Public Opinion Survey of Inverness Caledonian Thistle FC

Hello! I am a fourth year Business Studies and Economics student at the University of Edinburgh and I am currently conducting a survey for my dissertation on Inverness Caledonian Thistle FC. It contains a series of questions designed to gather information from supporters and non-supporters and should take roughly 5 minutes to complete.

All responses will be anonymous and confidential. They will not be shared with ICTFC but will be combined with others to learn about overall attitudes.

The answer provided will offer great value to my study, therefore, I would like to thank you for taking the time to complete this questionnaire.

Here's the link:

http://www.eSurveysPro.com/Survey.aspx?id=ddfb5295-8eec-4f65-a1d1-45a26a2c78c0

Thanks!!

I completed this survey. It was good.

Hey

Thank you very much to everyone who has helped me with my dissertation! I have received a great response and some really good feedback. I just have to get writing it now... If you haven't managed to complete the survey yet, there's still some time! Thanks again and hopefully your answers and suggestions can make a difference.

Good Luck Donald

Will you post any results or findings on the website.

Just completed it. Thought provoking questions and I would be interested in the overall results to see if other supporters feel the same.

Just completed this. Let us have a look at your paper when it is completed please.

Sure, I will put the findings up once the paper is in a week on Tuesday!

Thanks once again for a great response! Just to let you know that the survey is now closed. I will write something up about the results asap.

Apologies for taking so long to present the results!

Thanks to all who completed the questionnaire, there was some great information and I couldn?t have finished my dissertation without your input. Unfortunately I haven?t got my mark back yet so I can?t say whether it was good or not! Basically the results were very positive for the club. My key message was that the club could introduce a long term strategy, values, and such like in order to push the club forward, instead of working on a yearly basis. I argued that this will form part of a cycle whereby bringing in more people to watch the game brings in more money, better players, building the reputation of ICT and the cycle continues, resulting in a stronger, more stable team and club, becoming an accepted ?part? of the SPL. I understand that it?s not as simple as this but that?s what my dissertation basically came down to.

Unfortunately, using a free survey site prohibited me from filtering the results and making especially useful conclusions, for example, x age range feels ... Anyway, here is a rather long summary of the responses as promised.

252 individuals completed the survey, 78% male, and 22% female. The majority were 17-25 (48%). 2% were under 16, 7% were over 60, and the 3 remaining age segments, 26-35, 36-45, and 46-60 accounted for 12%, 12% and 19% respectively. 46% were employed full time, 37% were students. The remaining 17% were ?other? category, part time, or unemployed.

The next section included questions assessing the respondents? interest in football. 41% rated their support for Inverness CT as very enthusiastic. 18% responded very unenthusiastic and 41% were spread fairly evenly across the 3 middle options (somewhat enthusiastic, neither enthusiastic or unenthusiastic, and somewhat unenthusiastic). 42% were season ticket holders. 24% said that ICT was not their favourite team. 17% attend 0 games in a season whilst 34% were able to attend most home games (16 - 19 games). 12% and 11% attended 6 to 10 and 11 to 15 games respectively. For reasons why people support ICT, by far the greatest reason was that they were from or live in the area and want to support the local team. Other reasons were that they supported either Caledonian FC or Inverness Thistle FC before the merger and it seemed a natural progression; some liked to support a smaller club with a strong team spirit and the ability to cause a shock by beating bigger teams; others liked the family atmosphere at the club; some simply enjoy watching football. A significant proportion was introduced by family members and has continued the tradition.

The third part to the survey gathered details in relation to people?s attendance decisions. 36% would be very likely to recommend attending an ICT home match. A further 24% would be ?likely? to do so. Compared with other entertainment options in the region, most respondents felt that ICT offered about the same level of enjoyment if not slightly more. On a scale of 1 to 5 where 1 represents a much better experience, 30% selected 2 and 29% selected 3. Only 11 people (6%) said 5, or much worse, while 44 people (22%) chose 1.

Determinants of attendance included weather, prices, form, quality of opposition, whether the game was an early, late or midweek kick off, and whether there was an alternative game on the television. The modal response for each aspect was no effect, suggesting that Inverness? fan base is loyal and inelastic. Other responses were predictable. Good weather, lower prices, and better opposition are likely to encourage greater attendance. A good run of form is shown to have a positive effect whilst 30% reported midweek games are a somewhat negative effect. Bad weather and especially high prices also have a negative influence on respondents? decision to watch an Inverness CT game. Other football being shown live on TV had a slight negative effect, but over 75% reported that it had no effect on their decision to watch ICT.

In terms of satisfaction with the different aspects of the experience at the stadium, ICT scored well. 75% of respondents were either very satisfied or satisfied with the quality of football. The youth and community department was also rated highly. Match day entertainment received a mixed response: 22% were somewhat satisfied whilst 23% were somewhat dissatisfied. The refreshments service is certainly an aspect that could be improved given that 38% expressed dissatisfaction with it. Fewer than 5% were very disappointed with the responsiveness, professionalism and understanding of their needs when contacting ICT. Between 21% and 24% were very satisfied with the same aspects.

The following open questions were to gain more detailed answers regarding ICT?s competitors, and the aspects that encourage or discourage attendance. Pubs, shopping, golf, the gym, cinema, and the theatre were some of the activities respondents said that they may spend their money on instead of an ICT match. Others stated that they considered Ross County, rugby internationals, and Celtic and Rangers to be Inverness CT?s greatest competitors on match days. Some simply enjoyed spending their weekend at home instead of going to a football game. A highly noticeable response was the perception that ICT had no competitors. Most reported that the factor that encourages them to attend a game most is the opportunity to see entertainment. For some, attending games has become routine, and they have no intention of breaking the habit. One response which summarised this was ?I want my team to win and I want to be there to see it?. Common determinants were weather, form, opponents and prices. It would seem that a large proportion of Inverness supporters live outside of the town and will try to incorporate a visit to the stadium into other weekend plans. Watching Inverness is considered by many to be a social event and so the attendance of friends affects their likelihood of attending. There was a degree of disagreement as some reported the good atmosphere encouraged them to attend whilst others said that the lack of atmosphere discouraged their attendance. The range of determinants that discouraged respondents from attending was far wider. They included the price and quality of refreshments, ticket prices, transport issues, poor form, poor opposition, poor weather, road conditions, security, abnormal kick off times, work commitments, the match day experience, the repetitiveness of games and lack of competition in the league.

In order to assess the awareness of Inverness? marketing efforts, the sample was asked to list all the current activities they were conscious of. A few answered none and the most frequent answers were banners outside the stadium, the recent strip competition, press and radio coverage and adverts, emails and the work of the youth and community department. When asked to rank initiatives in the final section of the survey, the loyalty scheme and season ticket perks were most popular as they were noticeably rated 1 or 2 more frequently than the other options. 34% of respondents selected ?1? for the loyalty scheme. Special nights before midweek games, including a meal and match ticket, and a weekly e-newsletter were least popular.

I have not yet presented my report to the club however I intend to do this when I am next home.

Thanks again

Well done donald, you're through to the next round 100% of me said aye.