Quick cluster analysis tutoring

[ehblancz]

Hello everyone:

I have just been handed a major cluster analysis project and know little about how to do one. Does anyone in the group know of anyone who offers tutoring services on how to do a cluster analysis using SPSS basic program? If so, please offer suggestions. Thanks!

[Statman]

Sure, I can help. Please contact me directly

[A slight advertisement!]

[Carlos Michelsen]

I can also help!

Just drop me a line, or two, although I guess statman already gained top of mind.

[ehblancz]

Hey, Thanks a bunch Carlos. I will certainly keep you in mind as I move through this project.

Ehblancz

Unfortunately, there are well over 30 different different ways just to analyze data via cluster analysis. Most stat packs like SPSS and SAS offer a few of these, but there are many, many more that have been devloped, especially for uses in the social and physical sciences. The reason there are so many is that clustering is not theory driven, therefore there are many clustering routines that approach the issue from different points of view.

In general, I am not a big fan of clustering analysis, at least not for marketing related tasks. How dow you interpret "clusters" and how do you translate the observed results into meaningful marketing actions. You did not say what your objectives were in terms of the project, but if it is segamentation, then I suggest you look at latent class models rather than clustering. A package like Latent Gold (there are several others) is what we use for most of our segmentation work.

Robert Newman
Dallas, TX

[amitm]

Try sigmasoft. I forgot teir website but you can search for it easily.