N

NAM teams: see National Account Marketing.

Naive forecasting model: A time series forecasting model that relies heavily on the value of the variable in the most recent period to forecast a value for the variable in the next period in a time series.

Narrowcasting: Channelling messages into electronic medium in such a way as to reach small well-defined specialist audiences, eg. with cable television. Opposite to broadcasting.

National account: Customer of major 'national' importance, often with several locations throughout a country. May or may not operate a central purchasing operation. Sometimes handled on a national basis by one executive or manager.

National account marketing/management: the creation of marketing teams or groups (NAM Teams) within a company specifically to meet the needs of major client organisations; the teams or groups usually consist of marketing and sales personnel as well as engineers, production specialists, and so on.

National accounts: major accounts which are sometimes served by a separate sales force because of their importance. Account specialists try to meet their special needs and to develop close relationships with key personnel. Also referred to as Direct Accounts and House Accounts.

National brand: A brand available throughout the country as against in just one region.

National campaign: Marketing operation covering the entire country.

National introduction: the immediate launch of a new product on a nation-wide scale. Because of the risk and the substantial investment in production and marketing that a national introduction requires, many organisations choose the rollout approach instead. See Rollout.

National marketing manager: a marketing manager with responsibility for the nation-wide operations of a marketing division.

National press: Newspapers, dally or Sunday, distributed throughout the country but not necessarily enjoying a mass circulation.

National sales manager: a sales manager with responsibility for the nation-wide operations of a sales division.

Natural break: Requirement in broadcast media that commercial breaks occur only between normal gaps in the continuity of programs. Almost impossible to achieve in a network involving many different programs being broadcast simultaneously to different geographical regions, and so operates in principle rather than being applied rigidly. See Break.

Near-pack premium: a sales promotion in which a gift is to be collected from elsewhere in the store by consumers who have purchased a particular product. See In-Pack Premium; On-Pack Premium; Premiums; With-Pack Premium.

Need: Object, service or resource which is necessary for a person's survival, well-being or comfort. Sometimes confused with Want, which we see elsewhere. Eg. a person may need a surgical operation but can hardly be said to want it. Equally, one may want an extra helping of a delicious meal, yet not need it. However, a persons want may be so strong as to constitute a 'personal' need. see want.

Need-arousal: Stimulating people and motivating them to seek satisfaction from suggested sources, those offering a high probability of gratification.

Need-directed consumers: one of three broad groups of consumers (with outer-directed consumers and inner-directed consumers) identified in the Stanford Research Institute's survey of American lifestyles. Need-directed consumers, representing about ten per cent of consumers in the U.S., are motivated by need rather than by choice. See Inner Directed Consumers; Outer-Directed Consumers.

Need-driven group: A psychographic group identified in the VALS inventory that is characterised as striving simply to meet basic food and housing needs.

Need for affiliation: A basic social need identified by McCleland, which is similar in nature to Maslow's belongingness need.

Need for cognition: A scale that assesses the extent to which people tend to engage in and enjoy greater, amounts of effortful cognitive activities.

Need for power: A basic social need identified by McCleland that refers to the need of people to gain and exercise control over others.

Need-gap analysis: an approach to identifying the unmet needs of consumers, in which respondents are asked to envisage the ideal brand or product and then to rate various existing brands or products on key attributes; if no existing brand or product measures up to the ideal, a gap exists which could be filled by a new brand or product.

Need objection: an objection by a prospective buyer that they have no need for the product offered by a salesperson. See Objections.

Needs: Innate feelings of deprivation in a person. Result from a discrepancy between an actual and a desired state of being. See Wants.

Need-satisfaction approach: an approach to selling based on soliciting information to uncover a buyer's need before attempting to present an appropriate product from the range to satisfy it.

Negative currency: Giving something away in negotiations.

Negative demand: Actual avoidance of a product; refusal even to consider a purchase. Negative demand for a particular product exists when consumers, generally, would be prepared to pay more than the price of the product to avoid having to buy it,

Negative reinforcer: Negative reinforcers increase the likelihood of a behaviour occurring by removing an aversive stimulus.

Negativity bias: The finding that negative information is given more weight than positive information by consumers when they make decisions to buy a product.

Negligent behaviour: The actions and inaction's of consumers that negatively affect the long-term quality of life of themselves and/or society. Examples include drunk driving, product misuse, and fairing to use seat belts.

Negotiated contract: a formal arrangement for the supply of goods or services at a price agreed upon by both buyer and seller.

Negotiated price: a price agreed upon for the supply of goods or services by both buyer and seller.

Negotiated rate: a non-standard charge for the carriage of goods agreed to by both manufacturer and transport company.

Negotiation selling: a selling approach in which a salesperson attempts to produce a "win-win" outcome for both parties. The approach entails the assumption of a partnership between buyer and seller, the salesperson acting as a counsellor to assist the buyer to find the best solution to a problem.

Negotiations: seeking agreement on mutually acceptable terms prior to concluding a trading agreement.

