Milestones and beginnings
Wednesday, April 20, 2011 |
This is a big year for me personally – a year of important milestones. Johnston Research will turn five in the next few months. As an independent researcher, I have completed 100 projects and by the end of 2010, I had completed focus group number 500. And then there is the age thing… let’s just say my age now ends in a ‘0’.
It is also a year of learning and new beginnings. Johnston Research now has a website. For a long time, it just didn’t make sense and quite honestly, I could never carve out enough time to get a website set up. However, with the hiring of Jessica (another great new beginning), we had the the opportunity to make it happen.
Another new beginning is this blog. The purpose of the blog is to talk about the business of qualitative research. One of the things I most enjoy about research is being involved in such an interesting array of topics. It is so energizing to be invited into the client’s world for a few weeks or months and to become immersed in their issues. But, it’s not just the topics that are interesting, it is the process. Part of the interesting strategy of designing research is making sure we use the right approach and the right process to capture the best range of information. That is what I plan on writing in the blog – my opinions about how qualitative research can best be used in the Alberta marketplace.
… and of course, you can influence what we write about. I wouldn’t be much of a researcher if I didn’t ask for your feedback. Let me know your thoughts about the blog and I welcome suggestions for blog topics.
POSTED BY SANDRA JOHNSTON
Posted in: Other |
Why don’t we just ask them?
Wednesday, April 20, 2011 |
In the testing of advertisements and creative material, I often get asked "Why don’t we just ask the respondents what they want to see in the ad?" I strongly discourage these kinds of questions during focus groups.
I understand why this question seems appealing. If we have the people in the room we want to impact, doesn’t it make sense that they would be in the best position to tell us?
In a word – No. First of all, respondents are not marketing and communication experts. They cannot tell us what will engage and motivate them, they can only tell us what has engaged and motivated them (I know Don Draper would agree with me). It is for that reason that I encourage giving respondents material to react to. The material doesn’t have to be complete or fully developed (and often it is best when the material is clearly still in concept form), but respondents should be given the chance to respond to a few different approaches that utilize different tactics to tackle the advertising objectives.
Respondents also don’t understand the full scope of the advertising objectives – nor should they. They haven’t seen the creative brief and they aren’t fully familiar with the product, concept or issue being discussed. As a result, respondents can get fixated on ideas that we know simply won’t work for the project.
These open “What would you like to see?” questions also take up a lot of time during the focus group – time that can be better spent reacting to specific approaches and providing clear feedback on what engages, communicates and motivates.
This is not to say that respondents cannot provide great insight into new ways to reach and influence them, but if I am doing my job properly, these ideas will come to the surface during the focus group discussion as we explore reactions to presented materials and concepts.
The reality is, we often don’t know what we want until we see it or are exposed to it.
The following video is of Malcolm Gladwell speaking at Ted2004. He talks about this specific challenge as he discusses the evolution of spaghetti sauce…except that he does it in a much more interesting and entertaining way than I can – Buon Appetito!
POSTED BY SANDRA JOHNSTON
Posted in: Creative Assessments |
My emotional engagement
Thursday, April 14, 2011 |
I have had the good fortune to work with the Full House Lottery for many years. It is one of those really enjoyable projects; the clients are interesting and smart, the topic is one that research respondents like talking about and discussions can get very animated, and of course, it is for a good cause (University Hospital Foundation and Royal Alexandra Hospital Foundation). In addition to working on the lottery, my husband and I have been purchasing tickets for a long time. We also had the very good fortune to win the Harley Davidson bike the first time we bought a ticket - isn’t that what everyone dreams of!
One of the things we discuss every year during the research is how best to promote the cause or the beneficiaries of the lottery, so it certainly is top of mind for me. However, at the media launch for Full House Lottery in March, two men spoke about how they have benefited from the lottery and it brought home the importance of supporting the lottery in a very real and meaningful way – and in a way I had never thought of before.
After years of conducting research, I understand on an intellectual level the importance of creating a personal or emotional connection in order to motivate your audience. I've seen how a person's body language, opinions and even their demenour can change when they have made an emotional connection to a topic.
On that day, I connected in a different way to the lottery. One of the speakers at the launch was Chad, a young professional – a few years younger than me for sure, but close enough that I could say we are of the same generation. A little over a year ago, this man suffered a grand maul seizure out of the blue. He felt healthy and fine up until that day. This felt like a story that I could have heard from a friend or a peer. This was a healthy young man who could have been a brother, a friend, or a friend’s husband. It was discovered that Chad had a brain tumour, and during the treatment of that tumour, his doctor used cutting edge equipment that very few hospitals in Canada have access to (and he had access to it because the hospital foundation had purchased it with lottery proceeds).
I am not going to do him justice, but Chad said something along the lines of “You cannot control what is going to happen to you in life – you can only be prepared. So whether it is socking some money away in RRSPs or supporting great causes like this one, just do what you can to be prepared.”
I had not really ever thought about the tickets I buy for the lottery as being something you do to be prepared – as preventative. Somehow to me, it had always felt reactive, a way to solve a problem, not prevent one. But I liked that feeling, that through my support for the Full house Lottery I had helped the University and Royal Alex hospitals be prepared to treat their patients. It was just a subtle difference - but a world of difference.
POSTED BY SANDRA JOHNSTON
Posted in: Charitable Organizations |