Postal Survey The most common way of collecting data. It involves sending questionnaires to consumers in the post. The questions can be designed to make sure that Abdul’s research is as relevant as possible, allowing him to collect the correct data for his target market. He would also be able to produce many surveys at a low cost, so he can gain a wide variety of responses. The surveys could ultimately just end up in the bin, which could be a waste of money for Abdul as it is a small business. It will also take time for Abdul to analyse the results from all of the surveys, and some of the questions could confuse consumers so that the …show more content…
Abdul will be able to pose the questions in a way that the consumer will be able to understand, so that there will be no miscommunication and vague responses. He will be able to ask the exact questions that he needs in order to meet his research needs. Asking consumers questions will take a lot more time compared to surveys as Abdul will probably be by himself or with a small team of researchers. People may also be unwilling to answer Abdul’s questions, or they may be short of time leading to inadequate responses. On one hand, Abdul will be able to gain a wide variety of responses that meet his research needs. However, it will take a lot of time to accumulate the number of responses that he needs, and people may be unwilling to answer Abdul’s questions. I think that Abdul should carry out some face to face interviews as they are normally free to conduct, and will give him extra research data to help him with his business.
Telephone Interview Similar to a face to face interview, Abdul would phone consumers in the area to see if they would like to answer some …show more content…
He could also gain detailed responses and make sure the questions are phrased in a way which doesn’t confuse the potential customer. Telephone interviews are not free because Abdul would have to pay to access the lists of telephone numbers to use, which could potentially be too expensive for his new business. To gain lots of responses, he would also need to hire someone to phone people, as it would take too much time by himself. Consumers may also be unwilling to answer questions and he could even be subject to abuse as he would be an unwanted caller. On one hand, Abdul could gain lots of different responses from targeted consumers in his market. On the other hand, Abdul would have to pay lots of money to access the numbers required to carry out the interviews, and people may not answer his questions. I think this is not a feasible method of research because it costs in excess of £1000 to access 1000 numbers once, and it would be time consuming to call the numbers, creating a large phone bill.
Focus group/consumer panel Questioning a group of people about the product, generally using consumers who represent the whole