6. Looking at question 5, how do you think we can improve the ones you ticked?
- Do you want walkers crisp to introduce new flavours? If yes then which flavours would you like? (Please state below).
- Are you getting value for your money when you buy walkers crisp? If not then please state below the price you’re willing to pay.
9. Are you health conscious?
Yes No
10. Do you think walkers crisp produce lower fat products?
Yes No
1. Do you eat crisps?
This is a pie chart to show the frequency of people responding differently. By looking at my pie chart I can see that the majority of the sample targets do eat crisps and only 8% of the population said they don’t eat crisps. This clearly reveals that many people enjoy eating crisps. The reason why many people said yes, they do eat crisps is because of hunger, so when people feel hungry many of them tend to munch on snack food and crisps seem to be the favourite. However crisps contain MSG (Monosodium Glut) which is why it is impossible to eat just one bag as MSG makes you feel less full so you eat more and that is the reason why so many people eat crisps today.
2. How do you eat your crisps?
This is a pie to chart to show the frequency of different responses from the randomly chosen 40 people. By looking at the pie chart I can see that 34% of the people like eating their packet of crisps by sharing it with someone and 33% of people like it by themselves and don’t prefer to have with a dip or share it with someone. 13% of the population like eating their crisps by mixing it in with other flavours. The reason why people like eating crisps sharing it with someone is because they would not be taking in all the fats and salt that contains in one bag by eating on their own and rather tend to split that between perhaps 2 people as crisps tend to be very irresistible which makes it hard to avoid but they do that as most people are very health conscious.
3. How often do you eat Walkers crisps?
This is a bar chart to show the frequency of different responses chosen by the 40 people. I can see that many people tend to avoid eating crisps more than one packet once in a week and rather eat once a month or once every 3 months. Only 8 people eat crisps everyday out of the 40 people which tells us people are more health conscious. The reason I think that most majority of people eat crisps once a week is that because people are aware of all the ingredients that contain in one bag, such as high content of salt, fat, carbohydrates etc, and the dangers linked with eating to many crisps in a week and the negative affect it can have on your health on a long term scale.
4. Which one is your favourite?
This is a column graph to show the frequency of people regarding which crisp they like the best. Doritos and quavers relatively seems to be everyone’s favourite. Wotsits and French fries seem to be the less favourite one. The reason why I think that most people like Doritos is because it’s made of corn and not potato which gives a different taste and are much crunchier than some potato crisps. Doritos are best eaten with salsa dips which most people like as well.
5. Tick the ones you don’t enjoy eating.
This is a pie chart to show the frequency of the brands in walkers that people don’t enjoy eating. By looking at the chart I can see that majority of the people choose Wotsits as less favourable with Max being the second less favourable at 17% and Wotsits at 37% of the population. The reason why people most people said their least favourite is Wotsits is because of the cheesy powder that makes a lot of mess while you’re eating. The other downside to why Wotsits is the least favourite I believe is that flavour of the crisp tends to stick to your skin as you eat e.g. your hands usually still be orange after having eaten a packet as the flavour rubs off.
6. Looking at question 5, how do you think we can improve the ones you ticked?
7. Do you want Walkers crisp to introduce new flavours? If yes then which flavours would you like?
This is a column graph to show the frequency of the number of people that either want or are not bothered about introducing new flavours. The majority of the population which is 30 out of 40 people do want new flavours introduced by Walkers and only 10 people said they don’t want new flavours or the one they want already exists. The reason why many people said they want Walkers to introduce new flavour is because they believe that Walkers still don’t have all the possible flavours of crisps. While doing the survey many people mentioned the flavours that Walkers haven’t made yet, such as baked bean, chilli and lemon, picked onion, curry flavour etc.
8. Are you getting value for your money when you buy walkers crisps?
This is a doughnut shaped chart to show the chosen number of peoples responses. I can clearly see that the majority of the population think that when they buy walkers crisp they do get value for money. Only 28% of the population think they don’t get value for money when they buy Walkers crisps. The reason why only 28% of people said that they don’t get value for money when they buy Walkers crisp is that because the bag is not even half full and the price is about 40p to 50p whereas the price should not be more than 35p considering the amount of crisps they put in each bag.
9. Are you health conscious?
This is a column graph to show the frequency of how many people are health conscious. More than half of the population said that they are health conscious and only 13 people said that they are not health conscious. The reason why I think most people said they are health conscious is because they are becoming more aware of the dangers that can lead to all sorts of diseases by consuming all the fats and salts that contain in just one bag of crisps.
