Starting survey analysis

I have just started my analysis of my surveys and thought I would share a few of my findings with you. 

A personal brand is made up of two views:

·         What you want it to be; and

·         What is seen, felt and heard

In my audience surveys and my interviews I asked what the first word was that came to mind when a performers name was mentioned.   Have a look and let me know if you think these are a fair and give a good general representation of their personal brand:

	See	Hear	Feel
Marilyn Monroe	White dress Blonde Sex symbol Glamour Curvaceous	Ditzy Girly voice Cotton wool Happy birthday	Sad Vulnerable Sympathy
Katie Price	Boobs Fake Vulgar Business woman	Loud Cheeky Whining	Tragic Money seeking Attention seeker Admiration
Kylie Monogue	Smile Petite Bum/Gold hot pants Sexy Fashionable Good energy	Great entertainer Good voice Locomotion Pop princess	Brave Happy
Madonna	Idol/legend/icon Pop star Talented/controversial Smart/Business woman	‘Boderline/like a virgin’ Emotion Good in her day	Impressed Ever Changing Old Harsh
Michael Jackson	White Gloves The king Talented/Legend Great Dancer	Superstar ‘Thriller’ Amazing Vocals Pop	Lost his way Weird/Odd/Bizarre A legend that fell from grace Sad/Agony
Amy Winehouse	Drink and Drugs Brilliant artist Tatoos	Incoherent words Valerie Good Singer	Wasted Sad Vulnerable A Wreak
Gary Glitter	Paedophile Phariah Glitter	Loud Noise A pop star	Nothing Disgust Sad Mad
Cher	Long Hair Plastic Surgery Over the Top/Eccentric Great Songs Talented	‘Shoop Shoop’ Highly Fantastic Good back in the day	Nostalgic Earthy Lonely Entertained
Michael Buble	Sexy/Gorgeous Lovely/Yummy Handsome Cheesy	Fantastic Entertainer Brilliant Voice Jazz Modern day Crooner	Real Charisma Happy Loving Cheerful
Darcy Bussell	Ballet Dancer Talented Graceful Beautiful Dancer	Not a good voice	Impressed Admiration
Adam Garcia	Handsome Tap Dancer Great Footwork/Performance	Not heard much	Cute Warm towards him Strength
Grace Kelly	Legendary Beauty Style Icon Elegant/Graceful Film Star Princess	Unique Voice Class High Pitched	Entertained Moody Awesome
Fred Astaire	King Of Dance Legend Amazing Dancer Icon	Perfection Great Rhythms Old Fashion Smooth ‘Singing in the Rain’	Brings a smile to my face Just lovely Entertained Happy
Victoria Beckham	Skinny Stunning Visually Pout/Moody Devoted an successful Mother Social climber Wife of David Beckham	Spice Girls Not much Girl Power	Uninterested Vulnerable Insecure Not posh!

As you can see some brands have positive descriptive words and others not so good.  For ethical reasons I have not used some of the words even though I felt they were a true representation of how that person felt I did not think they were appropriate for use on here and would not have added anything extra.

A successful personal brand does not always have to portray a nice image.  There are some well known people who are very successful being the bad guy.  Katie Price for example is successful in her own right, has a fan base but as you see from the summary above the negative words out numbered the positive.

In some cases the personal brand can help you when you make a mistake.  Hugh Grant was caught in a compromising situation but he owned the problem, apologised and the fact that people liked him before and believed in his brand helped him get over the situation and it has not been detrimental to his career. Some other performers have not been so lucky. 

I watched ‘A week with Marilyn’.   I know this is someone else’s interpretation of events, however it is a good example of how someone was stuck in a personal brand created by others but not exactly what she wanted.   In my previous blog my research showed that you need to take control over your brand before it is decided for.

http://pearllinnascott.blogspot.com/2012/03/personal-branding-literature_8789.html

I am in the middle of analysing the surveys and it has been good looking back and reflecting.  There are some finding/results I am really pleased with but it also showed up a few things that could have been done differently. 

Hind sight is wonderful thing!

Personal Branding Literature

The first time I read any books or articles on this topic was at the end of the last module.  I think the subject of personal branding is something that most performers will know about and be interested in so I expected there be a lot of relevant articles and books.  How wrong was I?  

When searching the web I notice quite a few authors claimed to be experts on the subject and some have written books on the topic.  I found a huge amount of books and articles on branding and I made my list and visited the library.  This was a waste of time and I ended up using the web and having to purchase books.  When I started to dip into them I found the majority of them focused on company branding or personal branding from a business point of view, but not a lot referenced the entertainment industry or how it applied specifically to a performer’s career.    A few books and articles did give some information on specific performers but the majority of the content was on personal websites and how to be at the top of Google.

