Establecimiento de criterios básicos para realizar estudios previos

3.4.1 Thematic Analysis Concept

Thematic Analysis (TA) is a common qualitative research process that seeks to examining patterns within data (Boyatzis, 1998). TA advocates exploratory research questions like why and how, as answered through the eyes of people, and uses rich descriptions for interpreting in-depth presentations of context.

As Boyatzis (1998) implies, this method manages to keep researchers interacting with data, their

respondents and emerging analyses. When referring to the process of interviews, thematic annalists have the possibility to build further research questions as they go into their interview guides, and they also use their emerging ideas to develop further patterns.

3.4.2 Data Collection

The purpose of this study was to discover if branding is associated with perceptions of importance to aid in the future marketing of ecolodges by interviewing 12 ecolodge owners and managers from Costa Rica. Exploring ecolodge owners and managers’ perceptions of ecolodge branding is important for both businesses and the academic research field. These perceptions define and describe ecolodge owners and

managers’ opinions about, and interest in ecolodge branding based on which the concept will be validated or not. Therefore, the objective was to explore and analyse ecolodge owners and managers’ perspectives with regard to the following aspects of branding:

 What are owners and managers’ perceptions of ecolodge branding?

 What is the level of ecolodge owners and managers interest in adopting a cooperative ecolodge branding strategy?

 What future challenges do ecolodge owners and managers foresee in implementing cooperative ecolodge branding strategy?

In doing so, 11 English and Spanish interviews of 1 to 2 hours were conducted in December, 2015.

One of the interviews benefited from 2 participants, as both the manager and the owner of the ecolodge decided to interview, making for a total of 12 participants. Two of the 12 participants answered in written from and thus had a shorter, nonetheless succinct contribution to the study. From a total of 12

participants, 9 were native Spanish-speaking, and 3 spoke English, with Spanish as second language.

Hence, 7 interviews were conducted in Spanish and the rest of them in English. The limitations resulted from this dynamic language context are acknowledged and discussed in the bias section.

Interviews were recorded using Pamela Skype, a software application designed to record Skype conversations while Spanish to English translations were performed by the researcher. Participants’

names were randomly replaced with pseudonyms ranging from Ecolodge 1 to Ecolodge 12 as well as any other names or places they mentioned during the interviews to respect their identity. As per the transcript appendix, a similar structure was used for all 12 interviews including the consent and advising on the interview, the main interview questions and the resulted conversations. To ensure the interview information is coherent, only information that was accurately recorded was transcribed. As data was collected electronically, some parts of the conversation were not accurately recorded as interviews were

subject to good WI-FI connections. Social conversations were also left out for lack of relevance to research questions.

The 10 interview questions were designed to reflect the thinking behind ecolodge owners and managers with respect to branding and its ramifications for the ecolodge businesses (Appendix A).

Through these questions, participants were expected to comment on Costa Rica’s ecolodge branding situation, express their interest in joining a cooperative ecolodge brand, opinion on the market performance of such a brand and evoke preoccupations related to the future implementation of such a brand. Thus, the kind of answers looked for included but were not limited to brand associations, brand adoption, market predictions, and implementation concerns. Although not always complete, answers on the above-mentioned aspects were collected. As interviews progressed, insights on brand obligations and brand expectations were also collected as a result of discussions on participant’s willingness to financially contribute to the brand and the value expected in return. While these two aspects held a symbolic role for the majority of participants, some participants found it particularly important for the overall success of the brand, and are discussed in Chapter 4.

From a knowledge perspective, not all participants exhibited a thorough understanding of the concept of branding and its applicability in marketing. Throughout the interviews, it was discovered that none of the participants benefited from professional marketing training, with the majority being amateurs driven by their love for environment and not necessarily profit. As discussed in Chapter 2, this is in line with the majority of the literature characteristics on lodge owners and managers. Hence, the majority of

participants showed a keen interest in the ecolodge branding strategy and its applicability.

3.4.3 Data Analysis Approach Overview

With TA methodology, there is a hierarchical approach to data analysis. Interview data is analyzed through the process of simplifying, conceptualizing and transforming data into codes, to identify major patterns (Strauss & Corbin, 1998). It is a process that generally involves 6 phases like data

familiarization, initial coding, searching for themes among codes, reviewing themes, defining and naming themes and writing the final report. A code is a label attached to data units of the same meaning be they words, sentences, phrases, or paragraphs (Strauss & Corbin, 1998), and can be performed either

electronically or on paper. From the different kinds of data codes and concepts generated, various themes are assembled, and conclusions are elaborated.

Coding Scheme

As mentioned on numerous occasions, the scope of this study was to explore and analyze perceptions of branding importance in a systematic way. An open-ended, but theoretically oriented coding approach was thus desirable, to allow for all the information to be covered and explored in developing the final analysis. As such, data analysis was based on a coding scheme built in parallel with the actual coding which involved (Strauss & Corbin, 1998):

 Line- by-line coding: in which data is broke down in codes and concepts. In doing so, interview transcripts were read in full for an overall understanding of participants’ individual perspectives on branding, text units were coded, and similar content codes were grouped;

 Incident-by-incident coding: in which similar content codes are combined in coding categories;

and,

 Focused coding: in which themes are identified across the coding categories and branded them for final analysis.

Coding was performed electronically using text lines as main coding units, and where more than one or no codes were found, text lines were separated or gathered together. Line-by-line coding involved a

high number of codes which for the purposes of this paper would be overwhelming to discuss. The interviews lasted between 1 to 2 hours, with a total of 177 transcription pages of simple to complex paragraphs and a code for almost each text line. However, incident-by-incident and focused codes were reduced to a total of 8, respectively 3 codes.

The decision to reduce the number of focused codes was made by constantly comparing line-by-line codes to insure consistency in the way they were coded and grouped in categories, adding new coding categories only when necessary. In doing so, responses for each interview question were grouped and coded together to allow for a better understanding and systemization of data across the 12 responses.

Depending on the length of the responses, data was divided into 2 to 3 paragraphs, to help with incident coding.

A succinct representation of the coding categories and themes discovered upon analyzing interview transcripts is presented before Chapter 4.

3.4.4 Study Limitations

Recruiting during Costa Rica’s high season for tourism, using a limited recruiting period of two weeks only, and expensive phone-service between Canada and Costa Rica, this study used a rather limited recruitment format than if more time and resources to recruit a more diverse pool of participants were available. Also, 2 of the interviews were collected in written form, due to ecolodges being located at high altitudes and limited to poor Wi-Fi connections. One of the ecolodges provided limited input on

questions, adding to this study’s limitations.

The majority of data was obtained in Spanish (7 out of 12 participants responded in Spanish), with transcripts translated into English without using professional interpretation services. This may have caused limitations in creating additional opportunity for reflection about meaning. Last but not least, the researcher’s limited experience in categorizing and coding interview data needs to be acknowledged as

possible restriction in providing considerable detail and generating a complete theory with respect to participants’ perceptions of ecolodge branding.