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Hi Lyndsey, Even segmenting within a single visit can be very problematic as people's motivations, interests, etc. can change over the course of a visit. But I am not seeing where the 'visit' rather than 'visitor' distinction is coming into the WWT segmentation framework provided by MHM. The nine segments- 'learn together families', 'social naturalists', 'interested birders', 'sensualists', 'fun time families', 'expert birders', 'social birders', 'interested naturalists' and 'social day outers'- are each phrased as descriptive nouns about the person(s) rather than about the visit. The descriptions of the segments likewise focus on the person(s) rather than the visit. For example, 'learn together families' are described as follows: 'They are strong believers in life-long learning and actively seek opportunities in pursuit of this for them and their family. Accessing the outdoors plays an important role in their leisure time, and they are generally open to all forms of nature, rather than visiting specifically for the birds. They are valuable to the Trust being the largest segment, open to conservation messaging and strong advocates for the Centres'. All of the subsequent claims about this segment are framed in terms of people, not just WWT centre visits, e.g.: 'Learn Together Families are comfortable in and familiar with the outdoors and are generally prepared to brave the elements, going on a outdoors trip rain or shine'. The results provide descriptions of how people in this segment behave, as if they all thought and behaved in the same way. The technique that is used to create this kind of segmentation- using aggregate and average results to slot people into categories- is beyond imprecise: It is inaccurate on an empirical level (as is pointed out in the example of Falk's segmentation model in the article). Clearly the above segmentation categories overlap. Pretending otherwise, as this and other visitor segmentation models do, is problematic because it is providing an inaccurate description of visitors. Indeed, my core concern is accuracy (I hope I am not alone in expecting that professional research provide accurate results). In sum, there is no robust evidence that I have seen for placing individuals into these categories, and the persistent neglect of demographic data (e.g. social class) flies in the face of the good research that does exist. Best wishes, Eric --------------- Dr Eric Jensen, Fellow Higher Education Academy Associate Professor (Senior Lecturer), Department of Sociology, University of Warwick http://warwick.academia.edu/EricJensen Recent books: - Culture & Social Change: Transforming Society through the Power of Ideas - http://www.infoagepub.com/products/Culture-and-Social-Change Upcoming Books: - From Conservation Education to Public Engagement: Research, Principles and Practice (Cambridge University Press) - Making the Most of Public Engagement Events: Research, Principles and Practice (Cambridge University Press) - Doing Real Research (SAGE) Sociology at the University of Warwick ranked: The Guardian, Complete University Guide and The Times Good University Guide - 3rd QS World University Ranking - 23rd On 12/06/2014 11:23, "Lyndsey Clark" <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote: Eric, I heard about the WWT segmentation at the VSG conference in 2013 and one of the things that interested me the most was that they had segmented 'visits' rather than 'visitors'. I thought that this was important because as we all know, we all visit places with different hats on (I am sometimes a mother with small child, sometimes an 'independent adult' and sometimes a 'museum professional')... I read your and Emily's paper which you have mentioned a few times and didn't see much discussion of the difference between segmenting visits rather than visitors...? Have you any thoughts on that? Thanks, Lyndsey