Question

Topic: Student Questions

Who Do You Speak With When Doing A Survey

Posted by Anonymous on 3/21/2010 at 4:20 PM ET 25 Points
Hello,

We were discussing in school that when you do a survey for new business start up, you would talk to the owner or the GM of the store for the questions?
How do you do it?
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  • Posted on 3/21/2010 at 7:16 PM Accepted
    I'm assuming you mean that your business would be selling a consumer product and you want to talk with the retailer. Is that right?

    Regardless, the first thing you have to do is state very clearly and specifically what you want to know. What is the objective of your research? And what will you do with the results? Exactly what action will you take when you get the answer to your question?

    Once you know that, you probably ought to have a professional market researcher design the questionnaire or discussion guide for you. There are a lot of ways you can inadvertently bias the respondent, and that will give you bad information.

    All the other "how you do it" issues will depend on the objective and expected use of results, so maybe we should wait for you to fill us in before we start guessing.
  • Posted on 3/22/2010 at 3:05 PM Accepted
    I think you have to know the availability of both, and your target questions, of course. If you want to know how exactly the business started, then consult the owner. The key is to be polite as much as you can.
  • Posted on 3/30/2010 at 8:09 PM Moderator
    You talk to whomever would make the decision to hire/buy ... It doesn't matter what the titles are, whether they are owners or not, etc.

    This all goes back to what the questions are that you want answered. Whose opinions and views do you want?

    Good research has a clear objective (or question you want answered) and a clear understanding of how you will use the result, what the action standard will be. Then you have to ask the right people; you have to ask them the right questions; and you have to ask the questions the right way, and you have to analyze your findings the right way. Get any of them wrong and you'll probably have faulty or misleading research results.
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