...Guidelines for Conducting a Focus Group Surveys assume that people know how they feel. But sometimes they really don’t. Sometimes it takes listening to the opinions of others in a small and safe group setting before they form thoughts and opinions. Focus groups are well suited for those situations. Focus groups can reveal a wealth of detailed information and deep insight. When well executed, a focus group creates an accepting environment that puts participants at ease allowing then to thoughtfully answer questions in their own words and add meaning to their answers. Surveys are good for collecting information about people’s attributes and attitudes but if you need to understand things at a deeper level then use a focus group. If you’ve ever participated in a well-run focus group you’d probably say it felt very natural and comfortable to be talking with a group of strangers. What you didn’t know perhaps were the many hidden structures behind it all. A good focus group requires planning – a lot more planning than merely inviting a few key people to casually share their opinions about a topic. Outlined here are the details for conducting a high quality focus group. Also included are stepby-step instructions for making sense of all the information you collect in the groups. In this Guide you will find checklists for: Defining a focus group Designing focus group questions Recruiting and preparing for participants Conducting the focus group Analyzing the data You will also find...
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...Articles - Asking effective focus group questions 11/6/12 10:18 PM Asking effective focus group questions Tags: Focus Group-Moderating Focus Groups Article ID: 19941203 Published: December 1994 Author: Naomi R. Henderson Article Abstract Focus groups are not helpful if the right questions aren’t asked. This article discusses asking effective focus group questions, including the key elements of good focus group research, the role and purpose of effective questions, question types, general questions to establish a base and the classic 10 questions for opening up areas for discussion. Editor's note: Naomi R. Henderson is CEO of RIVA Market Research, Bethesda, Md. In the soft brightness of fluorescent lights, eight respondents wait earnestly for the focus group session on catalog shopping to begin. Each of the eight receives more than 10 catalogs a month and spends more than $100 each month on items from those catalogs. The moderator gives a clear statement of purpose: "We're here tonight to talk about catalog shopping in general and to look at an idea for a new catalog." General guidelines for participation are given and disclosures are made about taping and one-way mirrors. Respondents introduce themselves, and the http://www.quirks.com/articles/a1994/19941203.aspx?searchID=256631957 Page 1 of 11 Articles - Asking effective focus group questions 11/6/12 10:18 PM moderator easily builds a genial, warm rapport with the respondents. The moderator...
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...Marketing Research FINAL REPORT ESTABLISHING A KARAOKE CLUB – RESTAURANT “OPERA HALLS” IN VIENNA. Completion Date: 31 January 2012 Table of Contents 1. 2. Executive Summary ............................................................................................................. 4 Statement of Research Purpose and Objective .................................................................... 6 2.1. 2.2. 2.3. 2.4. Concept of the Karaoke Club-Raestaurant “Opera Halls” .............................................. 6 Marketing problem ....................................................................................................... 6 Purpose of Research Project ......................................................................................... 6 Research Method.......................................................................................................... 7 Secondary research ............................................................................................... 7 Qualitative research ............................................................................................... 7 Quantitative research ............................................................................................ 8 2.4.1. 2.4.2. 2.4.3. 2.5. Time schedule and Responsibility Matrix ...................................................................... 9 3. Research design and methodology .....................................................
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...contents: 1. Overview 3 2. Qualitative research approach methods and Quantitative research approach 4 3. The strength and weakness of Observation data collection 6 4. The strength and weaknesses of in-depth interview 6 5. Focus group discussion 7 6. Conclusion 9 7. References 10 Overview The aim of this report is to evaluate the qualitative study ‘In the Club: Ecstasy Use and Supply in a London Nightclub’ by Bill Sanders which was published in 2005 in the Sociology journal. The report will give a brief overview of the research aims, a description of the methods used, and explain the main findings reported in the paper that have been selected. A discussion of why a qualitative research approach has been chosen for the research question or questions posed in the study will also be evaluated. Furthermore, the use of an extended evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of the method or methods used in the research will focus in particular upon their appropriateness to the project’s key research question or questions posed and the robustness of the claims made in the article. Finally, a consideration of the potential contribution that a different qualitative method could have on the research question asked will be conducted to assess its strengths and weaknesses. The research was to explore what was widely known about those that used the drug ecstasy, those that sold the drug and whether these was a correlation between the two. Additional...
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...research refers to information that is directly collected from the source. Another simple method of primary research would be to directly talk to your customers and get their feedback. Primary research can be both qualitative and quantitative. 1. Qualitative primary research Qualitative primary research involves gathering information from interviews or focus groups • Open ended interviews include questions that cannot be answered with a yes or no. You can get a lot of information from such interviews and also find out about the dislikes, likes, requirements, trends and emotional motivators of your primary market • A focus group should ideally be led by experienced professionals who can lead a group of 6 or more people and ask them both general and specific questions. Since trained professionals are required to handle focus groups, they are very expensive Quantitative primary research Quantitative primary research involves the collection of numerical information from surveys. This information is then analysed. • Surveys can provide you with the information you require if the survey has meaningful questions. More people would be willing to take a survey...
