University of West London: Internet Marketing Ethics Application

This document presents a research ethics application completed by a student at the University of West London (UWL) for a project investigating the role of internet marketing in the UK fashion industry, specifically focusing on Next Plc. The application includes the completion of an ethics form and a data management and storage form. The research aims to identify the impact of internet marketing on business growth and expansion, analyze the strategies and challenges faced by companies, and suggest methods for optimizing internet marketing. The methodology utilizes a descriptive research design and secondary data collection from sources like books, journals, and the internet. The data analysis will employ thematic analysis to interpret and analyze the collected information. The student confirms that the project involves only secondary data and has no significant ethical implications, ensuring adherence to ethical research practices.

Secondary Data collection Only
University of West London Research Ethics
You are required to complete an ethics application BEFORE you
embark on the data collection exercise of the research project
Please complete all the following sections:
- Section A: Ethics Form
- Section B: Data management and storage form
RESEARCH ETHICS AND INTEGRITY

RISK ASSESSMENT FORM
Section A: FORM A
For all Undergraduate/Postgraduate Dissertations and Research
Projects
Please fill in this form, then SAVE IT AS A PDF and submit as instructed by your supervisor
with your project proposal
Your name: (first) ……………………… (last) ………………………
Student number: …………… Your email address: ……………@student.uwl.ac.uk

PROJECT DESCRIPTON
Please answer the following questions:
1. Do you intend to involve human participants in the conduct of your research?
If no, please skip questions 2 & 3.
☐ Yes ☐No
2. Does your research involve vulnerable adults or under-18s?
☐ Yes ☐No
3. Could your research potentially expose you, anyone assisting you, or
participants to emotional harm?
☐ Yes ☐No
4. Will your research involve travelling to geo-politically unstable
regions/countries (e.g. areas affected by war, civil unrest, natural disasters, or
listed as unadvisable to travel by the UK government?
☐ Yes ☐No
5. Will your research involve access to security-sensitive material? If yes, you
must include a data management statement.
☐ Yes ☐No
This proposal must be completed with the assistance of your supervisor. You
can change the size of the boxes (below) by typing or deleting as necessary.
It is very important to convey with clarity:
• Your research questions/the problem/the theme or topic you are investigating
(what you are proposing to do and to find out or to create)
• The methodology or technical approach (for projects comprising in whole or
in part the creation of an artefact) you will adopt – methods, number of
participants, who the participants (if any) will be, survey instruments used
technology and equipment employed etc.; and what questions you are
planning to ask your respondents (if applicable); how you will deal with
technical challenges.
Title of project ____________” Role of internet marketing in fashion industry of UK.
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________________________________________________________________
Name of researcher(s)
_____________________________________Email:[e-mail]
Name of supervisor _____________________________Date:________________________
WHERE APPROPRIATE TO YOUR CHOSEN TOPIC/RESEARCH: YES NO N/A
1 Will you describe in writing the main procedures to participants in
advance, so that they are informed about what to expect? A copy of
this must be attached to this application
✔
2 Will you tell participants that their participation is voluntary? ✔
3 Will you obtain written consent for participation and include within this
that they have a right to withdraw at any point? A copy of this must be
attached to this application
✔
4 If the research is observational, will you ask participants for their
consent to being observed?
✔
5 With questionnaires, will you give participants the option of omitting
questions they do not want to answer?
✔
6 Will you tell participants that their data will be treated with full
confidentiality and that, if published, it will not be identifiable as
theirs? This should be evidenced in the consent form and with a
signed copy of UWL’s data management form, attached to this
application.
✔
7 Will you debrief participants at the end of their participation (i.e. give
them a brief explanation of the study)? A copy of this must be
attached to this application
✔
If you have ticked No to any of Q1-7, but have ticked box A overleaf, please give an
explanation on a separate sheet.
[Note: N/A = not applicable]
YES NO N/A
8 Will your project involve deliberately misleading participants in any
way?
✔
9 Is there any realistic risk of any participants experiencing either
physical or psychological distress or discomfort? If Yes, give details
on a separate sheet and state what you will tell them to do if they
should experience any problems (e.g. who they can contact for help).
✔

