"But if the software goes down, my whole business would be paralyzed."
Category knowledge helps obtain additional insights
It’s important that the moderator understand the client’s field of business. For example, when we conducted research with business owners to discuss using an ASP model for accounting software (that is, businesses would use the Internet to do their accounting), respondents were concerned that if there were a problem with the service, their businesses would be paralyzed. On the spur of the moment, the moderator brought up the point that the provider could have redundant systems to pick up the slack when something went wrong, whereas, in a single business, if the server is down, it's down. Respondents found this argument persuasive, so we learned that this was an important point for the company's marketing communications.

 

More anecdotes (click on the quote to read the anecdote):

"We don’t know what we have to say to sway them. How do we turn prospects into customers?"
An unusual focus group technique yields results

"Talk to the employees. But don’t tell me that they need to be paid more money."
Clarifying objectives with clients

"That sounds like it came from the Iraqi Ministry of Information!"
Dealing with difficult respondents

"I want to know what people think of our website – both how it works and also the overall concept."
We came up with a hybrid methodology for more effective website research

 

Sign up for our Research Tidbit email newsletter!  We email Research Tidbits like the one above, at no charge,  whenever we come across information we feel might be useful to our clients (approximately once a month) - and hopefully, they help keep us top-of-mind! 

First and last name         E-mail address

 

  Do you know of anyone else who might benefit from these tidbits?  Enter their name and email above and we'll send them a sample tidbit.

 
 Bureau West Research Group

Home

Research Tidbits

Tel: 1-818-752-7210

Email: info@bureauwest.com