Post by Kage2020 on Jun 24, 2004 4:18:15 GMT -5
This is a concept that has intrigued me for sometime so thought that I would open it up for discussion as to the specifics and the means of 'posting' the information...
So what am I talking about? We all have heard various people - including myself! - talk about the 'demographic' or 'target market' of GW but, unsurprisingly, they keep their market research statistics to themselves. Recent comments made here have also suggested that the implication is that we should write for the younger audience, pre-pubescents or whatever. (Arguably GW has already done this since there is a definite shift in the style and quality of writing from the original publications such as the Realms of Chaos and subsequent publications. This could, however, also be related to the expansion of the GW market, i.e. the suggestion that a more tempered approach in the imagery results from an American market.)
So let's find out! The thing is that I'm not overtly familiar with the creation of questionnaires, especially those that maximise information. That lies more in the realm of social science and, yes, while archaeology does count as a social science it does so more because, like the Collosus of Rhodes, it straddles the gap between the two areas of endeavour. I'm afraid that I'm more on one foot than the other... perhaps around knee height...
Form
I was originally considering posting this as a series of polls on a forum, but rapidly realised that given Portent's response to the ASP that this would be a bad thing. It would quite simply hog up too much space.
The answer was, therefore, quite obvious and based upon utilising the skills of people already present on this forum, namely the web-designers. Or, in fact, anyone else who has less familiarity with web design... Create a web 'form' that utilises multiple answers, pull down boxes, or whatever, and then 'stores' the information for an individual response...
(Of course, how to prevent multiple response or spamming is up for grabs, partially the reason for suggesting that this go up on a forum...)
Questions
Again, no idea. Obvious questions such as location (by country), age range, working/not working, occupation, etc., are, well, obvious. They're found in questionnaires all over the place. But what about questions which talk about army type, points ranges and average spends per month on GW products, the distribution of that spend (BL, GW miniatures, codices, etc.)... Questions that ask "How would you describe your interest in GW material?" --> "Primarily the wargame", "More the wargame than the 'fluff'", "A balance of wargame and 'fluff'", "more the 'fluff' than the wargame," and "The 'fluff'" or somesuch...
The aim is to develop statistics on who plays GW (demographic), what they spend their money on (i.e. which armies, which types of miniatures, which games, etc.), their primary interests in terms of wargame/'fluff' and what they do with this (and how they do it; e.g. personal interpretation), their determinations about GW and other companies (i.e. BL, Forgeworld, etc.) and so forth.
Just thinking about doing a potential Portent article from the "Lads at the ASP" about this, depending on the results... or just as a means of dispelling or confirming some of the demographic assumptions made about the 40k universe and it's fans...
(And whether to even include the WFB universe!)
So what am I talking about? We all have heard various people - including myself! - talk about the 'demographic' or 'target market' of GW but, unsurprisingly, they keep their market research statistics to themselves. Recent comments made here have also suggested that the implication is that we should write for the younger audience, pre-pubescents or whatever. (Arguably GW has already done this since there is a definite shift in the style and quality of writing from the original publications such as the Realms of Chaos and subsequent publications. This could, however, also be related to the expansion of the GW market, i.e. the suggestion that a more tempered approach in the imagery results from an American market.)
So let's find out! The thing is that I'm not overtly familiar with the creation of questionnaires, especially those that maximise information. That lies more in the realm of social science and, yes, while archaeology does count as a social science it does so more because, like the Collosus of Rhodes, it straddles the gap between the two areas of endeavour. I'm afraid that I'm more on one foot than the other... perhaps around knee height...
Form
I was originally considering posting this as a series of polls on a forum, but rapidly realised that given Portent's response to the ASP that this would be a bad thing. It would quite simply hog up too much space.
The answer was, therefore, quite obvious and based upon utilising the skills of people already present on this forum, namely the web-designers. Or, in fact, anyone else who has less familiarity with web design... Create a web 'form' that utilises multiple answers, pull down boxes, or whatever, and then 'stores' the information for an individual response...
(Of course, how to prevent multiple response or spamming is up for grabs, partially the reason for suggesting that this go up on a forum...)
Questions
Again, no idea. Obvious questions such as location (by country), age range, working/not working, occupation, etc., are, well, obvious. They're found in questionnaires all over the place. But what about questions which talk about army type, points ranges and average spends per month on GW products, the distribution of that spend (BL, GW miniatures, codices, etc.)... Questions that ask "How would you describe your interest in GW material?" --> "Primarily the wargame", "More the wargame than the 'fluff'", "A balance of wargame and 'fluff'", "more the 'fluff' than the wargame," and "The 'fluff'" or somesuch...
The aim is to develop statistics on who plays GW (demographic), what they spend their money on (i.e. which armies, which types of miniatures, which games, etc.), their primary interests in terms of wargame/'fluff' and what they do with this (and how they do it; e.g. personal interpretation), their determinations about GW and other companies (i.e. BL, Forgeworld, etc.) and so forth.
Just thinking about doing a potential Portent article from the "Lads at the ASP" about this, depending on the results... or just as a means of dispelling or confirming some of the demographic assumptions made about the 40k universe and it's fans...
(And whether to even include the WFB universe!)
