The game needs to be inclusive. If nothing else, it’s good business to bring more women into the sport, because of ticket and jersey sales, but it’s also the right thing to do.

Ron Petrovich http://iamawomanandiknowfootball.com
Creator, I Am A Woman and I Know Football

1. How you “felt” as an “insignificant demographic” is irrelevant to survey research. Your self-esteem is not the researcher’s concern. It might be your therapist’s, however.

2. I stand by my description of LIFETIME viewers as bitter Thelma and Louise wannabes with curlers in their hair covered by the turbie twist they bought during the commercial break of some man-hating movie that promotes in-bedroom involuntary castration.

3. If the event sucked, I imagine that those surveyed would have told them that.

4. A survey is done to turn a question into answer (to paraphrase the slogan of a polling firm I have worked with). It may be that they SHOULD have asked the question you raise, but that may not be the question THEY were seeking an answer to.

5. Paying for the respondent can create a sampling methodology problem if not weighted and adjusted properly. The incentive can skew the sample above and beyond the inherent skew that exists due to normal refusal rates. Also, if people could volunteer themselves to be surveyed rather than chosen under a methodology devised by the researcher, that too can bias the outcome.

6. The idea of watching baseball pitchers scratching their balls in 3-D could kill the concept’s use in any sport.

My problem is with this “female quota.” I heard some of the survey-givers mention this quota, but while standing in line to return my survey for my $5 reward, a woman asked for a survey and was denied. When she saw me standing in line to return one, she said, “well she has one.” The survey collector replied, “I know, they aren’t supposed to have them. It’s a real problem.” That leads me to believe that there was no female quota, women weren’t supposed to get them period. How else would a large number of volunteers know when to stop giving them to women unless they were only allowed to personally hand out a set number to women.

Quota or not, I think that ESPN handled the situation poorly. I’m sure they had enough surveys and $5 rewards for everyone in attendance, so why not just let women fill one out? If ESPN doesn’t care about our opinions, what’s the harm in letting us just take the survey? Or did they not want to hand over the $5? Why risk alienating the USC female population?

Charity – great insights on the event itself. And you crack me up.

In an inaugural event, as a surveyor – in addition to my “standard” market – I’d be interested in the motivation of everyone in attendance. It’s easy enough to par down a particular set of results from just the men only and do comparisons to women who may have felt the same or differently.

Granted, they were also paying people $5 for a survey. Maybe the women just got greedy. Maybe I’m just bitter I didn’t get my $5. J/K.

And sexist remarks aside (haus fraus? ay, ay ay), ESPN could use your wisdom on their marketing team. I still feel that the network could attract more female viewers (thus, more ad dollars) without having to change its messaging in the slightest. But that’s a discussion for another post, not on this one with regard to surveys.