Researching possibilities in marketing

Abstract

Contrasts prospecting research with in‐depth qualitative research and statistical survey research. Presents a simple model – in mathematical terms, and as a numerical table – to relate the size of a sample to its power in terms of exploring the diversity of possibilities in a market. One implication of this model is that effective prospecting samples tend to be larger than those that are often taken for qualitative research: smaller samples may be surprisingly likely to exclude important possibilities and underestimate the degree of diversity in a population. By implication, qualitative researchers will often benefit from an initial prospecting survey of the market in which they are conducting in‐depth research.

Citation

Christy, R. and Wood, M. (1999), "Researching possibilities in marketing", Qualitative Market Research, Vol. 2 No. 3, pp. 189-197. https://doi.org/10.1108/13522759910291699