Find an example of marketing research in a newspaper article or trade journal, such as The Wall Street Journal, Advertising Age, Marketing News, Business Week, or Forbes. You might look, for example, for statistics from a survey reporting on the quantity of certain actions or one that reports findings from a qualitative study on how people feel about an issue or subject. As an example, there is a great deal of current research on the ways in which social media are used. In this study, if you were to take a quantitative approach, you might examine how many businesses use Pinterest or another social media site to market consumer goods. In a qualitative approach, you might examine how CEOs think about the future of Pinterest as a marketing tool.
- Describe the context for the research and identify the research problem.
- Discuss the research method that was used to gather data for the problem.
- Evaluate whether the choice of research method was appropriate and ethical, and share why you think it was or was not the correct method.
- Provide two additional sources to back up your evaluation.
- Cite the source, the URL of the newspaper article or trade journal article, where you located the marketing research.
Pew Research conducts useful market research nearly continuously. Here's a recent study that describes how consumers in the US consider news and news sources: https://www.journalism.org/2016/07/07/the-modern-news-consumer/