10. Do you think walkers crisp produce lower fat products?
This is a pie chart to show the frequency of the number of people that think walkers crisp produce lower fat products. 62% of the population said Yes and only 38% said No. I think that because more people are becoming aware of their health and try to eat healthy food so making walkers lower in fat is a must as they can than have a balanced healthy diet.
The great British crisp challenge
Golden Wonder has gone bust, seemingly defeated by Gary Lineker and an array of new gourmet products. But are the fancy versions really a better class of crisp? We asked Michelin-starred chef Shane Osborn, food critic Jay Rayner and scientist Erich Müller to do a blind test. Meanwhile, Laura Barton traces the origin of our love affair with fat-drenched potato slices.
If there is a smell that defines Britain today, it is not roast beef or fish and chips, nor wet earth or the greasy scent that floats up from the pavement on a rainy day, but the distinctive aroma of cheese and onion crisps. This is the smell that permeates our pub carpets, bus seats and cafeterias, which lingers lovingly on the nation's snack-troughing fingers and upon its breath. The flavour was introduced in 1962 by Golden Wonder, and although it has witnessed various permutations, from mature cheddar and red onion to sour cream and onion, it remains, in its purest state, the most popular crisp flavour in Britain. Its longevity is testament not only to our curious palates but to our enduring love affair with crisps.
The crisp test SO – Shane Osborn EM = Erich Muller(chemical engineer)
Walkers Salt & Shake, (24g, 98p for pack of six)
Jay Rayner, the Observer's restaurant critic I know these: a total marketing scam. There is no finesse to these; they are just a stupid gimmick. Anyone who doesn't want salt on their crisps is no friend of mine. 3/10
Walkers Sensations Sea salt and cracked black pepper, (150g, £1.99)
JR Interesting. I know this one. It's Walkers trying to develop a new market by bringing out a premium brand with slightly thickercut crisps in weird flavours. It tastes a bit chemical. I prefer Walkers ordinary ones. 5/10
SO Very chicken-bouillon-cube flavoured. Not that they taste of chicken but they have that fake, powdery kind of flavour. But it is quite nice all the same, thin and crispy. 7/10
EM Nice little spices. Interesting. Gourmet-style. The pepper gives it a good taste; leaving a bit of potato skin not only tastes good, but looks good too. 8/10
Overall: 7/10
Effectiveness of Primary and Secondary Research (M1)
Primary:
Surveys – I think this method would be the best way to help me answer my research question because I needed to get a response based on a large enough sample of people to provide statistically valid data. My target population was 40 people. This only gave me a rough idea of how the people responded. Therefore having targeting at least 100 people could give me better results including a variety of opinions and thoughts. Most of the people only gave me about 5 minutes maximum to complete the questionnaire. My research is only based on feedback from 40 people and wouldn’t require in depth answers as I am trying to look for a variety of answers from the respondents.
There are many advantages and disadvantages of using surveys:
Advantages:
- It is an effective way of collecting information from a large number of respondents. Very large samples are possible. Statistical techniques can be used to determine validity, reliability and most importantly statistical significance, meaning why did the respondents responded in this way.
- Surveys are flexible in a sense that wide range of information can be collected. They can be used to study attitudes, values, beliefs, and respondent’s behaviour.
- As surveys are standardized, they are relatively free from several types of errors.
Disadvantages:
- Structured surveys, particularly those with closed ended questions, may have low validity when researching affective variables.
- Although the chosen survey individuals are often a random sample, errors due to non-response may exist. That is people who choose, to respond on a survey may be different from those who do not respond, therefore biasing the estimates.
- Survey question-answer choices could lead to unclear data sets because at times they are relative only to a personal abstract concept concerning “strength of choice”. For instance the choice “moderately agree” may mean different things to different subjects, and to anyone interpreting the data for correlation. Even a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers are problematic because subjects may for instance put “no” if the choice “only once” is not available.
The questions in my research were thought out and very well planned before carrying out my research. Each question has a different meaning and aims of why they were being put in the questionnaire in first place. Most of the questions were simple and to the point so respondents wouldn’t spend long completing whereas if the questionnaire included long question that required 5 minutes on each question then no one will bother completing the survey.
