Census Bureau is one key source of information regarding various demographic variables. Besides Census Bureau of India, other sources include Newspapers, Trade Publications, Technical Journals, Magazines, Directories, Balance Sheets of companies, Syndicated and published research reports. Various third party information suppliers offer a variety of information about customers as per marketer’s requirements, for a price.
For example, Reader’s Digest markets a database covering 100 million households. It is one of the best databases to assess potential markets for consumer products. It lets Reader’s Digest management know the likes and dislikes of many of its readers. Behaviour Scan is a single source information service that monitors consumer household televisions and records the programmes and commercials watched. This source is an example that screens about 60,000 households in 26 US markets. Many companies develop their own databases.
According to Laurence N. Goal, a single source providing information about household demographics, purchases, television viewership behaviour, and responses to promotions is called a single-source data. When consumers from these households go shopping in stores equipped with scanner-installed computers, they present their credit cards to billing clerks for payment. This permits each customer’s identification to be electronically coded so that the marketer can track his or her purchases.
Some Important Data Sources
1. The Thomas Register: It is the world’s most important industrial buying guide for industrial products. Thomas Register of Indian Manufacturers is available in print, CD, and through Internet. It has 120,000 listings of 40,000 industrial manufacturers and service providers covering 10,000 different product and service categories.
2. The Source Directory: Source Publishers, Mumbai publish this directory. Currently Mumbai and Delhi editions are available. It provides contact information on ad agencies and related services, marketing and sales promotion consultants, market research firms, music companies, telemarketing, and different media.
3. Yellow Pages: Tata Press and GETIT yellow pages are leaders. Currently, yellow pages publications are available for all cities and major towns of India. New Horizons is a joint venture between Living Media and Singapore Telecom and have been publishing directories for specific businesses.
4. Internet: It is a source of extensive data on almost any subject. Different types of published data, research findings, statistics, and figures are available either free or on payment.