Focus Insite

Conducting a successful focus group is both an art and a science. Think about cooking. Just because you have a recipe, doesn’t mean you’ll have a successful outcome. Good cooks know how to account and respond to variables. The same holds true for moderators and market research recruitment consultants. Focus groups are effective for probing the ‘why’ and ‘how’ that drives consumer opinions and behaviors. Moderators seek a balance between structure and free-form: too much structure, and you limit opportunities for uncovering deeper insights; too little structure, and you end up with a rambling conversation that also limits insights. Let’s explore the framework that helps moderators find the ‘sweet spot’ for getting the most out of a focus group. 1. Bigger isn’t better. Focus groups that have between six to ten participants work best. Staying within this range allows all participants to engage and gives the moderator a chance to probe responses that yield richer insights. 2. Watch the time! Focus groups that exceed two hours have diminishing returns, and frustrate the participants. Keeping the focus group to between 1 ½ and two hours is the ideal. Scheduling a quick 10 to 15-minute break at the midway point refreshes participants and keeps disruptions to a minimum. 3. Spend time on writing your discussion guide. Experienced market researchers don’t ask random questions. They spend time creating a discussion guide that flows and asks open-ended questions. Depending on the topic of the focus group, moderators will use a variety of techniques to keep the conversation flowing. Anything from visualization exercises, to free-association exercises, to case histories are fair game for getting participants to think outside the box. Don’t forget to allow time at the beginning of the focus group to set ground rules about participation, give an overview of the study and its purpose, explain privacy and confidentiality protocols, and tell participants when they can expect a break. 4. Host your focus group in a neutral facility. A big no-no is hosting a focus group in spaces that are associated with the company sponsoring the study. Participant responses may be biased if they see company logos or overt associations with the company commissioning the study. Selecting a neutral location that is geographically convenient, and has easy parking, are all considerations that will help ensure success. Of course, if you’re hosting an online focus group, you don’t need to think about this step at all! 5. Recruiting a representative sample of participants helps avoid ‘group think.’ A screening guide is useful for finding people who fulfill a range of ideal characteristics. Ideally, your focus group will be comprised of a representative sample of the target audience. You don’t want a group that is too homogenous, as it yields responses that are too similar. On the other hand, a group that is too diverse makes it a challenge to control the discussion. 6. Keep it cool. Seasoned moderators set the tone early on and make sure that participants feel relaxed and safe to be forthcoming in their responses. Remember that you’re bringing a group of strangers together, so start your session with some ice-breaker exercises to help your group feel comfortable. Don’t forget to remind participants that there are no right or wrong answers and that the group is a safe space to be honest, even if the feedback is negative. 7. Focus groups are governed by privacy and confidentiality protocols. Focus groups, no matter what the topic, is governed by the ethical protocols of any social science methods. All participants need to sign a consent form that details the scope and intent of the study, and how the information shared will be managed. For safety and security reasons, don’t use full names in focus groups, only first names. Remind participants that they are also responsible for respecting the privacy and confidentiality of others. If you’re recording the focus group session, make sure that participants are made aware of this fact. If the above steps seem daunting, don’t despair. There are many nationwide qualitative research firms and recruiting agencies that can conduct a market research study on your behalf. In fact, it’s best to go with a professional firm that does nothing but qualitative or qualitative research consultant. You’ll get the best results in a timely matter. Looking to Fill a Study? Request a Proposal Today! Original Source https://bit.ly/3yWITUA

Nationwide market research recruiting firms have lots of tricks and techniques for finding the most qualified people to participate in market research studies. Our team of recruiters bring different skill sets to recruiting, and depending on the subject of the study, we’ll deploy different recruiters for different studies (e.g. medical studies or political recruitment.) Even though different recruiters have different ways of connecting with qualified participants, there are some commonalities that most recruiters share. Today we’ll share with you three tips for improving market research recruitment. 