I was thinking back on my last post ... and asking myself will blogs kill focus groups? I hope not, as that will mean I am out of business as a conventional qualitative researcher :).

And I think not. Because, while both can be research tools, the differences in the nature of these tools is intrinsic to the conversations they foster.

Because, especially in a country like India, a large portion of the 'consuming' population is still not online.

Because, often the focus group is treated as an end in itself, rather than a means to an end. Many times, focus groups and quantitative surveys are hijacked by internal client politics, and researchers are not really given the freedom to be creative. A simple example, advertising agency has created two ad concepts, marketing manager likes one, VP marketing like the other .. in two days flat, select the winner doing a couple of groups! QADR again.

Because blogs are conversations on the other hand, between customers, often between marketer and customers - they are emergent and may go off on tangents, as they encourage the telling of stories. Which sadly not all focus group moderators encourage especially when the client is breathing over them from the viewing room. Or because they just don't work hard at getting to the true heart of the matter. Which sadly, some clients feel are inconsequential, especially when they are just 'hearing' what they want to hear, to justify either their position or their boss's.

Because its easier to 'trust' what a researcher recommends based on physical evidence of focus groups (tapes, DVD, transcripts), rather than trust her ability to foster or analyze blog conversations.

Because many times, focus groups are intentionally set up as a conversation between the moderator and 8 respondents - we even call them respondents and not participants! Whereas blogs are conversations across people, where both the questions and the answers come from participants.

Because focus groups are more controlled - usually recruited purposively, with stringent demographic and psychographic criteria, controlled by questionnaires and field supervision - more a perception really, as practitioners we know there is no absolute verification method, and enhanced by one of the largest criticisms against focus groups - that the participant may not always be honest, as there is peer pressure that affects the expression of real behaviour and feelings.

Because blog conversations are viral on the other hand, and often there is no way of 'checking' back on the demographics. Its difficult for an 'outsider' (read marketer who isn't into blogging) to trust this conversation then, although some smart marketers believe, "bloggers' unsolicited opinions and offhand comments are a source of invaluable insights that are hard to get elsewhere".

I think I have sufficiently confused the issue .. which one is better at an absolute level as a research tool - I don't know. Still, I don't think blogs will kill focus groups. I see blogs as playing a large role in supplementing and complementing the information or data gathered around a certain subject. They are ongoing focus groups in real time.  I want to see more use of them in research methods. Nielsen BuzzMetrics and other blog monitoring services seem to be doing just that, but they are not cheap. Some call Technorati the focus group of the web. Others like AC Nielsen ORG MARG are using blogs to validate regular market research.

"Based on our findings of our regular market research on the fashion series models of Nokia and insights on youth, we tried to validate it with the qualitative research conducted through the content found on online blogging sites and discussion forums," said Anjali Puri, director, Winsights AC Nielsen ORG MARG.

What do you feel? Are blogs ringing a death knell for conventional focus groups?

Focus Groups,Qualitative Research Market Research, Research Methods,Blogs

1:33:30 PM    comment []  trackback []

Maggie Fox has a neat post on How Social Media is Changing Everything

"If you've ever wished you had the budget for a focus group, now you do. All that's required is reaching out to a couple of key individuals and asking them if they would be interested in testing your product or process and letting you know what they think, or posting about it, if they like.

Blogs in particular and social media in general can offer incredible insight for a relatively small investment (your time is another matter!). When I speak to clients about investigating a corporate blogging strategy, I often refer to it as "low cost market research", something Iím sure weíd all like to see a little more of!"

While nothing beats face-to-face contact, blogs can be a great space to have conversations with customers - Scoble does it every day. In other cases, customers are the ones encouraging marketers to engage in conversation - SkypeJournal is a great example of heavy users of Skype providing constructive feedback both positive and negative, observations and ideas. They're even writing poetry in the form of a Skypku :)

Are marketers listening and engaging in dialogue? Maybe. Maybe not. Are marketing departments afraid of this? I think they are.

Blogs may be one such tool available to us - there are so many more that can reveal and understand the motives and the process of emergence in conversations as they manifest in conversations between marketers and users. I met Jim McGee in Chicago last year and we had a lovely discussion about how blogs might change the nature of market research and how the notion of oral culture in organizations might help explain the relatively slow take up of blogs in the firewall. From his post after our meeting :

"In the marketing research context, blogs are a disruptive technology. Instead of having to generate data by way of surveys or focus groups with whatever artifacts the process introduces, blogs provide direct visibility into customers. Instead of having to connect potentially artificial samples back to the actual market, now you have to filter real market behavior, interpret it, and make sense of it. That presents two challenges to market research functions. First, market research staff have to develop new skills. Second, management of market research needs to spend some quality thinking time what to do with access to this new kind of market data.

The opportunity that blogs introduce into the marketing research equation is to create the opportunity to identify and run multiple micro-experiments in the market. Those that succeed get the resources to scale, those that fail to generate some useful data are quickly shut down. There are challenges, of course, especially given how quickly ideas spread in a connected world, but that should be offset by the speed with which experiments can be identified and run. Worth thinking about."

11:01:03 AM    comment []  trackback []