Monday, September 14, 2015

Origins of Design Research (Marketing Research)

An article from the AIGA website on the origins of market research:

"Questioning consumers about their lives and choices first began back in 1790 with the first United States census, which was initiated primarily to determine voting demographics. It wasn't until 1920 when Procter & Gamble executives went door-to-door asking American housewives for their opinions on new products and packaging that the modern age of market research really began. But it was in 1930 that the discipline truly took shape when social scientists A.C. Nielsen and George Gallup started quantitative testing and surveying. In 1950 the first qualitative testing began by getting a very targeted audience of consumers with a similar set of needs or concerns to understand their motivation, purchase behavior and attitude development within a particular frame of reference. These pioneering market researchers used psychology, anthropology, creativity and sociology to study a newly curious topic: why people buy the stuff that they buy. It is not unfair to say that all modern advertising sprang from this groundbreaking work."

Article:

I found the origins of modern market research touched on by the article interesting, some of the approaches shared were touched upon in our last lecture (ethnographic, focus groups, etc) 

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