1) Identify your TARGET audience The best study outcomes happen when participants are representative of existing, or eventual, customers. Before you can design a study or create a screening guide, the first step is to clearly define who your intended participants are. Be realistic about who your customers are and focus on recruiting them to participate in your market research study. Work backwards to quickly figure out who your target audience is. What are the goals of your research study? What do you want to discover? By answering these questions first, it will become clear who your target audience is. With your audience in mind the next step is to find a representative mix of participants. Good recruiters think beyond geography and demographics. While these are important, you want to also consider attitudes, characteristics, and behaviours of your participants. Some examples of more clearly defined categories of participants might include: Ohio parents who have children enrolled in pre-school; Golfers in the southeast who are active on social media sites; or 30-50 year old women who regularly commute more than 10 miles for work. Don’t forget that defining who doesn’t qualify to participate in your study as defining who does. Spending time on this first step makes the next step, writing your screening guide, a lot easier! 2) Screening Guides Now that you’ve identified your target audience, your next step is to create a screening guide to help identify qualified people to participate in your study. We’ve written about the importance of screening guides in assisting recruiters in past blogs, but in a nutshell, screening guides will help you weed out people who don’t meet all the criteria for participating in your study. They’re also great tools for helping identify ‘professional research participants’ or those who are savvy enough to answer questions in such a way to get them into studies that they don’t really qualify for. The trick to getting the wording right in screening guides is not to give too much away. Don’t reveal the purpose of the research study; don’t reveal the name of the product or company; and, don’t ask leading questions. Use the opportunity during the screening process to identify expressive and communicative people. If the respondents give only curt answers and aren’t descriptive in how they communicate during the screening process, chances are they’ll be the same during the study. 3) Incentives for Participation Offering monetary incentives in exchange for participating in a study will greatly improve your response rate and motivate people to complete the full study. It’s a bit of a juggle to know how much to offer as an incentive for participation. Here are 3 tips for finding the right balance:In-person studies (focus groups or in-depth interviews) should have higher incentive amounts than online or virtual participation. The additional logistics and time involved to participate in person commands a higher incentive. 1. If your recruiting high-income earners to participate in market research, they need to be paid a higher amount than lower-income earners. For instance, when recruiting for medical research studies, doctors and nurses require higher incentive payments than non-medical professionals. 2. The longer the time commitment to fully complete a study, the higher the incentive needs to be. If you’re doing a longitudinal study, or requiring participants to be active and engaged over any period of time, then you’ll need to offer a higher incentive. 3. Once a participant has fully completed his/her obligations, don’t delay payment. If payments will take a few weeks or a month to process, be very clear upfront about the delay. Marketing recruitment consultants is more than just finding people. There are many steps involved and it takes considerable time and energy. Most companies and even market research firms work with nationwide recruiting agencies to fulfill this important piece of market research. Sure, it’s possible to do recruiting in-house, but the stakes are too high to get it wrong. Outsourcing to professional agencies is your best bet for finding the most qualified people to participate in your market research study. To Learn More about Market Research Recruitment, Contact us Today! Original Source https://bit.ly/3htrUmY

Nationwide market research recruiting firms have lots of tricks and techniques for finding the most qualified people to participate in market research studies. Our team of recruiters bring different skill sets to recruiting, and depending on the subject of the study, we’ll deploy different recruiters for different studies (e.g. medical studies or political recruitment.) Even though different recruiters have different ways of connecting with qualified participants, there are some commonalities that most recruiters share. Today we’ll share with you three tips for improving market research recruitment 1) Identify your TARGET audience The best study outcomes happen when participants are representative of existing, or eventual, customers. Before you can design a study or create a screening guide, the first step is to clearly define who your intended participants are. Be realistic about who your customers are and focus on recruiting them to participate in your market research study. Work backwards to quickly figure out who your target audience is. What are the goals of your research study? What do you want to discover? By answering these questions first, it will become clear who your target audience is. With your audience in mind the next step is to find a representative mix of participants. Good recruiters think beyond geography and demographics. While these are important, you want to also consider attitudes, characteristics, and behaviours of your participants. Some examples of more clearly defined categories of participants might include: Ohio parents who have children enrolled in pre-school; Golfers in the southeast who are active on social media sites; or 30-50 year old women who regularly commute more than 10 miles for work. Don’t forget that defining who doesn’t qualify to participate in your study as defining who does. Spending time on this first step makes the next step, writing your screening guide, a lot easier! 