If you have ticked Yes to 8 or 9, you should normally tick box B overleaf; if not, please
give a full explanation on a separate sheet
YES NO N/A
10 Does your project involve work with animals? If yes, please tick
box B overleaf.
✔
11 Do participants fall into any of
the following vulnerable
groups? If they do, please and
tick box B overleaf.
Note that you may also need
to obtain satisfactory DBS
clearance (or equivalent for
overseas students).
Schoolchildren (under 18 years of
age)
✔
People with learning or
communication difficulties
✔
Patients ✔
People in custody ✔
People engaged in illegal
activities (e.g. drug-taking)
✔
Any other groups who could be
reasonably argued as
representing any form of
vulnerability – please specify
✔
12 Will you be accessing materials which may be considered security-
sensitive under the Counter Terrorism Act (2015)?
✔
There is an obligation on the researcher to bring to the attention of the School Ethics Panel any
issues with ethical implications not clearly covered by the above checklist.
PLEASE TICK EITHER BOX A OR BOX B BELOW AND PROVIDE THE DETAILS REQUIRED
IN SUPPORT OF YOUR APPLICATION. THEN SIGN THE FORM.
Please tick
A. I consider that this project has no significant ethical implications to be brought
before the School Ethics Panel.
✔
B. I consider that this project may have ethical implications that should be brought
before the School Ethics Panel, and/or it will be carried out with children or other
vulnerable populations.
I have received guidance on ethical research practices relevant to my subject as part of
my preparation for this module.
The project has no significant ethical implications to be brought before the school
ethics panel as all ethics, moral value has been followed by the
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Signed ___________________________ Print Name ______________________ Date
_______________
(UG Researcher(s))
Signed ___________________________ Print Name ______________________ Date
_______________
(Supervisor)

PART 2
SPECIFICATIONS OF PROJECT
Please answer the following question:
1. Do you intend to use only secondary data in the conduct of your research?
☐ Yes ☐No
Introduction to the research
Background to research topic area (with references where applicable). 200 words approx.
Include Aims and Hypothesis, Research Question(s) of the dissertation/project.
Aim
To identified roles of internet marketing in fashion industry of United Kingdom. A study on
Next Plc.
Research objectives
 To understand role of internet marketing in the firm.
 To identify the positive and negative impact of internet marketing on growth and
expansion of business.
 To analysis the strategies and challenges that are faced by company while making
use of internet marketing to attract customers within organization.
 To suggestions more method that can be used by next plc to grow and expand its
business operation.

Research questions
 What is the role of internet marketing in the organisation?
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 What are the various impact of internet marketing on Next plc?
 What are the strategies and major challenges that has been face by company?
 What are different suggestions that can be used by Next plc to make optimum use
of internet marketing to attract customers?
Background
With impact of covid-19 and development in technology, companies have started making use
of internet marketing to promote products and services to range of customers that are living in
society. Internet is one of the easiest and simplest method that helped in connecting and
building strong relationship with customers so that they are motivated to be part of specific
organization as compared to others. Social media, e-mail and official website are some of the
method that has been used by company while promoting its business online so that more and
more customers are motivated to be part of organisation. So, this study will include necessary
detailed pertaining to internet marketing, impact of internet marketing on company operation.
Moreover, the strategies or method that could be used by firm to grow and expand its business
in international market through making the best use of internet. Along with it the study has
also covered information related to challenges that are faced by company in context of
internet marketing.
Method
Outline all methodological issues - e.g. Design, participants, questionnaires, tests,
method of data collection. Who are you working with? How? What Measures? What
interventions/manipulations? What controls? If your research entails exclusively the
consultation of published documents, books, articles or other work in the public domain
please state this under the heading ‘materials’.
Research methodology: Is an segment that define about the method or procedures
that are used by researcher in order to gathered sufficient detailed pertaining to the
subject matter.
Research design: It is overall strategy that has been utilized by the researcher to
logically plan the research questions or the way data will be collected, interpretate,
analysis and discussed. Likewise, the study will be descriptive, experimental, correlation
and meta analytical so that appropriate method that could be used to find answer of
research questions.
Data collection: To complete the study related to role of internet marketing in firm, there
are mainly secondary method that will be used by researcher to complete the study. In
primary method, researcher ask questions to respondents or participant to gathered
sufficient information. At the same time, scholar will make use of secondary source to
gathered more related and sufficient information. Such as books, journals and articles so
that best decision can be taken to make study useful for others.
Participants (where applicable): No participant

