Customer Visits: Building a Better Market Focus: Building a Better Market Focus [Paperback]

Visits to customers by a cross-functional team of marketers and engineers play an important role in new product development, entry into new markets, and in exploring customer satisfaction and dissatisfaction. The new edition of this widely used professional resource provides step-by-step instructions for making effective use of this market research technique.Using a wealth of specific examples, Edward F. McQuarrie explains how to set feasible objectives and how to select the right number of the right kind of customers to visit. One of the leading experts in the field, McQuarrie demonstrates how to construct a discussion guide and how to devise good questions, and offers practical advice on how to conduct face-to-face interviews.Extensively updated throughout, this third edition includes three new chapters as well as expanded coverage of the analysis of visit data. It also discusses which industries and product categories are most (and least) suitable to the customer visit technique. The author also covers how the customer visit technique compares to other market research techniques such as focus groups.Visits to customers by a team of marketers and engineers play an important role in exploring customer satisfaction. This book provides step-by-step instructions for making use of this market research technique. It contains several examples which explain how to set feasible objectives and how to select the right kind of customers to visit.Part 1 Rationale; Chapter 1 Why Visit Customers?; Chapter 2 Customer Visits as a Distinctive Approach to Market Research; Chapter 3 Limits, Boundary Cases, and the Sweet Spot for Customer Visits; Part 2 Procedures; Chapter 4 Programmatic, Ad Hoc, and Hybrid Approaches to Visiting Customers; Chapter 5 Planning a Program of Visits; Chapter 6 Budgets, Recruitment, Coordination, Team Preparation, and Time Line; Chapter 7 Selecting Customers to Visit; Chapter 8 Preparing a Discussion Guide; Chapter 9 Constructing Good Questions; Chapter 10ls+