Module Code and Name (MN2026 Marketing Intelligence)
Module Code and Name (MN2026 Marketing Intelligence)
Module Leader: Prof Paul Baines
Assessment Type: Individual Assessment
Weighting:100%
Deadline: 6th April 2022 at 15:00 via Turnitin on Blackboard
Wordcount: 3000 words (+/-10%) excluding references, appendices, charts, and diagrams. Your word count for Question 1 should be 1500 words and for Question 2, 1500 words.
Academic Year:Semester 2, 21/22
Assignment Brief
Q.1 Write an abridged market research proposal for Tiger Sauces Limited based on the brief outlined below. Your abridged proposal should have the following six components:
(i) an executive summary,
(ii) a background,
(iii)research objectives (you should rewrite the questions provided so that they are more researchable),
(iv) research design (read the section carefully on approaching the question below),
(v) ethical issues, and
(vi) schedule sections only.
There is no need to include sections on personnel specification, costs, and references.
----Beginning of case study ----
Tiger Sauces Market Research Brief
Jasmine Puri is the marketing manager of Tiger Sauces Limited, a (fictional) food manufacturing company, based in Leicester. Tiger Sauces opened their first Indian Restaurant in Leicester in 1991. Later, they opened a second restaurant at the food court of Leicesters premier shopping mall, Highcross. Now Tiger Sauces is a family business employing circa 100 staff in total of 6 restaurants of differing sizes around Leicestershire, with a strong focus on quality and authenticity. The company started to produce sauces and offer Saturday morning cooking lessons after customers made requests for these. The range of sauces covers six of the most popular types of curry flavour that British people are used to when ordering take-aways or sit-down meals including: Korma, Bhuna, Dopiaza, Vindaloo, Jalfrezi, and Balti. Quite quickly though the firm realised that selling a restaurant meal and selling cooking sauces were two different propositions. The customer bases differed to some extent although there was some overlap of customers. They also realised that selling own-brand products to major supermarket chains presented a very significant opportunity for them. After 18 months development of the six sources, pilot production of the sauces began. Prior to the launch, however, Tiger Sauces felt it needed to obtain some market intelligence on the following areas:
Were the six sauces they had identified attractive to consumers or should other flavours be considered?
Should the promotional pitch be focused on the authentic taste of the sauces, on the variety of the range, or the price point?
What sauces are available from competitors and which do consumers prefer and why?
How should the company make the most of the link between the sauces and the restaurants from which they were developed?
Budget and Timeline
Tiger Sauces have agreed to spend up to 20,000 on this consumer insight project. The study must be completed within 4 months.
----End of case study----
Q.2 Using the dataset provided - hobbit.sav - based on a survey with restaurant customers, undertake the following tasks:
Analyse the descriptives for the variables provided in the dataset and highlight three of those that you think would be of particular interest to the restaurants marketers and why. In answering this question, pay particular attention to the type of variable (e.g. metric/non-metric) you are considering and what statistics can be reported for such variables.
Undertake a cross-tabulation using chi-square for three bivariate relationships in the dataset that you think would be of particular interest to marketers. Explain any assumptions that you make, show and explain all your statistical working (e.g. contingency table, chi-square tests, tests of association etc.), and make sure you interpret your findings both at the level of the tests and at the level of the information and how it is useful for the restaurant.
Identify one variable which is highly correlated with how likely a respondent is to patronize (use) the restaurant using either Pearson r or Spearman rho. To do this you can either use the ordinal Patronize variable to assess patronisation or transform the ordinal Patronize variable into a binary variable (Patronize/Not Patronize). Think carefully about which approach you adopt as this has an impact on what test you will need to use.
In answering the question, you will need to explain the assumptions you make when you undertake statistical tests of correlation and make sure you show any statistical workings and graphs/scatterplots. Do note that the assumptions required for a Pearson correlation test are different from those required for a Spearman correlation test and you need to demonstrate that you understand this.
Further Guidance
Approaching the Questions
Question 1: Research Design: Tiger Sauces Limited
Before you begin writing this section of your assignment, and to help you with the background understanding necessary to tackle Question 1, consult the following resources:
Chapter 3, on Marketing Research and Customer Insight in Baines, P.; Fill, C. Rosengren, S. & Antonetti, P. (2019). Marketing (5E), Oxford: Oxford University Press. There is an electronic copy of this book available here: https://bibliu.com/app/#/view/books/9780192555533/epub/OEBPS/Contents.html#page_ix.
