Market research and strategic decision-making in the context of the new product development

Abstract

Formulation of business and marketing strategy requires analytical support from the market research methodology, both in terms of the initial informing of decision makers and measuring the effects of applied decisions. The aim of this paper is to shed light on the symbiosis between market research and strategic decision making under new product development setting. New product development process is seen through the iterative stages of identifying market opportunities, product design, product market testing, product introduction and product lifecycle management. The authors offer answers for the following questions: what are the critical business decisions at every stage, what are the information inputs needed for any decision and which market research methods can help in their preparation. One of the main conclusions of this paper is that it is desirable that the marketing manager understands the entire process of market research in order to eliminate the risk of reliance on incorrect data and information in decision-making. Marketing manager, who introduces a new product, is expected, before making key strategic decisions, to understand the basic assumptions of individual methods, pros and cons of the methods used and to know how to interpret the research results. .

Keywords

• market research
• marketing strategy
• new product development