“Real” People: Verification and Credibility in Online Panels

With internet scamming and data integrity being at the top of most clients fears of online research, the nature of how a panel is built and enhanced over time matters. Our qualitative approach to online recruiting minimizes the risks associated with finding new panelists online.

Recruiting online can be scary; behind the safety of a computer screen, panelists can easily claim to be something they aren’t. Because the internet lets us communicate in a relatively new way, we’ve lost some of the learned non-verbal clues that come with face-to-face interaction. Avoiding eye-contact is a classic example of a fibber, but that clue is completely lost online.

Along the same lines, it’s important to note that spotting inconsistencies and little white lies is possible with online recruiting. Research has shown that individuals are most likely to be honest in communication that involves email because it leaves a trail, and they’re very likely to tell the truth regarding employment because of how easily their history can be found through web searches and networks like LinkedIn.

Because our panelists are mainly recruited for qualitative research, FPG’s panel has one of the highest rates of validation in the industry.  Unlike a majority of panelists at other panel companies, the panelists that make up FPG’s roster are verified by driver’s license during their in-person visits to our facilities.

Plus, in addition to the layer of in-person verification, FPG employs tactics in online recruiting that increase data validity to truly verify that a person is real. Here’s how a panelist recruited via the internet might enter FPG’s panel and participate in their first study.

FIRST TOUCH: Targeted Advertisements
FPG places targeted advertisements on search engines, websites, and social networks. Targeted means that we specify a unique panelist persona, such as a 20-something mother of a son under 2, and buy ad space that only displays for users that meet those criteria. Each venue allows us to target differently; LinkedIn gives the most robust options for business professionals, while Google lets us reach out to individuals actively searching for a product or service by name.

SECOND TOUCH: Specialized Landing Pages
Once the targeted individual clicks into the advertisement, they’re directed to a specialized landing page. The page they end up on continues the feel of the original advertisement instead of being a general recruitment page. When the young mother mentioned earlier clicks through from a targeted advertisement, she’ll land on a page with images that evoke feelings of family, and that gives more details about the available research.

THIRD TOUCH: Advanced Demographic Targeting 
After she’s joined the panel, FPG targets this new respondent based on the specific demographics she provided during sign up. That means that she won’t be invited to studies that do not pertain to her. Instead, her participation will be requested in research projects specific to the information she’s provided about herself and her family.

FOURTH TOUCH: Confirmation and Driver’s License Verification
When her profile matches an available study, the mother we mentioned might be invited to participate in-person for a focus group. Before the study, she'll receive a phone call from FPG's confirmation department that reviews the answers she gave in her online screener and assesses how articulate she is. After passing her confirmation, she'll go to a facility to participate in the group. When she arrives, FPG employees look at and check her driver’s license against her profile to ensure she is who she says she is. This verification is then entered into our database.

FIFTH TOUCH: On-Site Rescreening
After our staff validates her license, the panelist will be rescreened one last time at the facility. FPG's self-administered questionnaires are completed and signed by the panelist to elimate concerns that facility staff may bias respondent answers.

This qualitative verification of our panel enables better targeting and more data points, allowing us to use the panel more efficiently. This keeps costs down and enhances the panelists’ experience, ultimately driving higher participation rates. The process used by FPG to recruit new panelists lends credibility to the fact that our respondents are “real” people.

To find out more about Focus Pointe Global’s online capabilities, click the button below to speak with an FPG Pointe Person.

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Recruitment Techniques to Guarantee Qualified Respondents

Recruiting a marketing research project can make or break its success. With so much hinging on the responses of the people you include in your research study, it’s imperative to pay close attention to the recruiting process.

Setting the right tone early – preferably during your first touch with a respondent – helps you recruit highly qualified, articulate individuals. To improve your marketing research recruit from the get-go, incorporate these 3 elements to your process.

Know Your Respondents
Defining your ideal respondent is the first step to a successful recruit because it helps you and your panel provider accurately target the right people. Who do you want to learn from in your research study? Are they men, women, or both? Where do they shop, vacation, and relax? Do they have children? Are they web savvy?

With the who selects defined, it’s time to move into the where questions related to your respondents. Where do these people live? What city should I host my study? Would it be more or less successful online? Answers to these questions (and many more!) help define the feasibility for your marketing research project.

Realistic Rec­ruitment Timelines

Now that you know your respondents, it’s time to set a recruitment schedule. Because you’ve already set the definition for your ideal respondent, it’s tempting to limit the time your project is in the field – but this can be risky. Rushed turnaround times often lead to compromised results, namely under-qualified and inarticulate respondents.

