Over our time away I have been researching tools we use to segment our publics and the VALS2 survey was an interesting tool. The original VALS survey was built by consumer futurist Arnold Mitchell. Mitchell created VALS to explain changing U.S. values and lifestyles in the 1970s.

Using further study the VALS survey is now polished to identify in depth audience segments, which are categorized by innovators, thinkers, achievers, strivers, experiencers, believers, makers and survivors. However, this psychographic scale (formerly a values/lifestyle scale) is United States-centric and respondents may have the tendency to enter their aspirations instead of actual values/lifestyles.

I do believe this is a great tool to research the market for a new or failing product.This tool can be used to segment your consumers to find who may be your active consumer for your product and how to reach them in terms of the values and lifestyle.This tool should not be used as an end-all because it does not consider environmental and societal factors enough.

My profiles were striver and experiencer.

The striver profile did not match me particularly well.I am not trendy, but I am motivated by achievement.I do seek about the opinions and approval of others. Money doesn’t defines success for me, prestige does. I do not favor stylish products that emulate the purchases of people with greater material wealth, I favor efficient and durable products. Because of my Naval experience I want a career, and my college education and involvement with may different student organizations I have a diverse array of skills and I am focused.

The experiencer profile was quite accurate.I am sometimes motivated by self-expression.I can be an impulsive consumer seeking excitement and entertainment. I often do spend money on exciting new technologies that promises enjoyment and new experiences.Furthermore, I spend money on items related to exercise, sports and automobiles.

The profile results proved to me that the validity of the VALS2 survey may be more of an educated guess rather than hard accurate results.I feel this allows room for skepticism. For anyone who maybe a skeptic of the VALS2 survey I would advise them to use it as a research model to investigate potential target markets or to locate your active consumers.This is a great tool to see who buys your products, however, one must prepare and accept the disadvantages of surveys:

• They depend on subjects’ motivation, honesty, memory, and ability to respond. Subjects may not be aware of their reasons for any given action. They may have forgotten their reasons. They may not be motivated to give accurate answers, in fact, they may be motivated to give answers that present themselves in a favorable light.

• Surveys are not appropriate for studying complex social phenomena. The individual is not the best unit of analysis in these cases. Surveys do not give a full sense of social processes and the analysis seems superficial.

• Structured surveys, particularly those with closed ended questions, may have low validity when researching affective variables.

• Although the chosen survey individuals are often a random sample, the respondents are usually self-selected, and therefore a non-probability samples from which the characteristics of the population sampled cannot be inferred.

• Participants may not answer honestly.

• Survey question answer-choices could lead to vague data sets because at times they are relative only to a personal abstract notion concerning "strength of choice". For instance the choice "moderately agree" may mean different things to different subjects, and to anyone interpreting the data for correlation. Even yes or no answers are problematic because subjects may for instance put "no" if the choice "only once" is not available.

The communications representative project example on SRIC-bi website was about the U.S. long-distance carrier using the VALS2 to select its spokesperson for a major television campaign is a good example of how it works because the VALS2 wasn’t the end-all.They surveyed an already established target (heavy long-distance customers) what type of a spokesperson would they relate to.

I would assume that the phone company may have more information about their customers that could test their results, in addition, to interviewing and choosing the spokesperson that would fit the image of their company. Therefore, their secondary information along with the VALS2 results helped them choose multiple potential spokespersons for interview.

I learned that there may never be a survey or a psychographical tool that is an end-all in locating and understanding your target market.However, the VALS2 is a great tool to research results and to learn more about your audience, their tendencies and even the perception of your product and company. Do you think VALS2 is a great tool?Do you think the VALS2’s flaws out weigh their benefits?I am interest in reading your viewpoint.

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