by Lynne Conte

Created on: May 12, 2008   Last Updated: May 20, 2008

Developing the best opportunities for your business and how to market takes ethics. Are you in a focus group sharing your business knowledge? A skilled moderator leads focus groups consisting of screened six to twelve participants to assure relevant information. Focus groups are informative for business owners and managers in a Home, Internet or Franchise business to exchange ideas, promotions and understand how customers make decisions by testing existing programs.

Four Advantages of Focus Group Research:
*Focus groups generate new ideas
*Researchers are able to observe respondents actions through behavior, expressions and
voice
*Flexible about learning in specific interests
*Moderators do not overpower the group, but controls the direction of a discussion

Both Home and Internet business rely on the Internet, however, Home businesses require traveling and customer contact; Internet businesses (e-commerce/e-business) is an electronic business created by links to conduct business, usually buying & selling, consultant and collaboration business-to-business. Owning a business for yourself and with others given authorization to sell or distribute for another company, is called Franchise business. "The company that grants the independent operator the right to distribute its trademarks, products, or techniques is known as the franchiser. The independent, third party business person distributing the franchiser's products or services through retail or service outlets is called the franchisee"
(http://business-law.freeadvice.com/franc hise_law/franchise_business.htm).

Market research is a method of efficient planning by gathering, recording and analyzing information to help decision making in businesses; customer satisfaction is the key to a successful business. Tracking on-line to understand customer information is monitor cookies & tracking software to learn customers shopping patterns and their movements on a business website. Computers (information systems) organize, gather, process, analyze, store and disseminate information for specific business purposes. Information systems perform three functions for business owners and managers:
*Input, raw data captured from inside or outside the business
*Processing, transformation of raw data into usable form
*Output, processed data that is transferred to people

Decision-support system (DDS) is a system that supports decision making and helps businesses predict results of various alternatives before making a decision. Understand

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