Experimental Research

If there's one thing to be sure about marketing, it is the fact that it can burn a lot of money. A Gartner study reveals businesses spend roughly 12 percent of their revenue on advertising and marketing.⁸ That's $1.20 out of every $10 they make! Luckily, marketing doesn't always have to be wasteful. In fact, if marketers know where and how to invest their money, they can save the company tons of unwanted costs while maximizing ROI. This is the reason for experimental research. Let's dive in and learn all about this research method.

Experimental Research in Marketing

Before we learn what experimental research means, we must first understand why it is adopted. To do so, let's go back to two fundamental concepts: Mass marketing and Targeted marketing.

Unfortunately, this is rather expensive and only affordable by prominent firms. For smaller brands, a better way to access customers is through targeted marketing:

However, even when companies know what customers to target, it remains a challenge to capture their attention. How to know what the audience is interested in and craft a marketing message that will appeal to them? This is where experimental research comes in.

Experimental Research Definition

Experimental research is a test of which marketing strategy is most likely to work. But rather than guesswork, it uses real data from experiments.

One key feature of experimental research is that it explores the relationship between independent and dependent variables.

• Independent variables are variables that do not depend on other variables.
• Dependent variables are variables that change as independent variables change.

In experimental research, the independent variable is the cause and the dependent variable is the effect. As a marketer, you can influence the cause to observe changes in the effect, but not the other way around. The effect can only be tested or measured.

This is why experimental research is so powerful. It not only allows you to see the immediate results of a marketing decision but also manipulates the cause to influence the result.

Note here that the independent variable is the cause while the dependent variable is the effect. It is the change in the ice cream flavor that leads to the change in ice cream sales. While you can control which ice cream flavor to sell, you can't know which flavor will bring you the most profit without experimenting. This brings us back to a point early on: A cause can be manipulated to test or measure the effect.

When it comes to experimental research, there are three main types: controlled, manipulated, and random.

• Controlled experimental research - Research where all outside factors are kept constant. Only the measured variable is changed. For example, a hamburger store changes its packaging while keeping everything else (ingredients, flavor, etc.) the same to observe the effect of the new packaging on sales.

• Manipulated experimental research - Research where you can change the independent variable to measure the effect on the dependent variable. For instance, a bakery changes the amount of flour in bread and sees how customers respond.

• Random experimental research - A combination of the above two. For example, you add a new drink to the menu of all coffee stores you own, with everything remaining the same. If you randomly check a store, you will see that the sales may go up or down depending on the location.

The experimental research method may be different, but the idea is always the same, to find out the strategy that helps the business improve its performance.

Descriptive vs Correlational vs Experimental Research

Have you heard of descriptive and correlational research before? If you have, you might also know that they are human behavior research methods just like experimental research. Don't worry if they can't tell the difference between them. This section will help clearly distinguish these three types of research methods.

Let's start with the definitions:

Descriptive research is the type of research that provides an accurate description of a situation. As a result, it is often used to discover information, make predictions, and test a hypothesis. The only drawback is that it does not explain the relationship between different variables.

Correlational research is also used to test hypotheses and make predictions. However, unlike descriptive research, it allows the researcher to observe the causal relationship between variables.

Experimental research is similar to correlational research but goes one step further by letting the researcher manipulate the variable to see different results. ¹

Here's a more detailed comparison table:

Table 2. Descriptive vs Correlational vs Experimental Research. Source: Openpress.

Quasi-Experimental Research

Marketers use quasi-experimental research to understand the change in customer or firm behavior. According to Campell, this is the type of research where the "data generating process is not intentionally experimental" but caused by an external shock. ⁶