University Library > Guides > Simmons Choices 3

How to Use Simmons Choices 3®

 

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NOTE: The Library no longer has access to Simmons Choices 3. We now offer Mediamark Reporter.

Choices 3® is a CD-ROM product from Simmons Market Research Bureau, one of the leading consumer research firms in the country. Choices 3 contains information from the Simmons Study of Media and Markets, which features demographic, psychographic and geographic data of consumers and their buying habits. This resource allows the user to analyze over 8,000 brands in more than 450 product categories based on results collected from the surveys of 30,000 households. The resource includes data from the spring and fall of 2003, the most recent data available.

 

Access to Choices 3

Choices 3 is available for use in the Library on workstation S8, the computer next to the library guides across from the Reference Desk. Ask a reference librarian to log into the computer for you. Click on the icon on the desktop labeled Choices 3.

 

Using Choices 3

Although learning how to use Choices may take some time, the rewards will pay off tremendously. Unlike many of the Library's other electronic offerings, Choices 3 operates from a CD-ROM, giving it a vastly different look and feel than online databases such as ABI/Inform or Tablebase. This guide will lead you through the steps to getting the most from this resource.

Choices 3 has two major functionalities - CrossTab Reports, which provide insight into demographic, psychographic and geographic data of consumers and the products they buy, and Media Ranking, which match consumers with appropriate media types (newspaper/magazine titles and television).

NOTE: This guide refers to icons in Choices 3 - view a screen shot with explanations (PDF). Hovering the mouse over an icon also tells what the icon represents.

   

CrossTab Reports

Use the directions below or follow a step-by-step example to construct a CrossTab Report.

Select Survey | Set Up Columns/Rows/Filters | Run Report | Interpret Results

 

Select Survey

The Library has access to the Fall and Spring 2003 Media and Markets Surveys. In the main toolbar, click on the Change Survey icon - black arrow pointing to an S - and select which survey to search. Click on the plus sign next to the survey name, and then select POP (population) or HHLD (household).

 

Set Up Columns/Rows/Filters

The next step is to set up the columns, rows and filters for the data.

  • Columns represent products and brands
  • Rows represent demographic and/or media data
  • Filters (optional) screen for a particular demographic or geographic characteristic,
    such as female or the top 20 demographic market areas (DMA)

There are two methods to finding questions (i.e. search terms) in Choices 3.

OPTION 1 - Menus: In the Dictionary box - the box to the far left - use the options (Lifestyle, Opinions, Travel, etc.) to find a search term i.e., a question. Clicking the plus sign to the left of an option will expand the menu to offer more choices under a particular category. For example, choices like Age and Gender fall under Lifestyle (Demographics). After selecting your choices, options will appear in the Answer box - the center box. Click and drag the desired answer to the Columns box or the Rows box, whichever is appropriate.

OPTION 2 - Search: Use the binoculars icon above the Dictionary box to search for terms. This will bring back results for both question-level and answer-level searches. When searching, think of products as the question-level searches and brands as the answer-level searches. After searching, results appear in the Dictionary Box. Click the plus sign to the left of an option to expand the menu to offer more choices under a particular category. After selecting your choices, options will appear in the Answer box - the center box. Then, click and drag the desired answer to the Columns box or the Rows box, whichever is appropriate.

 

Run Report

In the toolbar, click the Run Analysis icon (looks like the corner of a spreadsheet) or from the menu bar, select Coding > Run Analysis. This will open a new window - the XTab Viewer, which contains the applicable data based on your columns, rows and filters.

 

Interpret Results

What do the numbers mean?
View an example report (PDF) to help make sense of the numbers.

  • Sample: total number of people/households that completed the Simmons study that meet the criteria selected
  • (000): the projected number of the US population that meet the specifications of both columns and rows -
    add 3 zeros to the end of those numbers (e.g. 8,362 represents 8,362,000 Americans)
  • Vert %: the number of people, based on weighted counts (above), that meet specifications in the columns, expressed as a percent
  • Horz %: the number of people, based on weighted counts (above), that meet specifications in the rows, expressed as a percent
  • Index: with 100 as a base, it indicates the likelihood of meeting the qualifications of both columns and rows
  • Base: the percentage of the selected base that the specific cell represents
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Media Ranking Feature

The Media Ranking feature works much like the CrossTab reports. Instead of products or brands as the columns, use the demographic characteristics to represent the columns and the media titles for the rows.
NOTE: Choices 3 does not give advertising rates for media titles.

To find Media Titles:

OPTION 1 - Menus: In the Dictionary box - the box to the far left - look for the categories Print Media or Cable/Television/Radio. Click the plus sign to the left to expand the menu to offer more choices under the category. After selecting those, options will appear in the Answer box - the center box. Then, click and drag the desired answer to the Rows box.

OPTION 2 - Search: Use the binoculars icon above the Dictionary box to search for terms. It will bring back results for both question-level and answer-level searches. When searching, think of media types as the question-level searches and specific titles as the answer-level searches. Click the plus sign to the left to expand the menu to offer more choices under a particular category. After selecting your choices, options will appear in the Answer box. Then, click and drag the desired answer to the Rows box.

After selecting media titles, repeat the same process for selecting questions for the columns and if desired, filters. Once you've completed that, you can then run the analysis and interpret the results as described above.

 

Export/Print/Save Reports

After running the CrossTab or Media Ranking reports, the XTab Viewer provides options to export/print/save these reports.

Export Reports (recommended)

Exporting the data into a spreadsheet program such as Microsoft Excel allows the user to easily change column and row headings, as well as perform other functions such as creating graphs and charts. From the File menu, select File > Export > Spreadsheet (CSV) File. It will prompt for the file to be named and saved. CSV files can be opened using any spreadsheet program, like Microsoft Excel.

NOTE: If you click on the MS Excel button from the toolbar or choose Excel from the Export menu, this DOES NOT necessarily export the data shown in Choices 3. Make sure to check between the file that opens in Excel and the data in Choices 3 for inconsistencies. Use the directions above for exporting as a CSV file, which appears to solve this problem.

Print Reports

From the menu bar, select File > Print. After printing, speak with the reference librarian, as they will need to release the print jobs.

Save Reports

Using the Save function from within Choices 3 will save the file as a Choices 3 Report File (.rpt), which can only be opened with Choices 3. If you wish to be able to work with the data, see the instructions above for exporting reports.

 

Help

For help with Choices 3, please contact Kyle Naff (naffk@uww.edu), Business Librarian. You may also find these other guides useful:
Simmons Study of Media and Markets - Choices 3 - Babson College
Database Guide: Choices 3 (PDF) - Stanford University

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