in the 1960s .

A structure consisting of people, equipment, and procedures to gather, sort, analyze, evaluate, and distribute needed, timely, and accurate information
to marketing decision makers. (Kotler, 2003, p.123)

Philip Kotler is acknowledged as the father of modern marketing and a foremost expert on strategic marketing. He was named the Founder of Modern Marketing Management.

Market research is the systematic design, collection, analysis and reporting of data and findings relevant to a specific marketing situation facing the company (Kotler, 2003, p. 129).

The management process:

1. Planning
2. Organization
3. Implementation- Execution
4. Coordination
5. Control and evaluation

MARKETING INFORMATION
SYSTEM
 
Internal information system: e.g.
Accounting, sales reports etc.
Multimedia data
Data warehouses
Decision support systems

MARKETING RESEARCH
 
Define the problem
Analyze the situation
Gather problem specifc data
Interpret the data
Solve the problem

Three distinct types of information are generally supplied to marketing managers for decision making purposes;

1. Recurrent information,
2. Monitoring information and
3. Requested information

Recurrent information is information that is provided on a periodic basis from periodic reports. Market or customer shares, advertisement watch rates, product or service ratings, price fluctuations, exchange rates, customer complains on product basis are some examples of this kind of information that managers receive on a weekly, monthly, quarterly or annual basis.

Monitoring information is derived from the regular scanning of certain sources. For example, a marketing manager may desire a summary of articles on competition for a specific industry or may want to learn about new product launches. Market trends, life style changes are good examples of monitored
information.

Market is an aggregate of people who, as individuals or organizations, have needs for products in a product class and who have the ability, willingness,
and authority for such product. Despite the unbearable desire to buy a Ferrari, a young university student cannot find a place in Ferrari market since he/she has no economic power to buy it.

A market segment consists of a group of customers who have similar set of needs and wants. For car market, small sized, low cost, basic transportation
automobiles may create a segment for students who are willing to buy such a car.

The commercial interaction between the firm and
its customers may offer a great deal of information
including (Lancester and Massingam, 2011):

Total sales or sales volume over time, Regional sales, Sales volume by market segment, Sales by trade category, Sales volume by type of channel of distribution, Pricing information, Communication mix information, Sales representatives’ records and reports, Inquiries or complaints received.

Research aimed at solving a specific, pragmatic problem is called as applied marketing research.

Effective marketing research involves five steps;

1. Defining the problem,

2. Developing a research plan,

3. Collecting problem specific data,

4. Interpreting the data and solving the problem,

5. Decision making.

In some occasions, big data is defined as such: massive data files that can be obtained from both structured and unstructured databases. Big data
entails:

• Technology: e.g., storage, computation
power,
• Analysis: e.g., pattern identification for
commercial, economic, social, technical
claims, and
• Mythology: the widespread belief that ‘big
data’ offers a higher level of generating valuable insights

There are some shortcomings of using external data for decision making purposes such as;

1. The necessary data may not be available, or it may need some transformations.

2. The integration with existing company data sources or information systems may be problematic.

3. Importing data can be time-consuming.

4. It may be hard to ensure data compatibility.

5. It may require manual work-flow and data processing.

6. It may be difficult to validate data formats

Customer insights are fresh understandings of customers and the marketplace derived from marketing information that become the basis for creating customer value and relationships.

A brief and comprehensive definition of CRM is defined as

“A systematic process to manage customer relationship initiation, maintenance, and termination across all customer contact points in order to maximize the value of the relationship”

Point of Sale (POS) systems is a system for processing customer orders at a point where the product is physically delivered to customers. Here are the other terms used for payments, delivery and transactions;

Transaction Processing Systems (TPS)
Electronic Cash Registers (ECRs)
Electronic Point of Sales (EPOS)