Your company introduced a product two years. In the first year, sales
were far above expectation. But in year two, they have fallen off
dramatically. You have been asked by senior management to:

1. Find out why sales have dropped
2. Develop options to improve sales

Provide a brief plan to address these issues. What type of research
would you employ? What type of internal and external data would you
collect? What would be the best research technique to use?

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Clarification of Question by hotmark-ga on 15 Jul 2003 22:35 PDT

This comes under the topic:
Foundation of research/Marketing Research

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Clarification of Question by hotmark-ga on 15 Jul 2003 22:38 PDT

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I need the answers before Wednesday 1pm PST 
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There are several different areas to explore to try to solve this
problem.  They are both externally and internally focused.  In the
interest of being brief, I will provide a list of bullet points of
areas to explore, followed by summary of techniques used.

- survey customers to find out their opinions about the product,
especially degree of satisfaction with it and intend to repurchase (if
applicable).

- survey prospective customers to find out their opinions about the
product.  Do they have a positive or negative opinion of the product?

- examine warranty data/customer service data, if applicable, to
identify possible product quality problems and learn how customers are
using the product.  Are customers finding the product unsatisfactory,
and if so, in what way?

- examine the competitive landscape (have competitors introduced new
products or lowered the price on existing products, for example).

- examine how the product is being sold (are retailers, if applicable,
still giving it the same amount of display space and promotional
activity, for example).

- examine sales data to determine if the drop in sales is concentrated
in a particular region or retail channel or is it broad-based.

- survey the sales force to identify issues they feel are impeding
sales.

With this data in hand, one can then make a plan to address the issues
uncovered.  Surveys would be a key technique to identify issues within
the sales force, with existing customers, and with prospective
customers.  Internal data gathered from interactions with the customer
through the customer service/warranty function could also be extremely
valuable in uncovering existing customers' opinions of the product and
any possible problems they may be having with it.  A combination of
internal and external sales data would be used to track possible
problems to a particular region or retail channel, along with
competitive activities that might be occurring.  The survey of the
sales force would be another way to gain a different perspective on
these issues.

I hope the above "plan" meets your needs.  Please request
clarification if needed.

Sincerely,

Wonko