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...Sensitive Skin: It is a Growing Problem and We Should Create Products to Help Customers Combat the Issue Have you ever tried a product for the first time and had some type of reaction to it? Well on average, 4 out of 10 women do have a reaction to new skin care or cosmetic products (Kligman, 2006). As one of the world leaders in the beauty industry, we should provide products for all skin types, even the most sensitive. Recent studies have shown that customers are worrying more about what they put on their skin and the possible reactions they will have. Customers want to know the products are made for their sensitive skin, but will also give them the type of results they come to expect from our brand. One of our competitors, Clinique, offers products that are gentle on the skin and do not contain some of the more popular irritants (Why Clinique, 2013). We need to figure out a way to gain the customers of our competitors and have them enjoy our products for what they offer to their skin. This study will help us understand the exact customer we want to reach as well as what they are looking for in their products. We will then be able to determine if we can move into the production phase and when the products are finished, where they should be sold. Problem Statement As more and more consumers are becoming health conscious, they are worry about their skin. In order to have healthy skin, you should wash, tone, and moisturize daily. For those with sensitive skin, it could be...
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...Introduction This study is to focus on the attitudes of the community towards violence against women, this study introduce: * the origin of domestic violence, * the definition of domestic violence against women, * how it affects the society, * forms of domestic violence , * the cause of domestic violence * A Review of Literature is to emphasize on the importance of the attitudes of the community towards the topic, the determinant, the suggested improvements and the limitations. This study will also conclude what is to be done to improve the attitudes of the community. Personal experiences and perspective The concern of this topic has sparked my interests as a Marketing student due to the recent reports of inhuman violent acts against women in India that has raised commotion all over the country, however this report is not pin-pointing at any countries, but as a general subject. You need also to link your topic and your personal experience to the theoretical perspectives (epistemologies and paradigms) that were discussed in class. Domestic Violence against Women The status of women has been seen as unequal to the status of men in terms of authority, opportunity as well as independence. Although the society has reached a tremendous change from degradation (1990s) to a position of equality (2000s), Violence against women which is defined as “an act of gender-based violence that results in, physical, sexual or psychological harm, or suffering...
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...and date is the best to conduct an interview. For example in this case, by conducting interview on weekends you might get better results as compared to weekdays like Monday where there are less people visiting the restaurant or they can be busy in their work. On the other side the place you are going to choose for the interview is also very important. For example in this case, it will be very convenient for the customers as well as for James to conduct interview in the restaurant itself, because by doing this he don’t have to organise another place and he can get more people to be interview. This will help to reduce the cost of interview. 2) Questionnaires – to conduct an effective interview, it is very import to know, what kind of questions you have to...
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...Abstract The National Department of Health and The South African National AIDS Council (SANAC) jointly agreed to launch a massive campaign for HIV Counselling and Testing. The campaign was launched as an effort to step up and supplement and modify the programmes that are already running in the country, to fight HIV and AIDS. The campaign is known as the National HIV Counselling and Testing Campaign and it is based on the National HIV Counselling and Testing Campaign Strategy of SANAC (2010). The study aimed to investigate the impact of the campaign in terms of awareness levels of the benefiting groups as well as the challenges experienced by the relevant role players in implementing the campaign at the Ga-Motupa community in Limpopo. The investigation tools used in the research were interview schedules (qualitative). Three different focus groups were sampled from the target groups, namely Care givers, learners and ABET educators. Individual...
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...universities have invested heavily in learning spaces designed to facilitate the kind of social interaction that the internet promotes. Networks – online and offline – are increasingly a part of the way that the modern world evaluates information, including research content. Yet all this presumes that modern users will best know how to find their way in this new information environment, that they have the skills to find the right databases, enter the right search terms, to discover the most appropriate research content for their teaching and learning and use it in the most appropriate way. This study was commissioned by JISC in 2008 and was conducted over four months starting in January 2009. The aims of the study were to answer the following questions, with users of research content defined as ‘learners, as graduate teaching assistants or as others for whom the research environment may not be familiar’: |...
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...(Bulearca and Tamarjan,2010). This tool will allow more access and marketing opportunities online. The main focus was to determine if this tool is marketable and beneficial for companies or their brands. To conduct the testing focus groups were used. This method was chosen because it offers great discussions like everyday conversations with no restraints. A pilot study will be implemented to amend any questions prior to the focus group study. The technique of peer checking was instituted to find blind spots and ensure the validiality of the questions. Member checking was used to verify the accuracy of the study and enables the researcher to get valuable feedback from the focus group. A good description of participants was provided to ensure the case study focus groups were viable and can be used for further research. The use of Augmented Reality as a form of experiential marketing during the past two years has been raising numerous controversies regarding its long-term benefits, extending from AR being only a promotional tool, to AR effectively contributing to a positive customer-brand relationship and to customer satisfaction through the creation of perceived experiential value (Bulearca and Tamarjan,2010). There is little known data on the long term effects of this type marketing due to a lack of benchmarks, and research studies. However, the purpose of the focus groups is to help the development of customer satisfaction. There are few companies that use the AR marketing...