Nonrecurring charge: an extraordinary item that appears on the company's income statement. It will not recur in the future and, accordingly, is mentioned and explained in a footnote. Examples include casualty losses, judgments, losses arising from foreign exchange fluctuations, large thefts, or changes in inventory valuation methods. The footnote section of the financial statement is one of the most important, since nonrecurring charges are explained there.

Nepotism: The practice of hiring relatives and granting them special consideration or privileges within the organisation.

Net audience: Number of unduplicated homes, readers or viewers, etc., also known as net readership.

Net cover: Percentage of the target audience receiving at least one exposure to a commercial or advertisement. See also Gross cover, Coverage, Four plus, Effective cover.

Net paid circulation: Part of total circulation paid for by readers, ie. after deduction of free or complimentary copies and of unbought copies published.

Net present value: The present value of an investment after taking account of future financial returns, having regard to inflation.

Net price: Final price after all discounts and allowances have been deducted.

Net profit: Gross profit minus operating and selling costs.

Net rate: Publisher's rates after deduction of agency commission.

Net reach: Number of people who will have at least one opportunity to see an advertisement after allowing for duplication of readership between issues and between publication.

Net weight: Total weight of a product minus any packaging.

Netting: Plastic netting extruded as a continuous cylinder and chopped into single units which are used to hold units of merchandise and to enhance their display. Frequently used for fruit or vegetable display in self-service stores.

Network: Television or radio stations linked together for transmitting identical programs simultaneously. Refers also to the facility by which programs may be retransmitted by other TV regions, and thus similar to syndicated press features.

Network analysis: Breaking down a complex project into component requirements and recording these in a diagrammatic form which incorporates a critical time scale, so that planning and control can be effected in the most expedient manner.

Network marketing: A form of franchising in which products are moved from the manufacturer to the consumer via networked agents who are users themselves but sell the products largely by word of mouth.

Networking: establishing an informal set of contacts among people with common social and business interests as a source of prospects, for the exchange of information, and for support.

Never-never: Vernacular for buying on credit; somewhat dated.

New: Word often applied to indicate a novel market opportunity. Newness may vary from very slight to very large, the risk factors increasing with the actual amount of innovation, so that many 'new' products fail to achieve market acceptance.

New account-conversion ratio: a measure used to evaluate salespeople in which the conversion rate of prospects to customers is calculated.

New product committee: a group within a company responsible for new product policies, including the assignment of priorities to options and ideas for new products and the final decision on whether or not to commercialise them.

New product development NPD: A function of marketing involving the concept of a new product to satisfy a consumer requirement followed by R & D, design, prototype, consumer testing, test market, and campaign launch.

New product duplication: the introduction by a company of a product that is known to the market but new to the company. See Innovation; Product Extension.

New products: products which are "new" in one or other of two dimensions - new to a company or new to the market; they include existing products which have been improved or revised, brand extensions, additions to an existing line, repositioned products targeted to new markets, and new-to-the world products. See Innovation; New Product Development; New-To-The-World Products; Product Extension.

News agency: A company which obtains news and then distributes it for a price to subscribing organisations which may include newspapers, magazines, radio and television.

Newspaper: Periodical published daily or weekly and containing news, features, reports, together with advertisements.

Newsprint: Coarse paper from which newspapers are commonly produced.

News release: See Press release.

New task buying: an organisational buying situation in which the organisation has had no previous experience with the purchase of product of the kind required. See Buy Classes.

New-to-the-world products: products which serve a purpose for which no product has previously existed. See New Products.

Next-to-reading matter: Advertisement position immediately adjacent to editorial. See Facing matter.

Niche marketing: Directing marketing activities into a market segment or niche. See Concentrated Marketing.

Nichemanship: a term used to refer to the art of skilful selection of market segments in which a firm can compete effectively. See Market Niche.

Nielsen: The A. C. Nielsen Co. was founded in 1939 in the USA. It offers a wide range of marketing research services in Australia, the USA and the U.K. including the well-known shop auditing service, the Nielsen Index.

Nielsen index: Retail audit of brands within predetermined groups, classified by geographical area within regular time periods. Standard format is available to subscribers in large and steadily increasing number of countries. See Retail audit.

Nixies: Returned undelivered mail for whatever reason.

Noise: Term used in communication theory to indicate an undesirable extraneous input which interferes with the primary message signal. See Communication Process.

Nominal price: Face value of an item, often used to indicate a minor charge being made for something of greater economic value.

Nominal scales: Comprised of numbers used to categorise objects or events without ordering the categories.

Nomological validity: A form of validity in which a measure correlates positively in the theoretically predicted way with measures of different but related constructs. For example, the tendency to purchase prestige brands should show a high correlation with a person's need for status and materialism and a negative correlation with price sensitivity.

No-name brand: see Generic Brand.

Non-business marketing: see Non-profit Marketing.

Non comparable alternatives: Choice options for which specific shared attributes cannot be identified and therefore cannot be compared.

Non comparative rating scales: A rating scale in which respondents are not given a standard to use when asked to assign a rating to some object. There is no referent given, such as " compared to your favourite brand," when non comparative rating scales are used.

Non compensatory models of choice: Models of choice that emphasise that high ratings on some attributes and not compensate for low ratings in other attributes.

