Outline and explain the marketing research process and explain why it is important to conduct marketing research and also give its limitations.

Marketing research is "the planned and systematic gathering and collation of data and the analysis of information relating to all aspects of marketing and the final consumption of goods or services" -Leader & Krystis. Sometimes a company may want information about its customers, and so will carry out research. The marketing environment is constantly changing and as marketers we need to monitor these changes through research. The research is not used to make decisions …

…information about your target market, competition and environment is collected and analyzed it may be presented to the decision makers of the business. In summary, the resulting data was created to help guide your business decisions, so it needs to be readily accessible to the decision makers. Bibliography: * http://www.pearsoned.ca/ar0.mstrong/glossary/gloss_ch05.html * Essential of Marketing - Jim Blythe * Fundamentals of Marketing - W.G. Leader & N. Krystis