What makes a realistic timeline varies from study to study and depends on the complexity of your targeted respondents. For a large, high incidence study, the recruit should be in the field at least 5 - 7 days. For more targeted studies, like those involving doctors or professionals, field time should be doubled. 

Streamlined Screeners

It’s no secret that respondent’s prefer shorter screeners. An effective screener lasts somewhere between 2 and 15 minutes – and rarely exceeds 20 minutes. Every minute over 20 runs the risk of losing the attention of your respondents, and worse, potentially turning them off to marketing research in general.

During the screening phase, it’s most important to ask questions that will make or break your recruit. What do you absolutely need to know about your respondents to recruit them? What specifically qualifies them to discuss your research project? Save the questions that you want to know the answers to for later; not only will respondents provide more in-depth responses in a marketing research setting, but they’ll also be more likely to participate in the future.

Every panel provider uses different recruitment techniques. At Focus Pointe, we use proven Check Pointe™ methodologies to ensure targeted respondents through in-depth screening and recruitment. This process guarantees that every single respondent is fully qualified and validated.

Schedule a consultation with a Focus Pointe Recruitment expert to learn more about our comprehensive array of qualifying Check Pointes ™.

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8 Hot Insider Tips from Years of Moderating

By Rich Thau

I've never blogged before about the art of structuring and moderating a successful focus group, but since the folks at Focus Pointe Global asked me to do this, I'm honored to take a stab at it. So, here goes, in sequential order from recruiting to executing:

1) How do you avoid recruiting highly opinionated people into your group so that they don't try to dominate the conversation? Well, there's no sure-fire way of achieving that, but many years ago I started inserting a question into the screener that seems to have helped mitigate the problem: Ask whether the prospective respondents have any bumper stickers on their cars that convey a political message. If they do, that's telling you something: They want to try to convert others to their point of view. You probably don't want them in your group.

2) If you want typical adults ages 22-64 in your groups, try not to host the groups before 5:30 p.m. Sessions conducted during business hours on a weekday tend to be filled with people who are not ideal respondents. Occasionally lunch-time sessions attract good respondents. Also, I've done successful groups over the weekend—but who wants to make a habit of doing groups on a weekend?

3) It makes sense to meet the recruits before bringing them in for the session. Sometimes you spot someone who shouldn't be there—perhaps they're asleep, or not fully engaged—and taking a quick look can help avoid some uncomfortable moments during a group. It also helps to ask folks stationed at the welcome desk if any respondents look familiar, like “professional respondents.”

4) I almost always re-screen groups by asking a key question differently in the re-screening than in the original screening. It's a great way to find people who should have been screened out originally, but weren't. I also regularly try to understand discrepancies between the original screening and the re-screening by pulling people out of the waiting room and asking them to explain the discrepancy. Sometimes the gap is explainable, and sometimes it's not. And when it's not, I've often paid the respondent and sent him/her home.

5) Nothing sets me off more than respondents who try to game the focus group system—they arrive three or four minutes after the group starts, so they expect to get paid without having to attend. I make it a hard rule with facilities: If the respondent isn't there by the time the group starts, they don't get paid unless I take them while in progress (something I am loath to do). The recruiting screener told them they needed to be there 20 minutes before the session starts, so if they are late, no payment.

6) My firm specializes in moment-to-moment dial testing, where we get continuous feedback on video presentations of various types during the focus group. If you ever conduct a session using the dials for this purpose, you MUST not only give detailed instructions, but also conduct a quick warm-up to make sure the instructions are understood. After moderating hundreds of sessions with the dials, I've noticed that there's at least one person in each group who does not follow the instructions—and as moderator I don't know who it is, what they're doing wrong, or how to set them straight, until I do a warm-up.

7) Never moderate groups back-to-back; always take a half hour break between groups to do a "brain dump" of what you learned, eat something, and consult with the client. We typically run groups from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m., and then from 8:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.

8) The most effective time-saving device I've come across for report writing is to do a digital audio backup of my session with my own recorder, and to sync the time on the recorder to the time on an easy-to-read digital stop watch that I place in front of me. When someone says something I want to make sure not to miss, I write down the name of the person and something they said, along with the time, so my associates and I can find it easily on the audio afterwards.

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Rich Thau is President and Founder of Manhattan-based Presentation Testing, Inc. (http://www.presentationtesting.com). You can reach him at richthau@presentationtesting.com or 212-760-4358.

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The opinions expressed in this blog post are Rich Thau's and not necessarily those of Focus Pointe Global. 

Benefits of a Single Point of Contact: Marketing Research Results

If you’re just joining our weeklong investigation into the benefits of a single point of contact for your marketing research project, then you missed the previous two posts in this series. Click here to read more about analysis and recruiting or focus group coordination.