Chapter 10 on Writing a Research Proposal of the course text: McGivern, Y. (2013). The Practice of Market Research 4E, Harlow: Pearson Education Limited.
The 2019 Market Research Society Code of Conduct, available here: https://www.mrs.org.uk/standards/code-of-conduct
To draw up an appropriate research design given the brief, you will need to skim-read Chapters 3, 5-9, 11, 13-15 of the McGivern (2013) text outlined above. Your abridged proposal must contain the following six components: (i) an executive summary outlining the key elements of the brief in one paragraph (ii) a background introduction to the market research problem in 1-2 paragraphs (iii) the research objectives (you should improve the research objectives provided where that is possible), (iv) research design (see bullet below), (v) a paragraph on ethical issues (having consulted the MRS Code of Conduct), and (vi) schedule sections only (include a Gantt chart, here as an object so it does not contribute to the word count). There is no need to include sections on personnel specification, costs and references as would usually appear in a market research brief. Note: most of your 1500 word count for Question 1 should be used for the research design element of the brief.
YOU MUST ONLY FOCUS ON RECOMMENDING ONE FORM OF EMPIRICAL RESEARCH, EITHER QUALITATIVE OR QUANTITATIVE, NOT BOTH. When you write up the research design for that recommended research approach be sure to explain each of the following elements for it: (i) type of research recommended, (ii) the research objectives to be adopted (iii) the interviewing method to be used (e.g. personal, telephone, (e)mail, web for either qualitative or quantitative, unless you wish to propose a form of research which does not use the interviewing approach); (iv) the sampling plan to be adopted (v) the questions adopted for a qualitative study or the questionnaire for quantitative research (vi) the data analysis approach to be adopted. In each case, briefly justify your choices with a rationale for why you propose that approach/method. Add Harvard (Author-Date) references to these brief justifications.
Develop your proposal carefully to ensure that each element of the research design works in tandem with other elements. For example, it is no use recommending a quota sampling approach be used for qualitative research if you are recommending sampling using an online panel study as it wouldnt work. Equally, it is not a good idea to recommend lots of closed questions for a depth interview.
Always try to put yourself in the position of a critical reader, ask yourself how s/he would react to your arguments, how s/he would understand it, be persuaded by it.
Spell- and grammar-check your work carefully before you submit your work.
Question 2: Quantitative Analysis of a Dataset: Hobbit Restaurant
Before you begin writing this section of your assignment, and to help you with the background understanding necessary to tackle Question 2, consult the following resources:
Chapter 15 on Analysing Quantitative Data of the course text: McGivern (2013), The Practice of Market Research 4E, Harlow: Pearson Education Limited.
When writing up your statistical analyses, you should always briefly justify your choices with a rationale for why you propose that analytic approach/method. Add Harvard (Author-Date) references to these brief justifications. Also explain any assumptions that these tests rely on and how you have adhered to these.
To undertake the work required for this section, you will first need to prepare your data for analysis. This means: (i) reading the hobbit.docx file, (ii) undertaking re-coding of your data in order to ensure the variables are in the right data form (i.e. nominal, ordinal, interval or ratio) for the tests you intend to undertake (iii) editing any tabular/graphical SPSS output so that it is interpretable to the reader.
When interpreting the data, make sure you explain any assumptions that you make about a particular statistical test (e.g. the form the data need to be in for particular variables) and/or any rules of thumb in interpretation of the statistical output (e.g. appropriate statistical significance levels, types of data required for particular tests and so on). Write up a data table for the dataset and place this in an Appendix for the assignment. If you wish to place more than one item in the Appendix you may do so, but you should then number the appendices and refer to them in your answer. You must not include more than 15 pages of Appendices. You will be provided with an example analysis for each of the three sections of Question 2 and you should use the same formatting approach. Conduct your descriptive analyses, cross-tabulations and statistical analyses, explaining any assumptions on which these tests rely and any adjustments youve made to your data to account for these assumptions (e.g. recoding your data, transforming your data). Do not forget to interpret the data in the context of the scenario (i.e. that based on the samples responses to attitudinal and behavioural questions run for a restaurant). Also note that SPSS output needs editing and properly writing up and you will need to do this anyway to meet your essay word count and appendices length requirements.
