Ethnography in Marketing Research Ethnographic

Ethnography in Marketing Research

Ethnographic research as a new tool in formulating marketing strategies

The article "Consumers in the Mist" by Gerry Khermouch tackles the importance of ethnographic research in marketing, a technique that shows a shift of focus in marketing research -- that is, from quantitative to qualitative research. The importance of research in marketing cannot be emphasized more, especially if companies would want to determine the attitudes of customers toward a product or service offered by the company. Khermouch's analysis of ethnography as a potential method in market research provides new opportunities for qualitative research become prevalent in the field of marketing.

One of the main advantages of qualitative research is that it allows researchers to probe deeper to determine consumer attitudes, ascertaining the satisfaction or dissatisfaction of consumers to a particular product or service, in particular (Churchill, 1995:196). Moreover, the consumer culture is best identified through qualitative research, an objective that is not easily identified in quantitative research, despite its systematic methods of sampling and analysis. These are the vital points that make qualitative research more appropriate in determining consumer culture than quantitative methods.

Under the qualitative research design, researchers can choose from a multitude of methods that is appropriate for the research problem and its objectives. These methods include in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and observation or ethnography. Each method has its distinct feature from the other, and these differences ultimately determine the appropriateness of the qualitative method to the market research that is to be conducted.

An in-depth interview is a one-on-one interview that usually lasts from 30 to 60 minutes. This method is appropriate in identifying an individual's personal opinions, beliefs, and values about a particular product or service (that is, in the context of market research). An advantage of in-depth interviewing is that it generates accurate and authentic information about the informant (interviewee) because there is an absence of external influences, such as people influencing the informant about his/her responses during the interview.

Apart from in-depth interviews, another commonly used qualitative method in market research is focus group discussion or FGD. In FGD, a minimum of 8 and maximum of 12 discussants participate to talk about an issue, which, in the context of market research, through an interactive discussion about the discussants' experiences and opinions about the company's product or service. What makes FGDs useful for research is the synergy that comes from the participants during the discussion -- exchange of opinion and information that can only be generated during the interaction. However, FGD is most vulnerable to external influences and participants have the tendency to be "swayed" by dominant participants. Thus, while it is more interactive and generates more information than in-depth interviews, FGD is susceptible to dominance of one or few participants, thereby resulting to information that is unreliable.

Lastly, ethnography provides a more detailed, objective, and authentic information about a phenomenon that is worth noting for purposes of research in marketing. Under ethnography, the researcher acts as the observer, objectively noting, describing, and analyzing recorded data from his/her observations of a particular group of individuals (e.g., consumers who are patrons of or defectors from a particular product or service). Through this method, the researcher "attempts to understand things that are otherwise foreign" (Littlejohn, 1999:211). Thus, ethnography brings into lucidity consumer culture, for the researcher to understand the consumers' sentiments and why a particular attitude is cultivated by consumers toward a product or service.

Khermouch discussion of the benefits of ethnography to market research demonstrates its effectiveness in probing deeply into the opinion and attitudes of people as consumers. Ethnography allows researchers to identify problems that would not have been generated through quantitative techniques, or even through in-depth interviews and FGDs. This is because ethnographic research records the candid and mundane in people's everyday lives and the observer-researcher becomes a witness to it. The commonality of the researcher-observer in the field makes the setting and people's actions real and natural, thus information generated from ethnographic research is highly reliable.