In conclusion, we’d like to turn your attention to the most important benefit of having a single point of contact to coordinate your entire project: marketing research data and results delivery.

Leaving the compilation of your valuable research data in the hands of strangers is a mistake. After all, this data is the reason you set out to study your target markets in the first place! No matter how good your marketing research provider’s team of data experts may be at their job, without the context of your entire project for reference, your results are likely to suffer.

Having a single point of contact who is intimately familiar with your research goals and objectives, someone who has followed your project from recruitment through results delivery, is the only way to guarantee that your results are gathered and presented in line with your requirements and expectations.

To learn more about the many benefits of a single point of contact for your next marketing research project, visit www.focuspointeglobal.com or stay tuned to the FPG blog.

Be sure to check back in next week when we’ll address the importance of body language in the data collection process. In the meantime, if you’d like this and all future Focus Pointe Global blog posts sent directly in your inbox, simply enter your email address in the field to the right to subscribe.

If you have any questions or would like to schedule a free marketing research consultation with your own dedicated FPG Pointe Person, simply click on the button below.

Benefits of a Single Point of Contact: Focus Group Coordination

As you may recall, we began this FPG blog series with an investigation into how a single point of contact improves the recruitment process of your marketing research program. Now, we’d like to take a closer look at how this same level of dedicated service improves the focus group planning and coordination process.

Whether you are conducting a single city study or a simultaneous multi-market research project, having a single point of contact drastically improves your chances of executing a successful focus group event.

A lot of careful planning goes into creating the kind of seamless focus groups that result in powerful, actionable data for you and your clients. It helps to have someone on hand who is familiar with you and your project, so that you can rest easy knowing that every detail is taken care of according to your unique specifications. By coordinating facility logistics, ensuring that all technological requirements are met and scheduling test groups according to the needs of your client team and qualified respondents, a single dedicated point of contact provides the guidance and oversight necessary to make sure your event goes smoothly from start to finish.

To learn more about the benefits of a single point of contact for your next marketing research project, visit www.focuspointeglobal.com or stay tuned to the FPG blog. We’ll conclude this week’s series of posts with an examination of how a single point of contact improves your marketing research data results. In the meantime, if you’d like this and all future Focus Pointe Global blog posts sent directly in your inbox, simply enter your email address in the field to the right to subscribe.

If you have any questions or would like to schedule a free marketing research consultation with your own dedicated FPG Pointe Person, simply click on the button below.

Benefits of a Single Point of Contact: Analysis and Recruiting

When it comes to service, one area where many marketing research firms fall short is failing to provide the consistent oversight that helps guide your marketing research project from concept through completion. This week on the Focus Pointe Global blog, we’ll be taking a closer look at the top three benefits of having a single point of contact for your marketing research initiative.

The first area where a single point of contact benefits your project is the recruitment phase. This initial stage of your engagement is critical for establishing your marketing research goals and requirements. The in-depth analysis and implementation that takes place during the recruitment phase is integral to the overall success of your project. When your marketing research firm provides a dedicated contact, you can rest assured that this person is equipped with the knowledge and resources necessary to see your project through from start to finish.

Whether you have a tough recruit or a routine project on your hands, having a single point of contact helps you gather the highly qualified and targeted respondents that drive focus group success.

To learn more about the benefits of a single point of contact for your next marketing research project, visit www.focuspointeglobal.com or stay tuned to the FPG blog. Later in the week, we’ll take a closer look at how a single point of contact benefits your focus group coordination efforts. In the meantime, if you’d like this and all future Focus Pointe Global blog posts sent directly in your inbox, simply enter your email address in the field to the right to subscribe.

If you have any questions or would like to schedule a free marketing research consultation with your own dedicated FPG Pointe Person, simply click on the button below.

Improve Your Recruiting Process: Know Your Respondents

Recruitment is the first and most important stage in any marketing research initiative. It sets the tone for the entire project and helps you gather the highly qualified and targeted respondents that drive success. This week on the FPG blog, we’re taking an in-depth look at three key areas that improve and enhance your marketing research recruiting process.

First up: Knowing Your Respondents. Just as a successful marketing research project starts with a strong recruitment effort, a successful recruitment starts with knowing who your ideal respondents are. Where do they live and work? How do they prefer to receive information? What motivates their decision-making processes?

Once you’ve formed a solid picture of the respondents you’re searching for, you can set about finding them. Balancing your demographic and geographic requirements is key here. You wouldn’t go into a grocery store looking for electronics, so why would you seek out IT Directors in 500+-person companies in the middle of a rural zip code? Check the feasibility of your study by doing a little pre-searching to make sure you’re looking in the right places for your marketing research project respondents.