Non coverage error: Non sampling error that arises because of a failure to include some units or entire sections of the defined survey population in the actual sampling frame.

Non-cumulative quantity discount: a one-time reduction in list price for a quantity purchase. See Cumulative Quantity Discount.

Non-durable goods: Products which are consumed within a short space of time eg. FMCG.

No-need objection: an objection raised by a prospective buyer on the ground that the product offered by a salesperson is not needed.

Non-family households: singles and non-related individuals living together; the increase in the number of non family households is an important feature of the changing Australian demography in recent years.

Non-luxury goods: Necessities.

Non-manipulative selling techniques: methods used in selling where a salesperson, rather than trying to force an unwanted product on to a customer by high-pressure means, works with the customer to identify a genuine need and to provide a satisfying solution. See Manipulative Selling Techniques.

Non-monetary price: that which it costs a consumer, other than money, to buy a product; the non-monetary price of purchasing a product includes the time devoted to shopping for it and the risk taken that it will deliver the expected benefits. Non-monetary price is an important concept in social marketing - for example, the price of avoiding the cancellation of a driver's licence is the abstinence from alcohol if driving.

Non observation error: Non sampling error that arises because of non response from some elements designated for inclusion in the sample.

Non-packaged goods: a sub-category of consumer nondurable goods; for example, petrol is a non-packaged consumer non-durable good. See Consumer Non-Durables; Packaged Goods.

Non parametric statistics: Statistics and statistical tests designed for nominal and ordinal data.

Non parametric tests: Class of statistical tests, also known as distribution-free tests, that are applicable when the data reflect nominal or ordinal measurement or when the data reflect interval measurement but the assumptions required for the appropriate parametric test are not satisfied.

Non-price competition: Price is not considered a significant factor in consumer's decision-making. Concentration of competitive activity into sectors other than price, such an incentive marketing, packaging, prestige, convenience, taste, and image advertising.

Non probability sample: a sample in which the chance of an individual within the total population being chosen is not known. Sampling techniques in Marketing Research in which the researcher uses personal discretion instead of random selection in identifying the sample, thereby reducing the statistical validity of the results. Where statistical precision is not the first priority, non-probability sampling can give useful results - and is usually cheaper. The two methods widely used by marketers are quota sampling and judgement.

Non probability sampling: the selection of a sampling unit by arbitrary methods, such as convenience or judgement.

Non-profit marketing: marketing activity undertaken by a firm whose primary objective is one other than profit; sometimes called Non-Business Marketing.

Non-profit organisations: organisations that buy and distribute goods and services for reasons other than the return of profit to their owners.

Non response error: Variation between the selected sample and the sample that actually participates in the study; caused by a failure to contact all members of a sample, and/or the failure of some contacted members of the sample to respond to all or specific parts of the measurement instrument.

Non sampling errors: Errors that arise in research that are not due to sampling; non sampling errors can occur because of errors in conception, logic, misinterpretation of replies, statistics, and arithmetic; errors in tabulating or coding; or errors in reporting the results.

Non-selling activities: tasks other than selling activities which form part of a salesperson's duties and responsibilities - paperwork, reports and sales meetings, for example.

Non-store retailing: the merchandising of goods by means other than retail shops; merchandising by mail order, vending machines, telephone, door-to-door, etc.

Nonverbal communication: the transmission of a message from sender to receiver without using words. See Body Language; Kinesic Communication; Proxemic Communication; Tactile Communication.

Normal distribution: Statistical term central to sampling theory. On a line chart, it shows the point at which the mean, mode, and median averages share the same value and has a characteristic ben-shaped profile. Standard deviation is calculated upon a formula derived from this distribution, enabling the confidence level (eg. 95 per cent) within which results are confined to be stated. In the example given, this would be accuracy defined to within +/-5 per cent.

Normal frequency curve: Pattern of distribution of values encountered frequently in statistical analysis where the mean, mode, and median values are identical or very close together. The curve is symmetrical, bell-shaped, and the average value lies at the peak of the curve. See Frequency curve and Dispersion.

Normative Influence: the influence exerted on an individual by a reference group to conform to its norms.

Norms: Rules of behaviour.

Norm of Reciprocity: A societal norm that states if a person does something for you should something in return for that person.

Not-at-home: Source of non sampling error that arises when replies are not secured from some designated sampling units because the respondents are not at home when the interviewer calls.

Noting: Term used in advertisement research. Indicates that a reader's attention was drawn to an advertisement when first looking through the newspaper or magazine in which it appeared, though not necessarily that he/she read, fully understood or acted upon this stimulus.

Noting score: Average number of readers found to have noted a specific advertisement or editorial item expressed as a percentage of total readership.

Novelty: A promotional item which is novel; usually embodying the name or logo of the company issuing it, and mostly cheap, ie., a give-away.

NPD: See New product development.

Nuclear family: Consists of a husband, wife, and offspring.

Numerical concentration: Selection of the most economic or effective media based on readership figures which most closely match those of the chosen target audience, after duplication and wasted readership have been eliminated.

Null hypothesis: One that, if accepted, will result in no opinion being formed and/or action being taken that is different from any currently held or being used.