Bringing the Focus Group Into the 21st Century
When you think of a focus group, there’s a good chance you imagine people around a table in a room, sharing their opinions on a particular product, message or service. The concept has been around for decades and has long been one of the best ways to gauge if something that is a great idea on paper will translate into sales and success. From new consumer products to political campaigns, focus groups are a great way to hear from a representative sample of your potential audience before going to market.
The process has been around a long time and, despite advances in technology, it hasn’t changed much. Until now. Appstem has just wrapped up a project with Storyline Strategies that has transformed their focus group process from completely analog to fully digital, allowing the company to not only be able to administer focus groups from virtually anywhere, but also to get better and more reliable data.
Storyline Strategies was founded by GOP pollster Frank Luntz as Luntz Global Partners. When he left the firm in 2017, new leadership rebranded the company to Storyline Strategies which now focuses less on politics and had broadened the scope of its research. The company now works with major brands like Google and Facebook to test messaging around their advertising, imagery and more.
Even though technology has been rapidly evolving over the last decade or two, focus groups have not. They still required the Storyline Strategies team to travel around the country, or sometimes internationally, to meet with groups of people, ask their questions and get feedback that in turn would guide their client’s campaigns.
The set up was fairly straightforward. The group would gather and receive a paper packet that would include copy points, ad mockups, etc. and be asked to give their impressions of those assets before the focus group gets underway. Then the group phase would begin with a discussion about different campaign aspects from speeches to training videos to advertising. Participants would use an actual dial to show how much they like or dislike what they’re seeing, discussion would follow and then the facilitator would aggregate the data to show how the audience responded. This approach required the moderator to transport cumbersome boxes of paper materials and equipment to the testing facility.
Appstem’s challenge was to create three products to streamline this process so that the information would still be accurate (and possibly more relevant) and that focus groups could be managed remotely. They worked with Storyline Strategies to design three products:
- An iPad app/iOS application that would act as an interface for participants in the group to use during sessions.
- A web-based administration panel that would allow moderators to upload questions, images, etc. to administer the focus group easily.
- A backend server app that would talk to the administration panel, stream video and receive and aggregate the data.
At the outset, Appstem and the client worked together to develop a plan that would not just take the existing process digital but also improve it to be easier and more efficient. One of the first challenges was to create a process so that moderators, even those with no technology expertise, could set up the iPads quickly and easily even in facilities with poor network connections or unreliable internet via an offline mode.
Appstem built a server app that runs off a regular Mac laptop, making it simple for moderators to upload all the group’s exercises and videos before the session. The moderator can download all the content to run the session locally vs. in the cloud. The group’s iPads are connected to the facilitator’s laptop by simply scanning a QR code - no cables or wires are necessary. The administration panel automatically configures and decodes the data via the iPad’s connection to the backend running from the laptop. This step solves the connectivity issues.
The moderators would also need to be able to stream video simultaneously to all the participants, which was one of the biggest challenges. When you play digital video there is always some latency, and with many devices at the same time that increases. Appstem had to find a way to get all the iPads viewing in sync, taking into account volume issues and not wanting to have any of the data points off. The team was able to implement video technology to stream from the internet without that problem.
Once the focus group starts, the packets are replaced by simple surveys on each iPad eliminating the need to use and lug around excess paper. The moderator is able to call up exercises and questions from the pre-group session during the group discussion. Unlike with manual tabulation, all the data is recorded on the individual iPads and sent back to the administration panel making it possible to gather and aggregate data in real time. That real time functionality also helps the moderator guide the discussion because they can see people’s reactions in the moment so they can dig deeper into trends and can follow up immediately. This leads to better qualitative data which creates a more holistic analysis of the results.
“The industry hadn’t evolved much in the last twenty years,” said Robert Armstrong, CEO of Appstem. “We were able to not only create new technology to update an outdated process but also improve the focus group overall by allowing Storyline Strategies to reach a broader range of demographics, gather data faster and get more accurate results.”
Focus groups are tried and true tools to bring consumers directly into the creative process and help ensure an end product that is supported by real-time data and is truly connected to the end user. Now, they can be facilitated faster, more efficiently and from anywhere – truly a 21st Century development.
For more information about the variety of work we do for an array of clients,
please visit https://appstem.com/work.