The questionnaire was distributed amongst people chosen completely at random and after they had completed it was collected back from them. More than half of the people left questions such as recommendation and opinions unanswered perhaps because they didn’t understand it or it required a thoughtful answer also a bit of time and consideration to complete. If I had explained what they needed to write maybe that could have been more of a help for them to complete the questionnaire fully.
I think the attitude of the respondents was fairly good, due to chosen product ‘crisps’. I carried out a random sample, in other words people were selected randomly to do the survey. However after all the respondents had completed the survey I had realised that the questionnaire had to be given to a certain age group to get an accurate response e.g. 12-20. This is because for instance when I got the questionnaire back from older age group people, I noticed that they had only answered 2 or 3 questions because most of them tend not to eat crisps so in order to target their age group as well I could have possibly asked them personally what could be changed on the current crisps and perhaps why they don’t eat crisps or I could use focus group targeting their age group as they are based on qualitative research which perhaps can get me accurate results. In order to target everyone to participate in the survey, I possibly can use both qualitative and quantitative data targeting different age groups e.g. people aged 12-20 are not going to spend more then 5 minutes to complete the survey therefore keeping the questionnaire short and to the point is essential and qualitative data would be used for them. For people who are slightly older (30-50+ year old) are not going to fully complete the survey therefore having a focus group especially designed for their needs will be very useful in order to receive precise results coming from everyone in the end.
Secondary:
Up-to-date – my secondary data was quite helpful in a sense that it was recorded on the 11th January 2006 and provided great information on some of the crisps from the respondents. Although it wasn’t very specific as to what I was trying to find out, perhaps because they haven’t carried out a market research for Walkers which can help me answer my research question. E.g. the secondary research had carried out a crisp test on some of the celebrities for their verdicts on particular crisps, which didn’t help me at all to conduct my own market research as to what sort of question I will be asking in order to answer my research question. However the secondary research helped me to plan the layout for my questionnaire and how the questions should be structured, so it’s easy to understand e.g. the questions in the secondary research asked to rate the crisp out of 10 and state any recommendation for Walkers if possible.
The internet source is very reliable because it provides information that is relevant to my research question and provides some important facts which I didn’t know about. I think the information I’ve managed to gather will be very constructive for Walkers because they can now introduce the new flavours most of the people been waiting for.
Conclusion and Recommendations (M2)
I think the results came out the way I had expected them to. The respondents also responded the way I had expected them to. However there was one question which I thought came out differently to what I had expected e.g. question 8 – “are you getting value for your money when you buy Walkers crisp”? I was expecting for majority of the population to say ‘no’ whereas more then half of the population said ‘yes’. Walkers are actually a little expensive considering that the bag is barely half full and I thought that most of the population would have agreed with me but they didn’t and thought that Walkers crisp were value for money. I think that Walkers crisp should only keep the current prices if they add more crisps in each bag or otherwise lower their prices.
There was a significance to question 2 and it was put in the questionnaire for a very good reason. Most of the people said that they liked eating their crisps by sharing it with someone and the rest said they liked eating it by themselves. This would help Walkers to make an advertisement which would have a great impact on the target audience e.g. if they make an advertisement including these methods that the respondents mentioned they could have a great impact on your sales (will increase) because if they enjoy watching the advert then they will definitely buy and enjoy eating the product that you showed in your advert, resulting in more sales.
After doing my research I found out that Wotsits seem to be least favourite crisps. The main reason why most people said they didn’t like Wotsits was because of the extremely cheesy taste and the flavour sticks to your skin while you eat. Therefore, I would recommend Walkers to improve Wotsits in terms of making it less cheesy and making the cheesy powder as such that it doesn’t stick to your skin while your eating as it makes a lot of mess and you have to wash your hands 2-3 times to get that orange colour off your skin.
The other thing that I found out after carrying out my research was that most people want Walkers to introduce new flavours. Therefore, I would recommend Walkers to make those flavours that my respondents mentioned as they believe that Walkers should make these flavours to help them increase their sales e.g. baked beans, tomato ketchup, sweet & sour, curry flavour etc.
D1 – Recommendation for improvements
I felt that the best thing I did was conducting the questionnaire in the appropriate format and presenting it well to everyone by making it look straight forward and easy to complete. Also I felt that I chose the right questions in order to answer my research question.
