Direct Marketing

Source: http://www.cagle.com/news/blog/BLOGgifs/

Telemarketing is just one form of direct marketing, along with emails, catalogs, leaflets, brochures and coupons, and even direct response television ads. This has become a quite controversial form of marketing in recent years, because it seems reasonable that no one wants to be bombarded with unwanted calls all day long, junk emails advertising products we do not even need, or our mail boxes stuffed with catalogs of products we've never even heard of.

Also, not everyone is aware of the fact that once we do purchase a product through direct marketing, we don't realize who else our information has been submitted to. For example, if you purchase excerise equipment by mail, the company will assume you are interested, in excerise clothing, diet pills, etc. That's the down side of direct marketing.

Pricing It Right

Source: http://www.glasbergen.com/

This is an example of psychological pricing. The perception of this pricing is not reality based, but psychologically based. The higher the price, the more likely customers are to perceive it has being higher quality product, compared to a lower priced product. Although there is point at which customers will question the value of the product if the price is too high. In fact, the less a customer knows about a product the more likely they are to judge the product as being of higher quality based on only knowing the price.

A Marketing Idea

Source: http://www.gabrielutasi.com/
When starting a company, you have to think, "what makes my business special?" And when you have your answer, think of how to advertise for it. Think of your customers, not yourself. Customers only care enough to the extent that you satisfy their want or need. And the advertising done in this comic, you are pricing 50% of what your competitor (who is you, afterall) is pricing.

Promotional Pricing is great, because many people don't start shopping till they see a big "SALE" sign. Promotional Pricing is a temporary reduction in price and is often used to price products that are just entering the market. This comic, brings humour into the art of advertising and pricing your products that are new. After all there is a limit to how low you can price, before you realize that you're actually losing money rather than increasing sales!

What makes a good questionnaire?

Questionnaires are a way to gather data from a large group of people inexpensively, quickly, and statiscally.

The steps to design a questionnaire are:

Defining the Objectives of the survey
Determining the Sampling Group
Writing the Questionnaire
Administering the Questionnaire
Interpretation of the Results

(Source: www.cc.gatech.edu/classes/cs6751_97_winter/Topics/quest-design/)

It is very important to be clear when making a questionnaire. The goal is to eliminate the chance that the question will mean different things to different people. If the designers fails to do this,

then essentially participants will be answering different questions.

For example, it asking a question about frequency, rather than supplying choices that are open to interpretation such as:

1. Very Often
2. Often
3. Sometimes
4. Rarely
5. Never

It is better to quantify the choices, such as:

1. Every Day or More
2. 2-6 Times a Week
3. About Once a Week
4. About Once a Month
5. Never

Most adjectives, verbs, and nouns in English have either a positive or negative connotation. Two words may have equivalent meaning, yet one may be a compliment and the other an insult.

For example questions that have neither strong negative or positive overtones. Consider the following two questions:

1. Do you agree with the Uniersity's plan to oppose ....?
2. Do you agree with the University's plan to support ....?

They both can ask the same thing, but will likely produce different answers. One asks in a positive way, and the other in a negative. It is impossible to predict how the outcomes will vary, so one method to counter this is to be aware of different ways to word questions and provide a mix in your questionnaire. If the participant pool is very large, several versions may be prepared and distributed to cancel out these effects.

Questionnaire are a long process that require careful attention. A questionnaire is a powerful evaluation tool and should not be taken lightly. Designing it begins with an understanding of the capabilities of a questionnaire and how they can help your research. If it is determined that a questionnaire is to be used, the greatest care goes into the planning of it.