2) Screening Guides Now that you’ve identified your target audience, your next step is to create a screening guide to help identify qualified people to participate in your study. We’ve written about the importance of screening guides in assisting recruiters in past blogs, but in a nutshell, screening guides will help you weed out people who don’t meet all the criteria for participating in your study. They’re also great tools for helping identify ‘professional research participants’ or those who are savvy enough to answer questions in such a way to get them into studies that they don’t really qualify for. The trick to getting the wording right in screening guides is not to give too much away. Don’t reveal the purpose of the research study; don’t reveal the name of the product or company; and, don’t ask leading questions. Use the opportunity during the screening process to identify expressive and communicative people. If the respondents give only curt answers and aren’t descriptive in how they communicate during the screening process, chances are they’ll be the same during the study. 3) Incentives for Participation Offering monetary incentives in exchange for participating in a study will greatly improve your response rate and motivate people to complete the full study. It’s a bit of a juggle to know how much to offer as an incentive for participation. Here are 3 tips for finding the right balance:In-person studies (focus groups or in-depth interviews) should have higher incentive amounts than online or virtual participation. The additional logistics and time involved to participate in person commands a higher incentive. If your recruiting high-income earners to participate in market research, they need to be paid a higher amount than lower-income earners. For instance, when recruiting for medical research studies, doctors and nurses require higher incentive payments than non-medical professionals. The longer the time commitment to fully complete a study, the higher the incentive needs to be. If you’re doing a longitudinal study, or requiring participants to be active and engaged over any period of time, then you’ll need to offer a higher incentive. Once a participant has fully completed his/her obligations, don’t delay payment. If payments will take a few weeks or a month to process, be very clear upfront about the delay. Market research recruitment agencies is more than just finding people. There are many steps involved and it takes considerable time and energy. Most companies and even market research firms work with nationwide recruiting agencies to fulfill this important piece of market research. Sure, it’s possible to do recruiting in-house, but the stakes are too high to get it wrong. Outsourcing to professional agencies is your best bet for finding the most qualified people to participate in your market research study. To Learn More about Market Research Recruitment, Contact us Today! Original Source https://bit.ly/3hExr9n

Over the past 18 months, most people are now accustomed to disruption. Our workplaces have been disrupted; our social lives have been disrupted; our personal lives have been disrupted. On top of all these disruptions, there have also been a number of false starts where things started to open up only to be quickly shut down again. It’s no wonder we’re all a little skeptical of what’s around the corner. The good news is that as more people receive their Covid-19 vaccinations, the more ‘normal’ life begins to feel! For qualitative researchers, this means resuming in-person focus groups. Even though qualitative researchers did a great job pivoting to online focus groups and implemented a number of virtual methodologies to continue with qualitative studies, nothing fully replaces the rich insights moderators gain by being with participants in person. It seems that as more activities are permitted there are always asterisks tagged on: Groups of 10 can now socialize (*but they can’t socialize outside this social bubble); Fully vaccinated people can now go into stores without their masks (* unless their local health authority claims otherwise); It’s safe to travel again (*yet many international borders remain closed). As moderators and nationwide qualitative research firms plan for in-person focus groups, it won’t really be business-as-before. Fortunately, focus groups tend to host small groups of people, but what if some of the recruited participants aren’t vaccinated? Who is responsible for ensuring anyone attending in-person qualitative research studies has both vaccine doses administered? Qualitative research consultant and research firms should consider including a “Are you fully vaccinated against Covid-19” question in the screening guide. Of course, anyone could say “yes”, so recruiting teams would need to ask for vaccine proof. It’s going to feel a little weird for some people to agree to get together with strangers to participate in an in-person study, and if recruiters can provide assurance that everyone participating in the study has proof of being vaccinated, this will certainly make recruiting easier, and ensure the health of the participants is being respected. Keep in mind that if you’re hosting your focus group at a designated focus group facility, you’ll want to ensure the office staff have also been vaccinated. Showing proof of vaccination allows for in-person research to take place without masks. So much non-verbal communication happens through facial expressions, and it wouldn’t be worth the effort to host an in-person focus group if participants’ faces are covered. Of course, Covid protocols are going to differ between jurisdictions and you’ll want to first familiarize yourself with local rules and recommendations before committing to hosting an in-person study. There are plenty of places around the country that are quickly opening up, and this will only pick up steam as we move into summer. It’s an exciting time for marketing recruitment consultants! We’ve all had to get used to doing things differently, but there’s nothing like people to coming together in person to participate in market research studies. Contact Us Today to Find the Best Participants for Your Next Focus Group! Original Source https://bit.ly/353lFzu

