[Sigia-l] Alternative Focus Group Methods

[Eric Scheid]

On 15/10/04 11:10 AM, "Jeff Lash" <jeff at jefflash.com> wrote:

> Personally, I find that focus groups are often used inappropriately. It's
> the one major consumer research technique taught to Marketing students, and
> thus it's the hammer to anything resembling a nail.
> 
> Which user research technique you use depends on what your goals are. Focus
> groups are useful in some instances, but in other cases techniques like
> creating collages, using diaries, or answering surveys are more appropriate.
> First figure out what questions you're looking to answer, and then determine
> the best way to answer those questions.

and if you don't even know what the questions are which you are hoping to
answer, then *that* is when focus groups come in handy -- they are better at
this "issues exploration and values determination" problem than other
methods.

What I learned is that focus groups sit at one end of a continuum of
certainty ... which stretches from "we don't even know what the issues are"
through to "we know the issues, we know the goals, we know the problems, we
know the approaches .. we just need some fiddly quantifiable measurements so
we can tune the instrument". Focus groups sit at one end of that continuum,
guess which one.

e.