Always try to put yourself in the position of a critical reader, ask yourself how s/he would react to your arguments, how s/he would understand it, be persuaded by it. Make sure therefore that you edit your work before you hand it in.
Spell- and grammar-check your work and check any mathematical/statistical calculations carefully before you submit your work.
Please ensure that you have read the advice on assignment writing and referencing which is available at: https://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/business/forms/DL/assignment-writing-guidelines/viewAll materials and sources should be appropriately referenced in the main body of your assignment (e.g. Authors name, year of publication). Simply cutting and pasting material from a website is unacceptable and will be considered as plagiarism. The assignment should therefore be fully referenced throughout and contain an end of text reference/bibliography section.
Any material used from a website must be referenced using the appropriate form for websites. Note references should only be drawn from websites which have academic merit (e.g. market research companies (e.g. Euromonitor/Mintel, or professional bodies like MRS/ESOMAR, rather than individuals website or crowdsourced opinion like Wikipedia). Extensive guidance on referencing is given in your handbook. Please adhere to the word limit.
Suggested Essay Structure
Question 1 should be structured as follows:
(i) an executive summary,
(ii) a background,
(iii)research objectives (you should rewrite the questions provided so that they are more researchable),
(iv) research design (read the section carefully on approaching the question below),
(v) ethical issues, and
(vi) schedule sections only.
Question 2 should be structured as follows:
Analysis of 3 descriptive variables.
Cross-tabulation and chi-square analysis for 3 bivariate relationships.
Correlation analysis of 1 bivariate relationship.
Use of Appendices
You will need to make extensive use of Appendices for this assignment and should use them carefully. You should place the following items in the Appendices.
A full copy of your questionnaire if you recommend a survey in Question 1 or your moderators outline or topic outline for a depth interview or some other instrument if you recommend qualitative research.
We are expecting to see a table of variables created from the variables in the dataset that you use in your analyses. A template will be provided for what this should look like.
We are expecting to see the statistical workings out for each of your analyses in Question 2 parts A, B and C. In the main body of your report you will need to use the word count carefully to fully explain your analyses. In the Appendices you should provide details of the test results you undertake including discussion of the tests you undertake to confirm the assumptions for the tests you have used have been met.
You might also find the following points relevant in writing up your Appendices.
Models, theory and discussion that demonstrate critical evaluation and analysis of issues related to the module being assessed should always be presented within the main body of the text. This discussion should make sense without referring to the Appendices.
Using bullet points in the text (which does not constitute analysis) and putting the detailed analysis in the Appendices is not acceptable practice and could result in failure.
The inclusion of Appendices should not be viewed as an opportunity to include anything that cannot fit in the word count.
Assignments that make excessive use of Appendices suggest inappropriate use. As a guide, we would not normally expect your Appendices for this assignment to exceed 10 pages of A4.
Appendices should always be referenced at the appropriate point within the discussion that they are referred to in the main body of the text.
Marking criteria
Writing this assignment, we want to see evidence that you have read the relevant chapters of the course text and other readings provided. You should also consult some academic market research journal articles to justify your choices in the research design question (Question 1) and in explaining and justifying the analysis techniques you used (in Question 2). Your work will be judged on the following dimensions:
Your understanding of the main principles of research design.
The practicability of the research design you propose, given the market research scenario provided.
Your understanding of how to prepare data for analysis and undertake some basic statistical analyses of quantitative data, and then how to interpret those results in a marketing context.
In evaluating the performance of student work for this assignment, Question 1 will largely be evaluated using the Critical Evaluation column and Question 2 the Analysis column of the Undergraduate grade descriptor table outlined below. The learning outcomes for this module are as follows (comments in brackets indicate on which question these are being evaluated):
Evaluate the quality of research designs for different industry marketing research applications (assessed in Question 1).
Explain the value of information, research, and analytics in marketing (assessed in Questions 1 & 2)
Explain and evaluate new trends in marketing research: in the collection, analysis and interpretation of marketing data (including big data) and information (assessed in Question 2).
Assess and critically reflect upon ethical issues in relation to conducting marketing research (assessed in Question 1).
