Research Barriers
During the research process, both quantitative and qualitative surveys showed quite a few challenges. Firstly, Tesla’s target group is upper-middle and upper class consumers – naturally, it was hard to find available respondents that perfectly fit such profile. After some networking, it was possible to find a few candidates that match our target requirements, but to increase sample size we decided to also interview other consumers that, even though not exactly matching the financial profile to qualify as Tesla’s target, are still part of the middle class, are interested in cars and had just bought or plan to buy a vehicle. Also, despite the relatively small sample size, we compared our findings with other third party researches from big corporations and we found out that our results were comparable to the findings of these researches that had a much bigger sample size, therefore validating our study.
Another barrier was the language - our group is formed by exclusively non-Chinese students and we don’t have a fluent Chinese speaker among us. To minimize the impact of language barriers in our study, we got a translator to help with both surveys, translating the questionnaire for the quantitative and helping with the qualitative interviews when necessary.
And lastly, time was another crucial factor – due to the short amount of time available to prepare and execute the research plan, sample size was compromised with the urgency the study required. Even so, we collected over 70 respondents to our quantitative study and 8 interviewees for our qualitative survey, which gave us great insights about Chinese consumers, the Chinese auto market and their views of Tesla and electric cars.
Methodology
Both primary and secondary data will be used to enable us to make recommendations and answer our research objective. Our primary data is qualitative, collected through in-depth interviews with possible Tesla customers, and quantitative, collected online and in person through a bilingual questionnaire. We chose to use in-depth interviews since we are exploring the possibilities in a relative unknown area. Therefore, an interview can provide us with useful insights about the Chinese car consumer. We used the survey to generalize our results in a clear and readible format.
Our secondary data is a mix of internal and external information, and iss obtained through sources such as articles, annual reports and market reports.
Market Research Plan
Research Objective
How can Tesla deliver value into the target market taking into consideration the preferences and purchase behavior of our target audience?
Target audience -> Chinese upper middle class/ upper-class.
