1
Business Statistics
Coursework
2
Question
A
Service bundling is the practice of marketing two or more services in a single package. For
example, Virgin Media’s bundle package includes Broadband, Digital TV, Calls package and
Line rental. Marketers spend
billions of dollars each year to promote service bundles by
emphasizing incentives such as savings discounts, convenient billing options, and free gifts.
A group of researchers from the US
1
studied the effects of bundle incentives on 300
consumers’ percei
ved value, search intentions for alternative service providers, and switching
intentions to a competitor.
Perceived Value, Switching Intentions and Search intentions were measured on a continuous
scale.
Service Bundles was a categorical variable with thre
e categories:
?
Unbundled
?
Bundled
–
convenience only
?
Bundled
–
10% Savings discount
The authors used one
–
way ANOVAs to examine the effect of bundles types on Perceived
Value, Switching Intentions and Search Intentions.
1.
What is ANOVA? How many types do y
ou know? Please, specify your answer.
(5 marks)
The ANOVA table for the results was:
2
.
Did bundle type affect significantly any of the continuous variables? Comment on the p
–
value.
(4 marks)
3
.
Which continuous variable do you thi
nk bundle type affects more? Comment on the F
value.
(4 marks)
4
.
The post
–
hoc mean differences for perceived value between bundle types are shown in the
below table:
1
Main results are adapted from Andrews, M.L., Benedicktus, R.L., Brady,
M.K. (2010). The effect of
incentives on customer evaluations of service bundles.
Journal of Business Research
,
63
(1), pp. 71
–
76.
2
Differences (I
–
J) between bundle types
*
p<0.05
Please comment on the
significance and the signs of each paired differences.
(8 marks)
5
.
In your opinion, do bundled services increase customer’s perceived value for the product?
(4 marks)
1
Business Statistics
Coursework
3
:
Question A
A researcher is testing the null hypothesis that there is no relationship between two
continuous variables (customers’ satisfaction: continuous dependent variable and
service quality
: continuous independent
variable). From a sample of n = 16, she
determines that b
1
= +4.8 and S
b1
= 1.6.
a)
What is the value
of t
STAT
?
(4 marks)
b)
What statistical decision should the researcher make? (for 95% confidence
intervals, the t value is
–
2.145 and +2.145).
(4 marks)
c)
Construct a 95% confidence interval estimate of the population slope,
ß
1
(for 95%
confidence intervals, the t value is
–
2.145 and +2.145).
(4 marks)
Question
B
The marketing manager of a large supermarket chain has the
business objective of
using shelf space more efficiently. Toward that goal, he would like to use shelf space
to predict the sales of pet food. Data is collected from a random sample of 12 equal
–
sized stores. For those data, SSR = 20535 and SST = 30025.
a
)
Determine the coefficient of determination, r
2
, and interpret its meaning.
(4 marks)
b)
Determine the standard error of the estimate.
(4 marks)
Question C
What is Simple Linear Regression? What are the assumptions of Simple Linear
Regression?
(5 marks)
2
Question D
A group of researchers from the UK
1
has attempted to address the relationship
between business strategy and firm performance, by
present
ing
an empirical
investigation of medium and large, high
technology, indus
trial manufacturing firms.
Business performance was measured on a continuous scale.
Business strategy consisted of
five
dimensions, each also measured on a continuous
scale:
?
Aggressiveness
?
Analysis
?
Defensiveness
?
Futurity
?
Riskiness
After collecting
a satisfactory sample, the researchers examined the correlation
between the dependent variable (business performance) and the independent variables
(Aggressiveness, Analysis, Defensiveness, Futurity and
Riskines
s). Their results are
shown in Table 1, prod
uced in SPSS.
Table 1. Correlation coefficients among the dependent & independent variables
Business performance
p
–
value
Aggressiveness
–
0.04
0.75
Analysis
0.34
0.04
Defensiveness
0.29
0.03
Futurity
0.21
0.03
Riskiness
0.01
0.89
a)
Give the defini
tion of correlation. What are the general assumptions of correlation?
(6 marks)
b)
Discuss the results of Table 1 in terms of their statistical significance, mag
nitude
and direction.
(8 marks)
c)
Can you conclude that an increase in agg
ressiveness leads to business
performance’s decrease? Please, specify your answer.
(2 marks)
d)
What would be your advice to managers who want to improve the performance of
their businesses?
(4 marks)
Question E
What are the two type
s of Chi
–
square test? Please, discuss each type.
(5 marks)
1
Morgan, R.E. and Strong, C.A. (2003).
Business performance and dimensions of strategic orientation.
Journal of Business Research
,
56
(
3
), pp.
163
–
176
.