I have found all the readings really interesting and there a few key learning’s, which I think are really relevant to entertainment industry:

·         Define your personal brand before someone else does

·         Be very sure of your brand before you choose it as its very hard to change once you decide

·         Once you have decided on your personal brand, control it and stay on top of it

·         Stay true and honest to who you are, do not lie as people see through it

·         If you stay honest and reliable, when you make a mistake and own it, people will be more likely to forgive you

·         A personal brand is not just what you do for a living. It is who you are as a person and what your values are. What you stand for are used to help you in your job.

·         A personal brand is a visual/selling point to show people what you stand for and what you will bring to the business/contract  

I then tried to think about other sources of articles and had a look at Equity and Spotlight.  I came across a workshop on branding for performers, how to define and use it to your advantage and the tools and skills to help.  The description of the workshop was exactly what I wanted to find out about and the tools to help raise your profile and network and to sell your brand were all the things we learnt in module one on the BAPP, blogging, social networks etc.   As expected they got a good response to attend the workshop so much so I was not offered a place and so far I have not had any luck getting a copy of any information they used.   Did any of you attend?

Reflection on my Surveys

I approached this task in five stages:

·         What did I want to find out and why

·         Who could I ask to participate

·         What tools were out there that what would fit my needs

·         Design the questionnaire and send it out

·         Analyse the answers

What did I want to find out and why

During my research I concluded that a personal brand is a two dimensional thing

·         what you want it to be; and

·         how you make other people feel. 

So based on this I designed two surveys

·         one for a performer

·         one for an audience

For the performer I wanted to see and explore the following:

·         what they knew about personal branding

·         how they thought it had helped or hindered their career

·         what they think made up their personal brand

For the audience I wanted to

·         What they saw

·         How they felt

Who did I ask

I wanted professional performers to complete the Performers survey and I realised my professional network along with social media was a rich source of data and potentially even richer if they extended the invite to their wider network.

I used my social network with social media for the audience survey.  This excluded any performers. 

The tools

Text books say the larger the sample the more accurate a survey tends to be more and reliable because it is anonymous so it encourages greater honesty, and it is more economical than an interview. 

Firstly I designed a questionnaire for the performer. I did an outline on paper first and divided it into 4 sections: Personal data about the respondent so I could do a comparison, their knowledge of personal branding; training or advice on personal branding and their feelings about other performers   I was seeking to explore their views without leading them so qualitative questions were more appropriate and quantitative questions were rarely used.

I searched the internet for online survey tools.  With the exception of Pirate Survey they all required either a monthly or annual fee for the functionality I needed e.g. more than 10 questions per survey and more than a 100 responses.  I decided to use Pirate Survey to pilot my questionnaire.  As I started to draft the questionnaire I began to realise that there were some limits with this tool. I completed the questionnaire and decided to pilot it with BAPP colleagues I only had 5 responses from my colleagues, but that was enough for me to analyse the suitability of the questionnaire and the tool.  I also tried out the reporting functionality which was limited.  

Because of the challenges with editing, retrieving and reporting I decided to transfer the questionnaire to a tool I was familiar with and happy with the functionality, Survey Monkey. I upgraded from the basic account, for 2 months subscription and that gave me more functionality e.g. better flexibility in the layout of the questionnaire, and the options to use more than 10 questions in one survey. 

I sent the final questionnaire out through Facebook, with a covering letter, consent, and a web link to over 200 of my contacts. 

Audience Survey

I then designed an audience questionnaire to find out what an audience sees, feels and hears and in addition I had some questions on current and past performers which I hope will inspire me for my artefact.  This questionnaire was even simpler.  It was short and asked only 7 questions, I decided not to pilot this survey and I used Facebook to send it out to over 200 of my non performing contacts.

360 or personal questionnaire

During my research I started to think about my own personal brand and decided that this should form part of my artefact.  I designed a questionnaire which asked what people thought about me (this was difficult and task I put off).  I was keen to get some really honest answers so I really stressed that this would be anonymous and I did not ask any personal questions.  I wanted to seek views from people who knew me well and others that had only a brief encounter with me.  Again I used the survey monkey tool to draft the questionnaire and I sent out the link to 30 people, who I knew would answer honestly, via Facebook.

I am now at the analysis stage and if anyone has any hints tips on how to use this tool I would be grateful for some advice.  I have found lots of common themes between the questionnaires, the interviews and my reading so I am feeling quietly confident that the questionnaire was pitched right.