The Demographic Profile of Attendees of the Music Event in Brisbane - Research Paper Example

Introduction to Research Quantitative report Insert Insert Number: Introduction to Research Quantitative report Introduction Different consumers have diverse motives when attending an event. Some attend for exploration, others excitement, and others for relaxation purposes (Pritchard & Stinson, 2013). A better understanding of the motives leads to an understanding of the extent of event satisfaction likely to be achieved after the event experience. To be able to run a successful event, the event organizers need to be sure of the consumer motives for a maximum event satisfaction. This research paper will thus be of importance to the organizers of the music event in Brisbane in helping them understand the demographic profile of attendees, the relative importance of each motive tested, whether the motives of tourists and non-tourists are different, and finally, whether the attendee’s event satisfaction is correlated with intentions to attend the event next year. To achieve the level of understanding sort by the event organizers, this report will briefly review relevant literature in relation to event motives and event tourist motives. Second, the report will explain the analysis procedures used as well as provide an outline of quantitative research approach used. The major quantitative approach will be descriptive and inferential statistics. Literature review A motive is defined as an internal factor that orders a person’s behavior. The behavior is a response to a desire to meet certain need. Pleasure trips, such as tourism trips are motivated by several needs (Crompton, McKay, 1997). When attending music events, an individual may be in need of entertainment, family interaction moments, relaxation or just recreation. The extent to which any of those needs will be met will be facilitated by the different elements in the package of the event (Crompton, McKay, 1997). Motives are the key ingredients to decision making process of attendees. When attending an event or a festival, many people would be looking for a chance to escape from daily routine as they have fun. The theme and the program of an event attract intrinsic motivation to be in an event at the specified time. The theme and the program arouse motives like socialization, novelty, entertainment, among other motives (Skoultsos & Tsartas, nd). Demographic characteristics of the attendees are one of the most researched areas of event attendees’ motives. These characteristics are specifically clear when considering event tourism. The standards set in an event determine who attends in large numbers. For example, an event organized targeting local residents may attract tourist if western model becomes part of the considerations in the event organization (Egresi & Kara, 2014). Tourists may get excited to experience the residents’ way of life as it will be displayed in the festival. The unique nature of the people becomes the main attraction point to participation. According to Hoyle (2002), market segmentation is driven by the diverse nature of event attendance motives presented by event attendees. This allows event organizers to practice target marketing that is important to customer event satisfaction (Hoyle, 2002). Profiling the event attendees for marketing purposes therefore requires one to have in-depth understanding of the nature of the economically significant group in terms of needs. Research Questions What is the demographic profile of the music event attendees? What is the relative importance attached to each motive tested? Is there any difference between tourist and non-tourists motives in attending an event? Methods A quantitative research design aims at determining relationships between things or issues. The design can either descriptive or experimental (Hopkins, 2002). That is, descriptive studies measure subjects only once while experimental studies measure subjects before and after treatment. This research adopted descriptive study since the subjects were measured once and the main aim was to establish associations between variables. The main themes measured were motivation to attend the vent, satisfaction, intention to attend the event next year, and demographic characteristics of the study population. The study was conducted on a sample of 100 people. Using a research questionnaire (see appendix 1), attendees were asked questions as they left the event. Randomization was achieved by ensuring that every third person leaving the event was interviewed. The data collected was analyzed using descriptive statistics. Demographic profile was measured in term of age, gender, income, relationship status, and tourism status. It was expected that the participant was a male or a female as well as a tourist or a non-tourist. Age was divided into 6 categories from 18-30, 31-40, 41-50, 5-60, 61-70 and above 70. Income was divided into four categories from $0-$50,000, $50,001-$100,000, $100, 001,$150,000, and $150,000+. Relationship status was in four categories where was expected to be currently single, De facto, married or never married. The descriptive statistics for demographic profile was Categories Frequency Age 18-30 46   31-40 31   41-50 12   51-60 8   61-70 2   70+ 1       Gender Female 52   Male 48       Income $0-$50,000 34   $100,001,$150,000 19   $150,000+ 24   $50,001-$100,000 23       Relationship Status Currently single 10   De facto 19   Married 33   Never married 38       Tourist Status No 48   Yes 52   n= 100 To main levels of motivation measured were escape from daily life (Esc), spend time with friends (KGS), spend time with other likeminded people (EGS), experience something new and novel (Nov), distinct cultural experience (Cult), the artists and music performances (EvAttr). The responses to six variables were categorized into strongly disagree (SD), disagree (D), neither agree nor disagree (N), agree (A) and