P6

Gathering Information:

Define the requirement:

To know exactly what information is needed, researchers are going to need a requirement report that lays out the criteria on information needed. A business would more than likely use an information system to gauge what data (inputs) are needed to make the system process into information.Without setting these requirements businesses will see a drop in efficiency because employees that are gathering the information are more likely to miss deadlines after coming up short with data and re-collecting. The opposite to this, but a problem none the less, would be that the employees collecting data can collect data that is already to detailed, almost as detailed as information which the system will not register as an input but that will most likely have cost more to collect.

Currency:

Not a form of money but how up to date and relevant data that has been collected is. Clearly data that has been collected a long time ago will not be as useful to a business than data collected recently. Business normally collect data in regards to it's target market to see what consumer trends are and to try to tap into these with their product. Obviously consumer trends change drastically at lightning speed, in terms of business, and old out of date data would not give a true representation of what consumers are buying, leading the business to believe that trends are still relevant when, in fact, they are not.

Relevance:

Closely related to currency, relevant data must relate to the operations of a business so they can then supply to the correct market. For example, if a business was collecting information about their new clothing range you would expect data to relate to clothes or fashion, irrelevant data would be to ask the public was their favourite food is because, clearly, that does not relate to their product at all and is completely useless to the business. The consequences of collecting irrelevant data would include incurring cost of collecting this data in the first place, missing the opportunity to release a innovative product before competitors which will subsequently see the business lose market share and revenue.

Identifying Alternatives:

Primary data is preferable to a business because it will, presumably, be relevant and up to date. There is a negative factor to using this method though, as it can cost a vast amount to collect this data first hand and there may be an alternative produced by a separate entity that is still relevant and up to date. This alternative will still be costly but it's likely to be a lower cost. Alternatives may seem relevant but they will never really be suited exactly to one business and others in the same market are probably going to use the same separate entity to provide data to them. Businesses can gain competitive advantage by using their own data if it is more current and relevant.

Establish Sources of Information:

Once the business checked with the system for the input requirements needed, it must identify where it intends to receive it's data from, the source of information. This source needs to allow for detailed and accurate data which also meets the businesses marketing expenditure budget and time scale for the project. If these criteria aren't met a business can lose money, not only to the expenditure of the project but the vast timescale can impact on the soonest possible starting time of the next project, this is called the critical path.


Other Factors to be Considered:

Again, timeliness is a major factor which needs to be thought out as well as the consequences considered. Not only can every extra day on a project cost money, but if the data is collected within a 4 week period on and off, you are using non current data which won't represent the target market, assuming you used the information from the first week. Health of employees can deteriorate whilst out collecting this data and you would need to have a back up plan is employees go off work with illness.

Select Information:

Not everyone questioned will have given a legitimate answer as they might have filled it out in a rush or genuinely don't care for sharing their information. This affects data collection methods such as multiple choice questionnaires because they could tick any box. To rectify this, business will have to select the information, not necessarily the information that makes them look favourable but the information which seems trustworthy.