|
TARGET GROUPS
Two groups of people were identified as targets for this survey.
• Group1: A group assumed to have good awareness of their health, and
• Group2: Several groups of people assumed not to have good awareness of their health.
For Group 1, the survey was presented to the subscribers of MyProductAlert.com who are considered health-conscious people. Additionally, the survey was posted on all pages of the website which receives visitors assumed to have relatively good awareness of their health. Also, an advertisement was placed in a newsletter that (besides else) addressed health and wellbeing of people. The survey for this group ran for 1 month.
For Group 2, a more specific Internet marketing targeting method was used to establish and reach the desired groups. Advertisements were placed in PPC (Pay-Per-Click) SE's (Search Engines) to reach the following groups of people:
• People who are visiting nightclubs; dance clubs; bars; attending parties, such as bachelor and bachelorette parties, college parties, spring break, and alike, where large quantities of alcohol and other beverages are consumed, and hardly any water;
• Smokers were targeted under assumption that if they smoke (since smoking is considered not healthy) they may live unhealthy lives;
• People eating fast food since fast food is very popular and it is very rare to see a fast food order accompanied by a cup or a bottle of water;
• People searching for beverages other than water.
In order to establish and reach these target groups, tools such as Google Keyword Tool, Yahoo Keyword Selector Tool, Wordtracker®, and several alike keyword research tools were used to pinpoint the search words and phrases used in search engines and associated to the target groups. These search words where then assembled in subgroups (nightclubs, spring break, and so on), based on what these people were searching for, to establish the target groups.
These search words and phrases were then used to reach the target groups via advertisements with the PPC SE's. The survey for this group ran for 4 months.
SURVEY RESPONSE
Incentives relevant to the target groups ranging from several page reports to whole e-books were used to increase the response rate of the visitors. After taking the survey, the Takers could download and read these reports for free.
The survey was presented in an addition to the incentive. In other words, when the visitor arrived, he or she was faced with what it looked like a sales page of the mentioned report or e-book, only, emphasis were put on the fact that they could have it for free if they would take the survey.
In addition to this, no personal information was required, such as name and e-mail, for taking the survey - only the person's input. This was done for the purpose to create a relaxed feeling that the Takers don't have to be worried about receiving possible spam afterwards.
Also, after taking the survey, the survey participants were asked to invite friends and family to take the survey too.
All of these three methods - the incentives; inviting friends and family; and not needing to submit any personally identifiable information - produced great response, which helped keep the advertising cost down.
SURVEY RESULTS
Group 1 Analysis:
The reason for the survey one-month run time for Group 1 was that an immediate trend was noticed when people started taking the survey. The health-conscious people said that they were drinking more water and less of the other beverages. At one month, that trend was so strong that there was no need to continue. The survey was pulled from the website.
• The survey results from Group 1 could be viewed here: Survey Results - APPENDIX 2 [pdf]
In the one month timeframe, a total of 1,108 people from Group 1 took the survey.
In Question 1 ("Which beverages people drink"), all 100% of them said that they drink water. Other high beverage consumption was the Tea at 83%, which was somewhat expected with health-conscious people.
In the mid-range consumption were: Coffee at 63%, Milk at 59%, and Juice or Non-Carbonated Soft Drinks at 43%.
All of the other beverages were in a lower consumption percentage.
The Question 1 presented answers to the "what" question as far as types of beverages that people drink. However, all of the other questions presented answers to the "how much" question as far as quantity of the consumed beverages on daily and weekly basis.
When looking at the answers from Question 2 through Question 21, even though people from Group 1 in Question 1 answered that they drink beverages other than water, they drink them in moderate to low doses on daily and weekly basis or they don't drink them at all. Only the tea is consumed in somewhat larger doses. The Milk is also consumed in somewhat larger doses on weekly basis, but it is unknown if the answers included eating it with cereal since this was not included in the survey.
The more important answers were the responses from Questions 22 and 23.
In Question 22 for the daily consumption of water, the answers were overwhelmingly at 5-10 glasses and 3-5 bottles. The same answering trend continued in Question 23 for the weekly consumption with answers of more than 20 glasses and 15-20 bottles.
