METHODOLOGY: 1997 Segmentation/Baseline Study
A phone survey of 1,191 Los Angeles County residents provided the baseline data from which program efforts were monitored and evaluated.
- 1,000 interviews focused on the general population, with 82 of these interviews conducted in Spanish.
- 98 interviews targeted Spanish-speaking recent immigrants.
- 93 interviews targeted Asian-language-speaking recent immigrants.
General population participants were drawn from a representative sample of random-digit phone numbers for Los Angeles County.
- Quotas were established for gender, age and ethnicity based on census data.
Participants were:
- 16+ years of age.
- Permanent residents of Los Angeles County.
- Lived in Los Angeles County for six months or more.
In addition to collecting general information among all Los Angeles County residents, a segmentation study determined which residents are the best targets for social marketing efforts – those residents identified as the greatest polluters who are most likely to change their behaviors.
- This segmentation identified six demographic and behavioral clusters, two of which became the primary focus of program efforts, comprising 63% of Los Angeles County residents:
- Neat Neighbors (50%)
- Fix It Foul-Ups (13%)
- While a third segment, Rubbish Rebels, ranked high in its level of polluting behaviors, because of this segment’s relatively small size (9% of LA County residents) and because of prior knowledge that it would be difficult to impact, the campaign did not specifically target this group.
- Expectations were that core elements of the campaign would “spill over” and reach Rubbish Rebels with critical messages; and in fact, there are significant changes in a number of polluting behaviors confirmed by the research that bear this out.