The Gantry Group Building Business Through Research

Gantry Group Newsletter Issue No. 3, October 2001

Online focus groups are very similar in methodology to a traditional offline focus group. Here’s how it works.

Determining the Sample – Who do you want to hear from? A Participant profile must be detailed for each focus group. For example, in the case of a business customer, the Participant must be defined in terms of industry, company size, job role group, geography, etc.

Creating the Guide – What do you want to chat about? The session guide is a set of carefully crafted, probing questions that you want to ask the focus group Participants, to solicit feedback or evoke a visceral response. Because the focus group is being held online, you have the flexibility of enhancing the focus group with the full range of digital multi-media visuals to solicit a more realistic reaction. This includes posting graphic images (e.g. depicting brands, logos, packaging, product), presentations, deploying active websites, product demonstrations, and video advertisements. The guide should be designed not to exceed 60 minutes.

Finding the Participants – Applying the Participant profile, candidates can be found through opt-in panels, opt-in email lists, your customer or prospect list.

Recruiting the Participants – Candidates are either invited to participate in the focus group through email invitation or by phone. Click here to see a sample Online Focus Group Invitation In this example, the invitation to participate is address from an industry association to its members. This is an example of Endorsement Marketing - an important technique that encourages participation.

Encouraging Participation – Participation can be encouraged in a number of ways. But what is most important is that the Participant knows that you value both their time and feedback. The type of incentive varies according to the specific focus group. For example, explaining to a customer that their input will directly shape the direction of the next product upgrade or customer service response may prove to be motivation enough. A $100 - $150 per Participant contribution to a charity of choice can make all the difference in making a participant feel that their time is being spent on a good cause. And don’t discount the allure of information. A summary report outlining the findings of the session can be considered invaluable by corporate participants in executive or management positions.

Scheduling the Session – Logistics for an online focus group are significantly easier. The need for the focus group to converge at an identified geographic location is no longer an obstacle. An online focus group participant can go home after work, kick back in a comfortable chair, log onto the Internet, click on the provided focus group room link embedded in their email invitation – and they’re in! Early evening  (e.g. 7:00pm to 8:00pm) is a great time to hold a focus group – particularly when trying to reach the “CXO” group. One thing to keep in mind when scheduling an online focus group is the time zones of participants' locations. Click here to see a sample Focus Group Confirmation Letter

Entering the Online Focus Group - Using online focus group technology, a virtual focus group room is created. There are three different roles that enter the focus group – the Moderator (i.e. that administers the guide), the Participants (i.e. the people whose opinion is being solicited), and the Observers (i.e. the members of the client company paying for the study who want to watch the session behind the virtual one-way mirror). Participants are sent an email containing a Web link to the online focus group, accompanied by a secure password. The Participant needs only Internet access and a Web browser as the necessary technology infrastructure to participate in the focus group.  Click here for a display of different views of Online Focus Group Room

Communicating during the Session– Online focus groups are run as a private online chat session. The Moderator is control central for the

Recording the Session – Generation of session transcripts is an automatic process. Session or individual Participant transcripts are electronically stored for later analysis.

Analyzing the Results– Applying the focus group results toward informed business decisions is, of course, critical. This analysis must take into account the demographic variations of the Participants, as well as a deep understanding of your business to arrive at a practical interpretation of the findings.
 
 

Fueling Online Focus Group Adoption

Focus groups enable a “voyeuristic” viewing technique that delivers diagnostic insights about behavior that can’t be gleaned from a depersonalized, written summary. Their real value lies in the ability to allow an interested viewing group to sit behind a one-way mirror to watch and listen to what the group participants have to say.  That's why focus groups remain so popular.

The primary objection to focus groups has, prior to the Internet, involved cost and logistics.
The expense of moving a large group of observers across the country can become exorbitant to the extent that travel expenses can sometimes exceed the cost of the focus group itself. Therefore cost-imposed restrictions limit just how many observers a company can afford to have benefit from the focus groups.

There is also a difficulty in getting senior managers and top-level executives to attend. Many cannot afford the time and schedules are often impossible to coordinate. The CXO group has remained elusive to focus group feedback – particularly in the B2B sector.
 
 

The Online Advantage

Internet research is fast becoming the preferred methodology for companies globally. Internet-based market research offers three key benefits over traditional methods: increased speed, reduced costs, and greater depth of consumer response. The Internet has proven to save as much as 50 percent in the cost of research, and reduce research time by up to 75 percent.

Online focus groups retain the best features of face-to-face focus groups, while removing the disadvantages. Demand for online research services are driven by three key factors:

1. Explosive growth in overall use of the Internet by consumers;
2. An increased need among marketers to understand how their customers are using the Internet;
3. The emerging benefits of online market research versus traditional market research.

Geographic Obstacles Removed - With online groups, expensive travel costs are eliminated, along with difficult focus group logistics scheduling – for both the Participants and Observers alike. Valuable time spent away from the office is also a thing of the past as the nearest focus group facility is brought as close as your desktop or mobile computer.  Clients never have to leave the office or the comfort of home as the project unfolds from any computer with Internet access. Online focus groups are ideal for research projects that involve geographically diverse groups and hard to reach populations.