Anyone who has worked on qualitative market research projects knows that reams of data are produced. Qualitative research often includes focus groups and/or in-depth interviews, and these alone can produce up to many hours of recordings. Making sense of all this information, and picking out the patterns and insights, is the essence of qualitative market research.You can also seek advice from qualitative research consultant. Qualitative research can be done for most any topic, from medical and healthcare studies to B2B. No matter what the scope of the study, the objective of market research is to provide the client with a better understanding of what users/consumers think and feel about a product or service; why one product is chosen or preferred over others; how branding, design, and packaging influences purchasing; which branding and marketing messages most resonate; and, if there is demand for a new product or service. No matter the methodologies chosen for any given study, researchers will ask lots of questions and probe respondents’ responses as it is part of insite research. Once researchers have completed gathering information, the next step is getting all of the video/audio transcribed. There are a number of transcription services available, but not all are created equally. Knowing how important quality, and affordable, transcription is to market research, we have brought this service in-house to better serve our clients. We know the demands on market researchers, and we make sure our transcription services have quick turnaround, are accurate, and comply with all HIPAA and privacy guidelines. Of course, transcription services aren’t limited to market research. Our services are available to anyone who requires transcription, and insite research and consulting for any reason. To learn more about our Transcription Services, Contact Us Today! Original Reference: https://bit.ly/3vsv4Mj

Quarterly business reviews are a standard practice that should not be underestimated. The impact of such practices reaches beyond the content reviewed during the process. Why should you care so much about a business’s serious approach to quarterly business reviews? A business’s ability to deliver results is dependent on acquired knowledge, especially through personal experience. By reviewing strategies, trends, and collected data routinely, adjustments can be made to improve existing standings. To complete successful quarterly business reviews, you must have a well-rounded approach to the common denominator of any market insite research business - the client. The purpose of quarterly business reviews is to ensure the goals and strengths of a business are aligned with a favorable outcome for clients. Bringing to the table a conversation about the who’s what’s, why’s, and how’s is a staple practice that should be approached with a confident and progressive mindset. So how does Focus Insite stand out when it comes to conducting quarterly business reviews? Review Past Projects Each business review is conducted by a qualified, designated team that takes the time to thoroughly evaluate past projects. By reviewing existing data, multiple advantages can be achieved. No amount or type of data should go to waste. Past projects can provide useful insight for future endeavors. Evaluating procedures not only highlight what can be improved, but existing strategies that produce effective results can continue to be applied. Project reviews offer a substantial advantage to existing and new clients. A business that collects data and effectively applies evaluated results into active practice offers clients more stable and predictable results. Though the processes conducted throughout an active project offer crucial information, the feedback upon finalization is the telling factor on whether or not a project was completed successfully. To Focus Insite, waiting on a client to give feedback is not good practice. By initiating the conversation, we can learn about the client’s perspective on the outcome of the project. Smooth sailing must be perceived from both sides for the project to be considered a success. Personalized Attention No two clients are alike so versatility is important when it comes to creating a plan of achievement. By developing strategies that are not confined by a template approach, each client can project a voice that will be heard and not ignored by a standard procedure. It is not to say that outlined structures do not serve an important purpose within the process. But a one-size-fits-all approach is not an ideal system for every project. It is essential to recognize and differentiate the various requirements and goals. In recognition, we work with each client individually to ensure our approach aligns with our client’s vision for success. Taking the