Undergraduate Grade Descriptor (please edit to reflect the marking criteria for this assessment)
Grade Mark Theory & Literature Analysis Critical Evaluation
First Class 100 -Synthesises disparate literatures with confidence to offer a new way of seeing an issue or context. -A perceptive and intellectually nuanced integration of theory and practice that demonstrates independent thought.
-Demonstrates a creative and engaged command of the literature and the issue in context such that new contributions to knowledge are considered possible.
95 85 78 -Draws on a wide range of relevant literature
-Arguments are nuanced and well supported by a variety of literatures.
-Demonstrates excellent knowledge of relevant theories and concepts -An insightful and perceptive analysis that demonstrates both the depth and breadth of the issue.
-Excellent integration of theory into practice such that new contributions to knowledge are emergent.
-Excellent examples provided to illustrate nuanced issues -Excellent evidence of sound judgement based on supported arguments.
-Logical, nuanced and complex argument presented.
-Sense is made of the issues identified with consistent support of relevant literatures.
75 72 2:1 68 -Draws on a very good range of relevant literature.
-Arguments are nuanced and supported by a variety of literatures.
-Demonstrates a very good knowledge of relevant theories and concepts -Very good level of analysis demonstrated leading to a nuanced and perceptive analysis of the issues.
-Very good integration of theory into practice.
-Well chosen, well justified and insightful examples provided. -Very good evidence of sound judgement based on supported arguments.
-Addresses assignment brief in full
-Logical and nuanced argument presented.
-Sense is made of the issues identified with the support of relevant literatures.
65 62 2:2 58 -Draws on a good range of relevant literature.
-Arguments are nuanced and supported by a variety of literatures.
-Demonstrates a good knowledge of relevant theories and concepts -Good levels of analysis demonstrated which lead to a perceptive analysis of the issues.
-Good integration of theory into practice.
-Good number of relevant examples provided. -Good evidence of sound judgement based on supported arguments.
-Addresses assignment brief
-Logical argument presented.
-Consistent attempts to make sense of the issues identified with the support of relevant literatures.
55 52 3rd Class 48 -Draws on an adequate range of relevant literature
-Arguments are supported by a variety of literatures.
-Demonstrates an adequate knowledge of relevant theories and concepts -Adequate levels of analysis demonstrated but with some lapses into descriptions or practice.
-Adequate use of theory to makes sense of practice.
-Adequate number and/or depth of examples provided -Adequate evidence of sound judgement based on supported arguments.
-Addresses assignment brief
-Adequate logic but argument can sometimes be difficult to follow
-Adequate attempt to make sense of the issues identified with the support of relevant literatures.
45 42 Fail 35 -Demonstrates a weak knowledge and understanding of key theories and concepts.
-Evidence of reading restricted to core course materials
-Minimal references to relevant literatures leading to unsupported assertions. -Some analysis but is predominantly descriptive of practice.
-Weak links between theory and practice
-Weak or undeveloped examples provided. -Minimum acceptable level of engagement with the assignment brief.
-Weak logic and weakly structured argument
-Many unsupported assertions and judgements made
Serious Fail 15 -Demonstrates an inadequate knowledge of key theories and concepts
-Meagre or inadequate use of supporting materials and literatures
-Limited evidence of reading -No analysis but descriptive of practice.
-Minimal to no links between theory and practice
-Irrelevant or obscure examples provided. Fails to address the assignment brief in full
-No obvious structure or argument presented
-Unsupported assertions and value judgements made throughout
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is to take the work of another person and use it as if it were ones own in such a way as to mislead the reader. Whole pieces of work can be plagiarised (for example, if a student put his or her name on another students essay), or part pieces, where chapters or extracts may be lifted from other sources, including the Internet, without acknowledgement. Sometimes plagiarism happens inadvertently, where students fail to read instructions about or do not understand the rules governing the presentation of work which require sources to be acknowledged. In such cases, the problem is usually identified very early in the course and can be put right through discussion with tutors. Deliberate attempts to mislead the examiners, however, are regarded as cheating and are treated very severely by boards of examiners. Any plagiarism in assessments which contribute to the final degree class are likely to lead, at the very least, to the downgrading of the degree class by one division. In the worst cases, expulsion from the University is a possibility.
Referencing
You are required to use the Harvard Referencing style for your work. Please ensure that you have read the advice on referencing which is available at:
https://uniofleicester.sharepoint.com/sites/academic-skills-online/SitePages/Reference.aspx
