Reasons for selecting this method of survey administration
Discuss about the survey process conducted to evaluate the buying behaviors of the consumers within the tourism industry.
The reflective report is prepared to discuss about the survey process conducted to evaluate the buying behaviors of the consumers within the tourism industry. Here I will explain about data and information collected regarding the consumption of luxury goods by the tourists. The reflective report will also present about the cultural values and motivational factors that can contribute to the influencing of consumer behavior and furthermore manage the various activities in accordance with the Privacy Act. The questionnaires are provided to the respondents who provided their useful views and opinions and ensured that the fieldwork is done appropriately. I will make sure that the most appropriate methods are selected during the survey process and make sure to provide some explanation regarding the improvement of administration procedure as well (Onyango and Wanyoike 2014).
The convenient sampling technique is selected as the most suitable non-probability sampling technique because it allows for providing a suitable time for the individuals when they can be present to take part in the survey process. It is both convenient and inexpensive and require very little planning. It needs to select a well-defined population, develop a list of members of the population and randomly select the samples from the entire population list. After engaging them in the survey distribution process, responses can be obtained regarding the number of times they have visited the place or destination, the actual purpose of visiting the place and companions who will accompany the individual during his visit to places (Church and Waclawski 2017). Here, I came to know about the consumption behaviors of the individuals and the luxury items that have been purchased by them during their travel. The face-to-face interview in the survey process is effective for conducting market researches and gain valuable insight. The face-to-face interviews have helped in understanding the mindsets of individuals, furthermore asked for clarification, and even controlled the question sequence. There are both benefits and drawbacks of the survey process (Wells, Bailey and Link 2014).
The advantages include generalized results, appropriately using the lower literate respondents, clarification of questions for the respondents and reduced chances of incomplete questionnaires. The researcher managed to connect with the respondents through empathy and personal interaction, which helped in understanding their feelings and gain a positive experience along with clarity of questions asked. The disadvantages faced were labor intensive and lack of accuracy for the sensitive questions asked to the respondents. I found that the face-to-face interviews were sometimes costlier, due to which online and mobile surveys were conducted where the respondents were provided with a survey questionnaire that was sent by emailing (Van der Aalst 2013). Another drawback faced was the processing of data and information, which had been overlooked at certain stages of the planning process. The face-to-face interview serves as an effective survey process for qualitative methodology that utilized in the market research (Brinkmann 2014). The research, being quantitative, questioned the analysis of actions undertaken.
Evaluating the success of the administration process
The survey administration process was successful in terms of the collection of data required to conduct the research effectively. The respondents were provided with relevant information about the research topic and they understood the questions properly as well. There was no such missing data or information, which further helped in understanding the effectiveness of the questions. The respondents took nearly one week for providing their useful responses and views during the survey process. They were not much confused because they were already informed about the purpose of the research. They prepared themselves so that the responses provided by them during the survey process are without any bias (Mahfoud et al. 2015). The respondents provided their perception of the luxury items that they purchased during their travel and their behaviors regarding the purchases were understood. The survey administration process was also successful because I understood the cultural values and it was found that the customers purchased the luxury items to create a differentiable status, self-esteem, for impressing people while the others fascinate these kinds of products. The respondents even missed few of the questions because they were unable to understand the questions properly, which hindered successful answers provided for the questions answered during the survey process. As it is a quantitative research, so the face-to-face interviews with the respondents and sending them survey questionnaires through emails and even managing the telephonic interviews have been successful for me to conduct the research accurately (Szolnoki and Hoffmann 2013).
To improve the survey administration process, it is necessary for me to make the questions much more simplified and easy to be understandable by the respondents. It should be more convenient in obtaining the responses of the individuals engaged in the survey process by conducting online and mobile surveys, because the survey questionnaires would be provided to them by emails, where they could present their views and opinions without any bias. It is necessary to keep the respondents informed about the purpose of the research so that they can know about its usage for academic purposes only and not for any commercial benefits (Steffen et al. 2014). This would create a positive mindset among them and allow them to provide answers to the questions present in the questionnaire with ease and effectiveness. The telephonic interviews could be beneficial for better response rate and at the same time, mail surveys could assist in sending the survey questionnaire to a group of individuals at the same time and ensure obtaining their feedbacks and responses easily. The survey administration process was further improved by creating multiple options for each of the questions. This allowed for influencing the respondents to select a particular option by just clicking or putting tick part to it and thus the responses were collected with much ease and efficiency (Deakinand Wakefield 2014). With the new age technologies, I even involved social media platforms like Facebook, Skype, etc. to perform video conferences and make the respondents attend the interviews to provide their useful responses.
Suggestions to improve the administration procedure
I have made the questions simpler and made the respondents understand about the purpose of research at first. The questions provided by me were user friendly and this helped in influencing the respondents not to skip any question and answer each one of them properly. After sending the survey questionnaires to the respondents, I provided them with information regarding how they could fill the questionnaire. The respondents completed the survey questionnaires electronically by using a computer system connected to the internet or via email to ensure that the responses were without any bias. The targeted population was assessed by me to enable selection of a particular sample size who were engaged in the survey administration process. While collecting the data from the respondents, there were times when they were not available or present at the same time and place, which created difficulties (Robinson 2014). I made sure to inform them previously so that that they could be present at the allocated time and provide their useful views and opinions regarding their preferences for the luxury products and services.
From the survey administration process, I understood that most of the respondents preferred to try out some kinds of luxury items during their travel to some place. Among the respondents, most of them believed that the luxury goods provided them with enough scopes to show their status, gain respect and reflect own styles to become popular and improve the social circle. Few of them strongly believed that the luxury goods favored their social status, showing off their financial success and even presenting something that could suit their personality and character (Janghorban, Roudsari and Taghipour 2014). From the survey administration, I understood that creating awareness among the respondents would be essential for enhancing their level of participation, furthermore make them know about the consent process. As I was quite straightforward towards them and the questions were simple, it became easy for me to conduct the survey process effectively and provide an initial introduction about the entire survey process. It was important for me to obtain their feedbacks as well, which might create more scopes and opportunities to improve the ways data should be collected as well as enhance the efficiency of the survey administration process (Edje et al. 2013).
Conclusion
From the reflective report, I obtained a lot of skills and knowledge that were required to conduct a research appropriately and manage proper collection of data and information. The face to face interview was though effective, still I preferred the online and mobile surveys because it was more convenient for gaining their responses quickly and without any bias. There were few situations when the respondents were not available to take part in the survey process, because of which, it became a daunting task for everyone’s responses and me to obtain each properly. I made sure to send them the survey questionnaires through emails and even obtained their views and opinions via telephonic interviews. The user friendly and simple questions designed by me helped them to understand the purpose of the research easily and provided responses, which were collected and used for further analysis during the survey administration process.
References
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