time to understand the goals of a client allows for a better outcome. In most general cases, a failure to meet a vision is the result of a lack of communication. Understanding its importance, communication is highlighted as one of the four key values at Focus Insite. Daily updates to clients for current projects prompts proactive awareness in keeping the vision on track. Naturally, a shift in goals may have evolved since the initial implementation meeting. Quarterly reviews allow for an update in strategies and compensate for the natural evolution of business development. This approach helped Focus Insite thrive during the peak of the COVID-19 impact. By promoting transparency, we offer confidence in our services. The answer is available before the question is asked. We believe our showcased stability paves the way for a long-term and successful partnership. So if you are in search of market research recruitment agencies then your can surely contact Focus Insite. Be Prepared A pre-assembled agenda adds tremendous value to a productive review. We recognize the value of time. Our efforts to organize a productive arrangement is our way of saying we have time for you, but we won’t waste your time. Though reviews are designed to be completed in one go, a follow-up may be necessary. In those cases, it allows an opportunity to further assess the information covered during the initial review. How often do we find ourselves asking questions after the presented opportunity? At Focus Insite, our doors are open for as much communication is needed to ensure no questions go unanswered. Overall Impact Quarterly business reviews may come off as an intimidating endeavor, but with the right tools and proper communication, reviews can be a rewarding experience. Focus Insite aims to improve all aspects of the operation. Feedback from our clients is essential to our mission and is an important building block to the relationships with our clients. Company also offers insite research and consulting. At Focus Insite, reviews have become an art that keeps clients coming back. We cannot emphasize enough the importance of our relationships with our clients and extend that same culture to everyone who joins. Focus Insite is quickly becoming a preferred vendor amongst major companies, and for good reason. Interested in learning more about what Focus Insite has to offer? Reach out at bids@focusinsite.com to receive more information about how Focus Insite can help your company achieve its goals. Original Reference: https://bit.ly/3v0m94f

Like any industry, insite research has evolved over the years. How market research is conducted today looks quite different than it did 100 years ago. Even though market researchers use techniques today that weren’t available even 20 years ago, the foundations of market research remain the same: getting a deeper understanding of peoples’ needs, wants, and beliefs. This blog is the first in a two-part series that looks at how market research has evolved over the past 100 years. There is no doubt that market research has benefited from technology. Data collection used to be a laborious and slow undertaking, taking weeks to collect. Nowadays, researchers can gather more data within hours. Technology also allows market research recruiting teams to access a more culturally, ethnically, and geographically diverse group of people to participate in studies. A Brief Timeline of Market Research from the 1920s-1960s 1920s: Market research as we know it today can be credited to Daniel Starch, who first developed methodologies for studying and testing market research in advertising. His creation of the Starch Test was the first tool that attempted to measure how effective magazine and newspaper ads were. For the first time, companies could know if people remembered seeing their ads, and what effects (if any) they had on behavior. 1930s: Most Americans are familiar with the Gallup poll, as it’s often referenced when taking the pulse on public opinion on a wide range of topics. George Gallup was a numbers guy and realized that small samples of the populace could generally predict attitudes. The surveys and polls (quantitative research) that are still used today can all trace their origins to George Gallup. 1940s: Most market research involves focus groups. Because focus groups are so ubiquitous, it’s easy to forget that they didn’t exist prior to the 1940s. The impetus for focus groups, or ‘focused interviews’ as they were known, came about during WWII, as a way to measure reactions to anti-Nazi radio broadcasts. What was discovered while testing various messages was that you had to drill down to gain further insights into how participants felt and reacted to the messages. This was the dawn of qualitative research consultant. 1950s-1960s: During this period was the heyday for motivational and consumer behavior research, as well as a leap forward in predictive statistical techniques developed by Paul Green. The developments in market research recruiting firms during this era had a massive impact on advertising. Using in-depth interviews, brands were able to dig deeper into peoples’ desires and create ads that were relevant to the masses. In our next blog we’ll pick up in the 1970s to our present decade. While the methodologies and tools have evolved over the years, what has remained the same is that market research is the only way companies can gain insights into consumer behavior and motivations. Wanting to find the best people to participate in your Market Research Study? Contact us Today! Original Reference: https://bit.ly/3sMOw58