How Do the Limitations of Qualitative Research Differ from the Limitations of Qualitative Research?

How do the limitations of qualitative research differ from the limitations of qualitative research?

From my point of view, the limitations of these two different market research concepts, the qualitative and quantitative, are all about the objective of the research, the company strategy and the size of the examined market. It is apparent that "qualitative" relates to quality, focusing on individuals and on reasoning. On the other hand, "quantitative" relates to quantity and to numbers and statistics of a mass.

Each of these research types has its own methodology to be achieved, after studying the best relevant ways to do so. Quantitative response is designed to look at a large amount of phenomena, for example a theoretical study of a small group that is projectable for the whole population. Yet, qualitative research is conducted totally in different patterns and beyond numbers. It is kind of a scientific observation of very specific group of people that does not necessarily reflect the whole population, to find about certain subjective issues.

I believe that the limitations of using the research styles are controlled by the purpose of the research such as identifying a problem or a need, or increasing the customers' satisfaction level. Another important aspect of conducting these methodologies is the primary decision on which style to choose for this research project, quantitative and qualitative methods. Then, must perfectly define the methods, assess their obvious strengths and weaknesses, and establish what instruments and when each method is most effectively utilized to achieve that goal aligned with the company's strategy and research objective.

The main strength of quantitative research is reflecting the reality through numbers and charts. Moreover, this generalized discipline determines customer profiles and market size to examine. On the other hand, this method is time consuming, expensive and has logistical difficulties.

Basically, qualitative research is an extremely subjective in structure and more into understanding of the customer's feedback, impressions and opinions. Such information is best acquired through examining small samples. Quantitative market research techniques are flexible, very detailed, focused, and obtained through many ways. It is also highly demanded by the company's management. It can be misused or misunderstood in terms of using and interpreting its capability and value. To get best result from the market analysis, it must be subjective and targets a small sample size, without focusing on quantities. Another common misconception is that the management always expects a definitive conclusion from such research, actually, it only provides an enough information to establish a firm basis for decision making.

It is frequent to apply both qualitative and quantitative research methods for certain studies, for example in case of surveying large number of clients on using certain item (quantitative) and then their views on using this item in order to enhance it (qualitative). Additional major difference is that qualitative is time spent heavier

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