Once you’ve identified the “who” and the “where,” the next step in the recruitment process is determining the “when.” Knowing your respondents’ behavioral characteristics and schedules is the key to ensuring a successful recruiting process. Stay-at-home moms, for instance, aren’t usually available in the afternoon when the kids are getting home from school. Similarly, surgeons can’t be reached most mornings since they are most likely in the operating room.

Stay tuned later in the week when we will go deeper into the question of “what” to ask potential marketing research project respondents with our guide to designing the perfect screener. If you’d like this and all future Focus Pointe Global blog posts sent directly in your inbox, simply enter your email address in the field to the right to subscribe.

If you have any questions or would like to schedule a free marketing research recruitment process consultation with one of our experts, click on the button below.

Improve Your Recruiting Process: Streamline Your Screener

We began this week’s examination of recruiting process improvements with a look at the importance of knowing your respondents. If you missed the first installment in this week’s series, click here to read it. Now, let’s take a look at how to ask the right questions of your respondent groups in your marketing research screener.

Studies show that shorter screeners yield better, more precise responses. Depending on the level of feedback you receive, a well-formulated screening survey session should last between 2 and 15 minutes. Any longer than this and you run the risk of losing the attention of your respondents. During this initial stage, try to concentrate on what you need to know, not what you want to know…there will be plenty of time for more in-depth questions in a focus group setting. For now, avoid questions that require statement ratings or repetitive responses. By focusing your screeners with clear and concise questions, you have a better chance of finding the right respondents much faster.

When formulating your screener questions, it’s also important to keep your language as targeted as possible to the needs and knowledge levels of each respondent group. In order to recruit the best, most qualified respondents, your screener language should speak directly to each candidate in a clear and easily understandable manner. How you speak to each respondent during your screening session is even more important than how long it takes.

Later this week on the Focus Pointe Global blog, we’ll continue our examination of key recruiting process improvements with a look at turnaround times. If you’d like this and all future Focus Pointe Global blog posts sent directly in your inbox, simply enter your email address in the field to the right to subscribe.

If you have any questions or would like to schedule a marketing research project recruitment process consultation with one of our experts, click on the button below.

Improve Your Recruiting Process: Realistic Turnaround Times

To wrap up this week’s discussion of marketing research project recruitment improvements, we’d like to take a moment to address the issue of realistic turnaround times. If you missed the first two posts in this week’s series, click here to read Know Your Respondents or Streamline Your Screener.

It’s only natural to be anxious to see the recruitment results for your upcoming project. But by rushing turnaround times, you run the risk of compromising those results. In contrast to quantitative, qualitative research projects depend on having the right, specific respondents to fulfill your goals. Pressing to fill your focus group fast often leads to under-qualified or inarticulate candidates that don’t provide the rich answers that you or your clients need. By providing sufficient time to screen qualified respondents, you greatly increase the value of your respondents and, therefore, the results of your qualitative research project.

It’s also important to plan for the unexpected. This doesn’t mean that you should expect everything to go wrong, but if you plan for every eventuality in the recruiting process, you’ll be fully prepared if and when the unexpected does occur.

Last but not least, remember that client samples have their limit. Therefore, it’s important not to frustrate or upset the people on your list by keeping them on the line too long or calling them too many times. The damage such overuse may cause far outweighs the benefits of any results you may gather.

Check back here on the FPG blog next week when we will address the benefits of a single point of contact for your marketing research project. In the meantime, if you’d like this and all future Focus Pointe Global blog posts sent directly in your inbox, simply enter your email address in the field to the right to subscribe.

If you have any questions or would like to schedule a marketing research project recruitment process consultation with one of our experts, click on the button below.

Large Group Testing Success Factors: Event Scheduling

To wrap up this week’s discussion of large group testing success factors, we’d like to take a moment to address a couple of key considerations you should keep in mind when planning for your marketing research event. If you missed the first two posts in this week’s series, click here to read our large group recruitment recommendations  or facility setup tips.

The most important thing to remember when scheduling your marketing research event is that check-in and check-out times naturally increase with the size of your group. Not only do large groups take longer to vacate and settle into your facility before testing can begin, you also have to leave time to clean up the room and reset your equipment after each session. That’s why it’s critical to schedule extra time between groups.

By padding or extending the time between sessions, you will help to ensure more seamless transitions that prevent respondent frustration and, ultimately, help all focus group facility personnel do their jobs better.

Check back here on the FPG blog next week when we will offer up some helpful tips for improving your recruitment process. In the meantime, if you’d like this and all future Focus Pointe Global blog posts sent directly in your inbox, simply enter your email address in the field to the right to subscribe.

If you have any questions or would like to schedule a free large group testing consultation with one of our experts, click on the button below.