User surveys work well for products with few users, but they can be unreliable due to difficulties in estimating purchases and overly optimistic responses.
With this method, the current users of the product or service are asked how much
they will be using within a specific time frame. A good example of this technique is a
study done each year by the Hydraulic Fluid Association, where a questionnaire is sent
to each of the members and they then indicate how much hydraulic fluid they will
use during the coming year. There is a difference between user surveys in a business-
to-business market and a consumer market. In a business-to-business market, the
information can be obtained by a salesperson, since there are far fewer users than in
a consumer market. There are, however, two possible problems with this user survey:
first, it may be difficult to ascertain how much of the product customers intend to buy
from a specific organisation and, secondly, customers may be overly optimistic when
indicating how much they intend buying.
In establishing the purchasing intentions of consumer markets, the organisation
will not be able to rely on its salespeople to collect the information because of the
large numbers of users. This is where market and marketing research play a role
in establishing consumer purchasing intentions. Even with market or marketing
research, the organisation will not be able to reach all the consumers and will
therefore make use of a sample of customers.
From the above, it is clear that the user survey is best used when there is a small
number of users. There are specific advantages and disadvantages with user surveys
paraphrase to one short sentence and use simple vocabulary
1 answer