Abstract
Problem statement: Treks'n Rapids, a leading adventure sports and huma n resource enrichment company in India, wanted to identify mai n motivational factors of attraction towards adventure sports among youths of National Capital Region. Objective was to improve the effectiveness of integrated marketing communications strategy. Ad venture sports are categorized into four classes: (1) mountain sports; (2) extreme sports like bungee jumping and free fall; (3) rafting and kayaking; ( 4) paragliding, sky diving and skiing. A total of fift een motivational factors have been identified with the help of literature review and an exploratory study. These are: Thrill, Requires zeal/energy, Spells status, Builds confidence, Helps in personality dev elopment, Instills self-belief, Creates unique identity, Is a stress buster, Helps in goal-setting , Is challenging, Requires toughness, Builds sense of achievement, Is a unique experience, It is fun/adve nture and Improved technology has reduced risk. Approach: A questionnaire was created and sent to over 500 p eople online. Through word of mouth people were encouraged to visit the website and res pond to the questionnaire. Fifty-seven responses were obtained. These were analyzed using SPSS. Results: Only two factors were extracted. First all the 57 responses were analyzed as a whole to find o ut the main motivational factors. Next each of the four individual categories of adventure sports was separately analyzed and results were found to be highly consistent. Two composite variables that eme rged are labeled as: (1) characteristics of the adventure sports encompassing: thrill, challenge, f un, toughness and zeal required; (2) characteristic s of the self like: building confidence, personality development, sense of achievement, status, self-bel ief and help in goal setting. Resultant factors were us ed to discriminate respondents based on gender and spend. In both the cases more than 73% of original grouped cases were found to be correctly classified . Conclusion: Findings of this study will help a firm engaged in adventure sports in developing an effective integrated marketing communication strate gy by fine tuning messages in their communication.
Highlights
Adventure sports have obtained both significant profile and following during recent years
The definition of what constitutes an adventure sport is fluid, as new sports are introduced on a regular basis; all adventure sports tend to produce a profound surge of excitement in the athlete, while requiring the athlete to assume significant physical risks
An adventure sport will require the athlete to perform at a high rate of speed, where the athlete is subject to significant effects of gravity, or where the athlete is exposed to special dangers due to the performance of a stunt with limited, or no, safety equipment
Summary
Adventure sports have obtained both significant profile and following during recent years. Important motives for participating were to maintain fitness; experience fun, excitement and challenge; and acquire and improve skills-findings consistent with the youth literature (Gill, 2000; Klint and Weiss, 1986). Through this study the firm wanted to identify the motivating factors towards adventure sports among the youths (between 18-35 years of age-considered to be the largest segment for adventure sports) residing in National Capital Region. This would help them in enhancing the effectiveness of their communication strategy. Can we discriminate between high spenders and low spenders based on the identified motivating factors?
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