strongly agree (SA). The level of satisfaction was measured in five categories. Those were very dissatisfied (VD), dissatisfied (D), neither satisfied nor dissatisfied (N), satisfied (S), and very satisfies (VS). The intention to attend next year’s event was expressed in five responses. Those were definitely will not attend (DWNA), may not attend (MNA), uncertain (U), might attend (MA), definitely will attend (DWA). The descriptive statistics were as below Results Table 1: Demographic table Categories Frequency Age 18-30 46   31-40 31   41-50 12   51-60 8   61-70 2   70+ 1       Gender Female 52   Male 48       Income $0-$50,000 34   $100,001,$150,000 19   $150,000+ 24   $50,001-$100,000 23       Relationship Status Currently single 10   De facto 19   Married 33   Never married 38       Tourist Status No 48   Yes 52   n= 100 From the results, the majority of the attendees were between the ages of 18-30 years that was 46% of the sample. While it seems that older people who are 70 years and above do not like attending the function because out 100 people, only one person was within the age bracket. This means that event organizers ought to consider including activities that are more inclined to the youth since they are the majority in music events. While the number of people who earn $0-$50,000 was at 34 %, on the other hand, those who earn $50,001-$100,000 are 23 % that is the lowest. This indicate that majority of the attendees are limited in terms of resources. This tells the vent organizers that they should consider changing fewer amounts on tickets if they are to attract more people to the event. The demographic data shows that those who have never married were many (about 38%) as compared to those who are married which is at 33 %. This indicates that to the organizers those events like couples show may not work well like an all-inclusive event. Table2: Means, Standard deviation and P-values The results above indicate that cultural experience was the greatest motivation to tourists with a mean of 4.12 with a standard deviation of 1.17, while know group socialization was the least motivation with a mean of 2.37 with a standard deviation of 1.25. This was the opposite with non-tourists whose greatest motivation was novelty (m=4.00, SD= 0.99, and m=3.98, 0.86 respectively) followed by know group socialization and the least motivation being cultural experience. The most significant measurements in the study were know group socialization and culture. They both had p=0.00. Intention to come back next year was also significant with p=0.00. Three tests for correlations between event satisfaction and intentions to re-attend Whole sample (r) 0.41 Non-tourists (r) 0.63 Tourists (r) 0.17 The correlation analysis shows that there is a correlation between event satisfaction and intentions to re-attend (r = 0.41). It therefore means that event satisfaction will likely make the attendees comeback. On the other hand, there was a strong correlation between event satisfaction and intentions to re-attend with an r=0.63 for non-tourists. While for tourists the relationship was not as strong as for tourists the relationship is r=0.17. Conclusion It is said that music is the universal language understandable by everybody regardless of age and race (Higgins, 2012). From this research, both male and female attend music events whether as tourists or non-tourists. However, the youths who have never married attend more than the older generation. This may be because the youth are more explorative than the old people. The youths have less responsibilities thus can afford to spend any amount on entertainment. Earning is another factor determining attendance of an event. For this research, majority of the people who attended earned $0-$50,000. This means that if the event could have been a little more expensive, the number of attendees could have been affected significantly. Among the main motivation to attend music events is cultural experience for the tourists and socialization for the non-tourists. Event satisfaction will determine if the attendees will plan to attend the event next year or not. The non-tourists are the most probable people to come back. To the event organizers I will recommend 1. The organizers to consider youthful activities more since they are the greatest audience for music concerts 2. Event pricing should be able to accommodate individuals with less earnings. 3. Attendee satisfaction should come first in every step of the planning since satisfaction will determine intention to come back. 4. When planning tourism events, the organizers should emphasize on cultural experience since it is the main motivation 5. When targeting non-tourists events that enhance socialization. 6. When planning for an event, the organizers should have an all-inclusive event. Targeting married only may reduce sales since most event attendees have never been married. References Crompton, J. L. & McKay, S. L. (1997). Motives of visitors attending festival events. Annals of Tourism Research, 24, 425-439. Egresi, I., & Kara, F. (2014). Motives of tourists attending small-scale events: the case of three local festivals and events in Istanbul, Turkey. GeoJournal of Tourism and Geosites, 14, 94-111. Higgins, K. M. (2012). The music between us: is music a universal language? Chicago: University of Chicago press. Hopkins, W. G. (2002). Quantitative research design. Sports Science, 4, 2000. Hoyle, L. H. (2002). Event marketing: how to successfully promote events, festivals, conventions, and expositions. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons. Pritchard, M. P., & Stinson, J. L. (2013). Leveraging brands in sports business. New York, NY: Routledge Publishing. Skoultsos, S., & Tsartas, P. (nd). Music as tourist motive and groups of attendees among festival audiences. The case of three music festivals in Greece. Retrieved from http://tourconf2013.aegean.gr/proceedings/paper30.pdf Appendix 1 Read More