Archive for November 7th, 2012

Danger. Marketing Researcher at Work. Terry Haller.

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Danger. Marketing Researcher at Work. Terry Haller. 1983. ISBN 089930026X.  This an older book but like Ogilvy on Advertising I consider it a classic. The author never did publish a follow up to this book as I suppose he pretty well summed it up the first time.  He lists and details 111 dangers wrto how market research makes errors.  From the first to the last page his droll style is not only entertaining but educational as he uses real story after real story to fill in how these dangers come to pass.  Although this book predates the Internet tools era, you will find enough meat here to be able to pragmatically counter the  approaches and misunderstandings coming from the market research dept (or senior admin) to help your marketing and  sales career. Just a few that I picked up on:

  • Market research without a control group is not research
  • You can not measure attitude but you can measure behavior
  • Everyone seems to confuse strategy with execution tactics
  • The pursuit of meaningful differentiation is always important
  • The consumer determines the segment, not the researcher

This is a soup to nuts guide more people should read and take to heart.

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