Exploratory research is a marketing study whose purpose is to collect preliminary information that will help to identify and define problems and to hypothesize causes and possible solutions. It is the first step in the research process.
This type of research is usually conducted through interviews with experts, focus groups, or analysis of secondary data. It is flexible and unstructured, and its purpose is not to provide definitive answers, but to generate ideas, shed light on ambiguities, and guide future, more formal research (descriptive or experimental).