Increased Reach - Online market research enables you to capture the attitudes, behaviors, and opinions of previously unreachable or elusive audiences.

Access to the CXO Business Community – This same geographic barrier has posed an even higher barrier to reaching the CXO community – the key players in business buying decisions. The convenience of online focus groups has made them a feasible tool for the Business-to-Business (B2B) sector. In general, online focus groups successfully reach higher level people in the business community.

Removal of Geographic Bias – Traditional focus groups run the risk of reporting geographic bias. Because an onsite focus group must be run locally to make it logistically possible for the Participants to attend, an unbiased geographic cross-section is often unattainable. Online focus groups, not suffering from such restrictions, result in more valid results.

Protected Anonymity – Focus group candidates are identified and validated against the Participant profile prior to the focus group. While each Participant is known and qualified for the study’s sponsor, the anonymity of the Internet provides a comfort level for focus group Participants. It has been proven that focus group Participants express their opinions and share information more freely in an online setting than in a face-to-face traditional setting. Sensitive subject matter (e.g. income, personal health, employee satisfaction) can be explored in depth without a Participant revealing his/her identity to the other members of the focus group.

Less Time, Less Cost to Actionable Results - An online focus group can be conducted in a week or less for about half the cost of a traditional focus group. It can bring together a broad geographic blend of people and is generally more convenient for panel members. Online focus groups are regarded as a vehicle for high velocity research, working to deliver quick insights for decision-making.

Highly Interactive Response – Just like traditional focus groups, Moderators can draw open, rapid, in depth response from each Participant, as well as discussion between Participants.

More Balanced Participant Response - Unlike the traditional focus groups, one strong, outspoken personality can't control the group. Since each Participant must type his or her response to every question posed by the Moderator, online focus groups enforce an even, equal opportunity setting for all Participants. It’s not surprising then that, on average, online focus groups yield twice the transcribed feedback than that of a traditional group. In addition, technology makes it far easier to take corrective action on an unruly Participant by dropping the individual for the electronic session.

Automatic Real-time Session Transcription - Online focus groups create an immediate, permanent and secure written record of responses that is ready for analysis.
 
 

Online Focus Group Drawbacks

Online focus groups do manifest certain limitations for some specific project and target group situations. For projects where body language and facial expressions are critical, or respondents are required to taste and touch a product, online groups may not be the proper methodology. Technological advances will soon remedy this.

Further, online focus groups require that Participants have Internet access. Since not everyone has Internet access, it is difficult (but not impossible) to draw samples that mirror the U.S. population. However, with over half of U.S. households and 7 out of 10 business people now connected to the Internet, this obstacle is quickly diminishing.

Finally, some companies are still skeptical about the security of images, product designs and other top-secret information contained in online research studies, fearing that hackers or competitors are more able to gain access to the digital information than with traditional methods. While no system is 100% secure, online research technology has incorporated security measures to eliminate this threat.
 
 

Real World Applications

So, what types of marketing research work best online? While there are many types of research highly conducive to the Internet, there are several areas that have become particularly popular within corporate marketing organizations.

Concept Testing – How does the target market react to a new product or service concept? Online Focus groups provide an environment and a targeted audience to pre-test new ideas, web pages and product concepts prior to launch.

Product Testing – Given a set of possible capabilities, what do decision makers within your target market tell you your priorities should be? Focus groups let you quickly calibrate your scope.

Strategic Message and Positioning Testing – What are the key messages that position the offering most favorably within the target market?

Brand Testing – Online focus groups are a great way to test company/product naming, brand strength and awareness.

Packaging and Advertising Testing – Online focus groups let you solicit Participant reaction after viewing advertising elements such as logos, still photographs, product packaging or video formats. The appeal of alternative ad campaigns for a new product or service can effectively be tested prior to launch.

Business Problem Diagnostic – Online focus groups can be used to flush out underlying business or product problems and/or market perceptions within the target market setting.

Given the ever-accelerating rate of innovation and technology introduction, it is difficult to predict the market’s ability to adapt and adopt. Technology innovation has demonstrated that it is ahead of the market digestion curve! Corporate and product marketing decisions now require the assurance of direct market contact. The recent company fallout is proof enough to demonstrate the need. The convenience, speed and cost advantages of online focus groups provide all sized companies with an expedient method for tapping into their customer base for guidance. Online focus groups may indeed pay for themselves by enabling marketing programs to be implemented right the first time.

About Gantry Group: Founded in 1997 and headquartered in Concord, MA, we are a full-service, custom market research and advisory firm dedicated to helping companies cost-effectively accelerate the successful market adoption of their products and services – online and offline.

The Gantry Group creates, orchestrates and interprets online focus groups that have been instrumental in shaping the direction of our clients’ new business initiatives, as well as offering decisive diagnostic action to overcome nagging business challenges. Please contact us to discuss your business needs and how we can help you turn research into action. Call today to schedule a live demonstration of our online focus group technology!
 

The Gantry Group, LLC 30 Monument Square, Suite 135  Concord MA 01742

Phone: 978-371-7557 Fax:  978-287-0043 Email: info@gantrygroup.com Web: www.gantrygroup.com

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