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First of all sometimes it does. I can't make a better hypothesis because there is no previous studies of any kind. The hypothesis can be wrong it's not really important, what's important is to start experimenting on the matter instead of just debating whether or not it has an impact. It's not that random anyway, when you think about it the game manual suggests that PRMs have indeed a direct impact on merchandising, yet we can't put a figure on it.

Public Relations Managers help market the team to the fans, encouraging more people to show up to games and be willing to pay more for tickets

We know it does affect affluence, but we don't know if it's profitable (is the salary compensated by the extra affluence?). Anyway I was replying just to inform everybody that maybe I'll know a little more about PRMs at the end of the season, maybe not, at least I tried. But I agree with you, the results could be proven totaly irrelevant at the end.

I can't make a better hypothesis because there is no previous studies of any kind. The hypothesis can be wrong it's not really important, what's important is to start experimenting on the matter instead of just debating whether or not it has an impact.

First of all, a hypothesis needs to be testable and falsifiable, so the possibility of it being wrong isn't trivial, it is critical. You missed every single point I tried to make, so I'm not sure where to even start. So, my answer is... Yes. Sorry, I'm not criticizing you, I actually feel at fault here for not being able to properly explain myself in a way that is understood.

Edit: OK, I'm giving this one more shot. After making another attempt to understand your post I think this may be a language issue. I have a feeling what you were trying to communicate was that it didn't matter to you about the quality of your hypothesis or objectives, as long as data is actively being gathered (not that it shouldn't be a falsifiable hypothesis). I disagree with this also, and I'll try to explain my position in a way that makes better sense.

The more specific your hypotheses are, the better you can focus your data collection. Otherwise your efforts are being wasted due to excessive data being collected, not enough data being collected, or due to applied variables not satisfying or conflicting with your requirements. It is better to have a detailed and clear hypothesis you really don't like than a fuzzy one you approve of, or what I can only simply describe as random data collection. Call it whatever you like.

It's not that random anyway, when you think about it the game manual suggests that PRMs have indeed a direct impact on merchandising, yet we can't put a figure on it.

Public Relations Managers help market the team to the fans, encouraging more people to show up to games and be willing to pay more for tickets

The quote you referenced to support your statement doesn't. Not only does it not seem to suggest a direct impact, it doesn't even suggest an impact to merchandising. I think this is referring instead to the indirect impact of the marketing of a team's attendance and merchandising through fan surveys. Whatever it means, this doesn't make mass data collection without an idea of what your looking for make any more sense.

I can't make a better hypothesis because there is no previous studies of any kind.

I don't see how a lack of previous study prevents you from making a more useful hypothesis. A hypothesis is an educated guess that does not rely on mounds of data. Experiments are done to test the hypothesis, not to come up with one. Also, what kind of animals do you plan to use? That is almost as important as the white coat

Last edited by bonespawn at 10/25/2010 10:03:48 PM

Guinea pigs cos they are more cute and fuzzy then the lab rats. On the other hand I believe the BB servers are now ran by a new type of animal instead of the hamsters which were the backbone of the former servers.

Public Relations Managers help market the team to the fans, encouraging more people to show up to games and be willing to pay more for tickets

With that statement in my opinion it means that better PRM's will give teams with bad fan surveys a better chance at attracting more fans to their arena. This has no direct influence on the MR.

I've changed PR managers a lot over the seasons and every time I increase the PR level I get higher merchandise that week, and everytime I lower my PR manager level my merchandise drops. So that indicates to me that merchandise is definitely affected by PR managers. I don't think there is a way to prove if it is directly affecting or indirectly affecting.

Any numbers I provide aren't going to be helpful bceause I constantly change my roster.
For example I hired a level 4 PR manager this week (I had a level 1 before this), and my merchandise increased by 3k. However, I also bought 4.5 million dollars in players this week, so that could also account for the merchandise rise.

Your strategy puzzles me. When you were tanking your games you had a level 1 PR and now that your planning on winning games with those new players you go and upgrade your PR to level 4. I was always taught to do the exact opposite.

Get a good PR when you expect to lose a lot of games to offset the decrease in arena attendance.
Get a level 1 PR if you are expecting a 22-0 season since your arena will be packed to the rafters anyways.

Well I upgraded the PR manager for a few reasons.
1. I wanted the Specialty to make games easier to win.
2. My arena attendance is low at the moment due to tanking so I'm hoping that winning tonights game plus winning the cup plus my PR manager at level 4 will help me get close to selling out.
Perhaps I should have kept my PR manager at level 4 the whole season, but I figured that the 20k I would save on salary each week is roughly the same as the amount the PR manager would increase my arena attendance by. So I didn't see a point in it.

OK, I dug up some data here to explain my observation last season. Keep in mind that this isn't an attempt to prove anything, and is merely to explain my observation and why I suspect that there could be an additional impact to merchandising unrelated to fan surveys and tied to the PR Manager. There are a number of other known and unknown possibilities I have considered, and this is merely one of them. Here goes...

In my case, 2 weeks had passed since my last player purchase on 7/1, and I was seeing consistent rises in MR for many weeks prior in Division V, and then continuing after my promote to DIV up until my staff event. I don't have records going back that far for merchandising, but I know for a fact that I had gradual/constant increases to MR prior to this point.

I downgraded from a level 3 to a level 2 PR on Sunday 7/18. I saw my first drop to MR on 7/19 the following day (the financial update). I don't have proof or a record of the fan surveys, but I can tell you they were also the same on this week as they were the prior week. I had equal numbers of wins/losses from week to week, etc.

Even if I was incorrect in my recollection of fan survey data, my fan surveys only went through the roof after. I promoted the previous season, went 6 rounds deep into the cup tournament, won TV game and began to really win games and beat higher ranked teams. Despite all the improvements week to week and my fan surveys hitting 4.5-5 balls, I continued to experience MR drops. These drops spanned from 7/26 - 9/13 with an average decrease of $345.00/wk.

My thought process here, is if fan surveys are supposed to improve my MR, why did great increases only result in continued drops. When I had worse fan surveys at the beginning of the season I had increases, not decreases. Anyway, on 9/19 I made my next staff change, and this was the first time I saw any change in MR trends. Following this, my data breaks up even further because of too many additional variables being introduced. I don't think this information is enough to draw any conclusions, but all I'm saying is I think this was a good enough observation to question what I really know about PR managers.

Public Relations Managers help market the team to the fans

Market the team meaning also selling jerseys and such, so merchandising. I'm pretty sure having a star player from your country is a big merchandising boost, NT selection is also a huge boost.

As for the hypothesis, this is not a theory I'm testing, it's just a vague idea so there is no need to formulate an accurate hypothesis... Basically it's an input-output analysis with only a few variables (15 and collected during 12 weeks so 180 elements). This is a modelling exercise with not enough variables so it's bound to be innacurate and hard to analyse. And I understand your point (I think), you're saying that an experiment must test a theory, and for this test to be efficient you have to formulate correctly your hypothesis in order to collect only the right data. Sure thing but I'm not exactly experimenting I'm trying to understand a system and find the typical response to a known input (PRM level).
So yes the data collected won't be enough, and some variables may be applied while it shouldn't, nonetheless it should provide some answers.
Imagine that with a lvl 4 PRM manager my merchandise revenue does not increase significantly (let's say less than + 20%) while my roster stays the same and my results are constant then we'll know that "merchandising-wise" it's not profitable to acquire a lvl 4 PRM.