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...Focus Group Discussion Thank you for agreeing to participate. We are very interested to hear your valuable opinion on latest trends in health and fitness. • The purpose of this focus group interview is to analyze the role of fitness center in sedentary lifestyle. • The information you give us is completely confidential, and we will not associate your name with anything you say in the focus group. • We would like to tape the focus groups so that we can make sure to capture the thoughts, opinions, and ideas we hear from the group. No names will be attached to the focus groups and the tapes will be destroyed as soon as they are transcribed. • You may refuse to answer any question or withdraw from the study at anytime. • We understand how important it is that this information is kept private and confidential. We will ask participants to respect each other’s confidentiality. THE VIDEO RECORDING BEGINS Focus Group Members: |S.No |Name |Age |Profession | |1 |Tarun Kumar |36 |Sports Therapist | |2 |Anjesh Sharma |28 |Fitness Manager | |3 |Ankit |24 |Fitness Trainer | |4 |Pooja Sharma |28 |Digital Marketer | |5 ...
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...Best Practices for Measuring Customer Satisfaction Customer satisfaction is perhaps one of the most talked about challenges of organizations in the public and private sectors. Indeed, this represents every organization’s sole purpose, and is at the heart of every organizations mission statement. It is seen as a key differentiator and increasingly has become a key element of business strategy. Customer satisfaction is tied directly to profitability. “Customer wants and needs drive competitive advantage, and statistics show that growth in market share is strongly correlated with customer satisfaction.”(Evans, 2010). If your customers are happy, they tend to be loyal. And if they’re loyal they not only buy more, they refer other customers. It is critical to give customers the opportunity to provide feedback about their overall satisfaction level and specific likes and dislikes. A company will lose business, miss growth opportunities, and put itself at a competitive disadvantage without an effective customer satisfaction research program in place. Therefore, it is very important to the success of the business to know right away if they are doing something that frustrates or dissatisfies the customers. According to Evans & Lindsey (2009) in Managing Quality, “To create satisfied customers, the organization needs to identify customers’ needs, design the production and service systems to meet those needs, and measure the results as the basis for improvement” (pg. 190). A customer...
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...1. A report of the focus group discussion (1) Focus Group Objective Through the focus group, interviewee’s buying behavior such as buying frequency and criteria, the reasons why people are not eager to buy HTC’s products, as well as the reasons why the sales of HTC Smartphone drop would be investigated. A combination of thoughts and ideas obtained via the discussion of focus group so as to make the research more whole-broadly. Also, fresh ideas could be collected. (2) Method and Procedures In doing the focus group, interviewees which are the current users of Smartphone were recruited. There were evenly distributed among gender. Therefore, up-to-date views and different comments among gender towards Smartphone could be gathered. Dissimilar type in this project was adapted as the interviewees were the non-users, current users, ex-users and potential users of HTC Smartphone. For example, the users use Iphone, Samsung, LG, Sony, Asus and HTC. With this arrangement, opinions from users using different brands could be collected. Each member in our group was responsible for finding his/her targeted interviewees. The recruitment of interviewees began 2 weeks before the focus group start. Firstly, the time of focus group was set up. Then, interviewees were invited by phone. Also, there was a screening during phone calls to ensure they are current users of Smartphone and try to raise the probability of finding interviewees with different brands of Smartphone. The appropriate...
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...Page 1 of 21 SECTION A: Problem in Context and Statement of the Problem The effect of In-store advertising and strategic shelf space within the South African FMCG market, and the impact it has on consumer buyer behaviour. Impulse buys are a form of consumer buyer behaviour but could it be that these buys are purchases that are fueled by emotion and desire, for instant gratification and not just a spontaneous urge. Research shows (Shaw, 2014) us that in fact we are drawn out of a subconscious state of being into a conscious one when that “impulse” to buy something not on our list occurs. “Consumer behaviour is the study of individuals, groups, or organizations and the processes they use to select, secure, and dispose of products, services, experiences, or ideas to satisfy needs and the impacts that these processes have on the consumer and society” (Kuester, 2012). This proposal is going to look at different influences and how these influences affect consumer buyer behaviour. Objectives: This proposal is going to establish to what extent the effects of in store advertising and shelf space/product locations have on consumers buying behaviour 1. To examine how in store advertising effects the consumer buying behavior. 2. To determine the effect of shelf space / product locations on consumer buyer behaviour. Further detailing on the above objectives: 1. To examine how in store advertising effects a shoppers buying behaviour This objective is to prove the relationship...
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