This was a very good indication that health-conscious people understand the health benefits of drinking water and keeping themselves well hydrated. Also, even though some of them said that they do consume beverages other than water, they consume them in a low to moderate doses.
Group 2 Analysis:
The results from this group were very interesting because in Question 1 no clear trend emerged even to the last day of the survey. More troubling was the fact that there were people who even said that they don't drink water at all. The survey for this group ran for four months in a "wait and see" mode for a trend to emerge, but at the end of the fourth month all advertising was stopped and the survey was pulled because it was determined that there was no need to continue.
• The survey results from Group 2 could be viewed here: Survey Results - APPENDIX 3 [pdf]
In the four month timeframe, a total of 12,763 people from Group 2 took the survey. 94% of them said that they drink water. Surprisingly, 6% (792) said that they don't drink water at all. In addition to that, 14% (1764) said that they only drink few sips a day and 38% (4831) said that they only drink between 1-3 glasses per day. A very important fact regarding these numbers needs to be mentioned.
There are reports that in 1998 a survey was conducted by Yankelovich Partners for the Nutrition Information Center at The New York Hospital - Cornell Medical Center and the International Bottled Water Association(5)(9) which revealed that 10% of the 3,003 surveyed Americans said that they didn't drink water at all. Does this mean that people are getting more educated about the benefits of drinking water because now only 6% answered that they don't drink water at all?
Not necessarily. These survey numbers cannot represent the entire population unless all the people in the country or the world answer that question. What's important is that there were people back in 1998 and there are still people nowadays that do not understand the health benefits of drinking water, hence they drink it in small amounts or not at all, which means people are still not educated about it.
Other beverage consumptions in high amounts for this group were Coffee at 92% and Soda-Pop at 84%. The alcoholic beverages also scored fairly high with Beer leading at 73%.
The coffee is very popular nowadays and it came to no surprise that almost all of them answered positive. Since Soda-Pop is a drink that is served almost everywhere and vending machines are present in almost every corner, it is safe to consider that it too is a popular beverage. And it sounds like the multi-million dollar Super Bowl commercials might be working very well since Beer came as the most popular alcoholic drink. Almost all of the other beverages scored relatively higher compared to the responses from Group 1.
The Question 1 presented answers to the "what" question as far as types of beverages that people drink. However, all of the other questions presented answers to the "how much" question as far as quantity of the consumed beverages on daily and weekly basis. And this is where it gets even more interesting.
When looking at the answers from Question 2 through Question 21, a lot more people from Group 2 drink beverages other than water and in higher quantities compared to Group 1.
For an example: 65% from Group 2 answered that they drink 1-2 Soda-Pop drinks per day while only 22% do from Group 1. And a combined 19.1% from Group 2 answered that they drink more than 3 Soda-Pop drinks per day while only 1.5% do from Group 1.
In the weekly column, 59% from Group 2 answered that they drink 7-10 Soda-Pop drinks per week, while only 3% do from Group 1. And 11% from Group 2 answered that they drink more than 10 Soda-Pop drinks per week, while only 1% do from Group 1.
While one may offer an argument that there is nothing wrong with the above consumption difference (people could drink whatever they want), more troubling are the responses from Questions 22 and 23.
In Question 22 for the daily consumption of water, 38% answered that they drink 1-3 glasses per day, and 28% answered that they drink 1-3 bottles a day. This could be only one glass or one bottle, or up to three. Even more troubling is the fact that 14% (1764) said that they only drink few sips a day.
In Question 23 for the weekly consumption, 30% answered that they drink 10-15 glasses per week and 21% answered that they drink 10-15 bottles per week with almost all of the other people answering even lower than those numbers. Though it seems like that some of the people who don't drink any water at all on daily basis answered that they do drink some water on weekly basis because out of the 792 only 358 said "NO" on weekly basis.
And, what do we think of the 6% (792) people who answered that they don't drink any water at all?
This is a very good indication that people from Group 2 don't drink enough water and perhaps don't understand or choose to ignore (for their own reasons) the health benefits from drinking water. Or it could be that they drink too much of the other beverages that they don't have room for water.
Whatever their reason is, these results from Group 2 prompted the "Beverage Trial."
|