Data analysis:To analysis the data, thematic and SPSS are two different method that
are used by researcher so that necessary information can be drive. While, proceeding the
research related to “ role of internet in fashion industry” Thematic analysis will be used.
As it helps in effective understanding, interpretating and analysing the data through
making use of theme, charts, graph and other representation. s
Materials (to include locations and resources): To conduct the study pertaining to the
subject matter there are various resources that will be used such as books, journal and
internet. All these methods will be used by researcher to gathered sufficient information
related to the topic so that it can be useful for other and helped in better decision-making.
Analysis
CLEARLY describe the method of analysis you are going to use. Is it qualitative or
quantitative?
There are two major method that are being used by researcher to gathered, analysis
and interpretate information so that useful data can be extracted and appropriate decision
can be taken. Qualitative method involves collection, analysis and interpretation of non-
numerical data in order to understand the concepts, opinion and experience. Thus, it
helped in gathering in- depth knowledge or insight pertaining to new topic areas so that
right decision can be taken. On the other hand it can be stated that quantitative method
involve use of numerical or facts and figure to drive appropriate information pertaining to
the subject area. So, out of both the researcher has planned to undertake qualitative
research method as it involves helps in gathering more and more information related to
subject matter. Thus, it contributes in generating new ideas that could be used by
companies and top management to enhance organization positioning in competitive
environment.
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Section B: RESEARCH ETHICS AND INTEGRITY
DATA MANAGEMENT AND STORAGE STATEMENT
All applicants should familiarise themselves with the Data Protection Act
1998, and adhere to its principles in all aspects of their research:
http://www.uwl.ac.uk/sites/default/files/Departments/About-us/Web/PDF/
policies/policy-on-data-protection.pdf
Research data covers a broad range of types of information (see examples
below), and digital data can be structured and stored in a variety of file
formats.
EXAMPLES OF RESEARCH DATA
Some examples of research data:
Documents (text, Word), spreadsheets
Laboratory notebooks, field notebooks, diaries
Questionnaires, transcripts, codebooks
Audiotapes, videotapes
Photographs, films
Test responses
Slides, artefacts, specimens, samples
Collection of digital objects acquired and generated during the process of
research
Database contents (video, audio, text, images)
Models, algorithms, scripts
Contents of an application (input, output, logfiles for analysis software,
simulation software, schemas)
Methodologies and workflows
Standard operating procedures and protocols

As a student or member of staff undertaking a research project, I
understand that I am responsible for the following:
 The security and confidentiality of all data collected
 Mitigating all risks to anonymity, privacy and confidentiality posed
by all kinds of personal information storage, processing, including
computer and paper files, e-mail records, audio and video files, and
any information that directly identifies an individual. It is
recommended that data be anonymised at the point of collection.
I will ensure that:
 Data and codes and all identifying information will be kept in
separate locked filing cabinets/files and working files will contain no
identifying information, and will only be accessed by one or two
persons
 All audiotapes will be transcribed using codes or pseudonyms for
identification of individuals and destroyed upon completion of the
research project
 Access to computer files will be available by password only
 Research data will be stored for up to 5 years after the end of the
project, after which they should be disposed of safely.
Name:
Application ID:
Project title:
“To investigate the role of internet marketing in fashion industry of United
Kingdom. A study on Next plc.”
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