Using my questionnaire survey method I was certainly able to find reliable data which constructs a strong conclusion. Every questions had a flow to it so it doesn’t sound out of place and also each question had an aim to find out something, which I felt was met. I used both open and closed questions so that the respondents don’t have hard time completing the survey and give them opportunity to answer confidently. For most of the questions, respondents have given very thoughtful ideas, such as on question 7 where it required giving different flavours of crisps. Most of the people stated more then 1 flavour which then allowed me to conduct the analysis more accurate and precisely keeping my research question in mind.
If I were to conduct the marketing research again then I would change a few things such as the length of the sentence and perhaps rephrase the questions. The longer the sentence is the more chance you have of expecting the respondent skipping to the next question; therefore I would make sure to keep some of my questions short and simple to prevent the respondent from skipping to the next question partly because it will take too long to fill in. Also I could have possibly given out samples of the crisp to everyone who haven’t tasted them before to help them answer my research question. Also if they can recommend any changes to that particular crisp they could do so. This way they would get interested in the whole thing and more people perhaps will be willing to fill in the questionnaire, which would result in a better conclusion. The other thing I like to mention is that the secondary research that I found was not excellent and didn’t help me answer my research question, therefore if I were to carry out this market research again then I would definitely find a better secondary research that will be relevant and would provide valid information for my research question.
The fact that my secondary research was not helpful is because it doesn’t have any questions that the respondents could answer, this could be seen as a negative point because if I were to conduct my primary research using the secondary research then I wouldn’t be able to do that, as this secondary research is not good enough as a guideline, therefore it wont be any help. However, I did see one positive point in the in the secondary research which is that they tested a scientist (chemical engineer), a chef and a food critic to give opinion about different walkers crisps blindfolded and how it could be improved. This I thought was a very creative idea to use to find out if a professional body can distinguish between different flavoured crisps blindfolded. One of the crisps that were tested was walker’s sensations sea salt and cracked black pepper; the respondents were able to give constructive feedback and also were able to identify some of the flavours. More importantly the criticism they gave on this crisp would’ve helped walkers very much because the fault in the crisp a professional body can identify, a ordinary person or students might not be able to e.g. that the crisp had a chemical taste and that they preferred original flavour, they cold also taste the fake powdery kind of flavour which tasted like chicken although they weren’t that flavour.
I could have improved my questions in many ways, so it could have been much easier for the respondents to complete the survey. I thought that question 1 ‘do you eat Walkers crisp’ could have been improved for more accurate results so that you can conduct your analysis more precisely in the end. For instance, I had only two simple options for this question, one as a ‘yes’ and the other as a ‘no’, now if I had added another option e.g. ‘sometimes’, this could have helped the respondents to answer the survey more accurately in less time. The other question that I felt needed amendments was question 2 ‘how do you like eating your Walkers crisp’. Altogether for this question I had 4 options including ‘other’ now instead of ‘other’ I could have added ‘eating by myself’ which was one of the most obvious option which I didn’t mention, or rather forgot to mention and only concentrated on the other options. Walkers can do many things to improve their sales and satisfy their customer’s needs e.g. make their crisps value for money, in other words add more crisps in each bag. They can also carry out their own market research in order to find out which new flavours their -customers want and perhaps to ask randomly why their least selling crisp is not liked and this way they can improve sales for that crisp as well. The other thing that Walkers can do is to introduce lower fat products because while carrying out my research I found out that some people thought that Walkers have a high content of salt in their crisps and are fattening so in order to satisfy those people they should lower their salt content and make crisps less fattening.
The sampling method I used for my research was random sampling. I think this method was really helpful because the sort of question I was asking was random too and it required getting information from everyone e.g. all age groups. This than led me to come to a conclusion after I had done the research and put all the results together, that the older age group people did not eat much crisps and therefore to increase the sales of Walkers we have to target these people as well and maybe use Quota sampling or even focus groups to exactly find out why they don’t eat crisps and what can Walkers do to improve their brands.
There are many ways I could’ve improved my primary and secondary research. Firstly to start of with my primary research just by looking at it I can tell that the questions are not spread out evenly across the page which makes it look like that it has been completed in like 5 minutes and not much thought has been put into my research which might put respondents off and they might not want to fill in my questionnaire. Secondly by looking at my secondary research which I found from internet I can see that its not really relevant to my questionnaire and doesn’t even has a layout of questions that could have helped me, so therefore to improve I could have explored in business magazines as it is a source of secondary research as well and would have a relevant article that cold help me carry out my research accurately which would result in more accurate outcome.
