Focus Groups have traditionally been a staple research methodology for Market Research / UX focused Qualitative Researchers. Bringing representatives of your ideal customer profile into a central location enables you to meet them face to face and to hear about their needs, emotions, attitudes and experiences first hand. 

It is a more cost-effective and time-efficient method than 1:1 interviews (aka In-depth Interviews, IDIs, “depths” or User Interviews) as you get to meet 6-8 participants concurrently and it enables you to better understand feelings, motivations, and opinions. Focus Groups have also been used for a range of approaches including concept and product feedback in a group setting or in workshop format for UX Research and Product Design.

What are the disadvantages of Focus Groups?

However, despite the attractions of online Focus Groups, there are several disadvantages to Focus Groups:

• Focus Group Recruitment can be challenging

It can be difficult to recruit participants as they have to visit a Focus Group facility (usually in a major city) and get parking etc.

• Focus Groups require complex logistics and travel

For the Researcher, you need to block out days, book facilities, arrange catering, and get all your logistics in place.  

• Focus Groups may result in Group Bias

The influence of ‘group bias’ as discussions become swayed by one dominant person in the group is a concern

• Recall Constraints (poor memory)

Recall limitations as participants are mostly speaking about post rationalized, past experiences and events

• Private v Public Forum

Are participants really being themselves or are they seeking to project a different persona in front of a bunch of strangers?

• Focus Groups are not suitable for capturing Sensitive Data

It can be difficult to capture sensitive data in a group dynamic especially where trust is hard to establish given the short time window

• Limited Duration

Most Groups last a couple of hours at most. Effectively, you pay everyone for 2 hours of their time but maybe get 15 mins of interaction from each participant.

Despite these limitations, Focus Groups represent an important means by which researchers can gather additional insights to help shape decision making. There is no doubt that this method of research is extremely powerful when run by an expert researcher who can tune into the group, read the room and work the group to surface insights, probe them, and validate them. 

However, a more recent issue could serve to significantly reduce the attractiveness of Focus Groups in the short to medium term. That is Covid-19. The likelihood of participants attending in-person Focus Groups in major cities in the short to medium term looks highly unlikely at present. With social distancing rules in place in most markets, recreating that intimate group setting will be extremely difficult if not impossible. 

What are some alternatives to Focus Groups?

As a replacement to traditional Focus Groups, researchers and brands are looking at the three main alternatives: Online Focus Groups, Online In-Depth Interviews, and Mobile Ethnography. 

Online Focus Groups

Online Focus Groups are similar to traditional Focus Groups in their methodology and approach. The researcher conducts their Focus Group in a “Zoom-like” virtual room over an online platform by engaging with a group of participants and asking them questions that encourage dialogue and elicit insights. 

Participants can be recruited from diverse geographical locations as well as from different socioeconomic groups, with external factors reduced (as they can participate from the comfort of their own homes). 

While cost-effective and efficient, (no parking is required), this method has many drawbacks. The biggest barriers are the limited time window, technology/connectivity issues, and the lack of intimacy. 

Drawbacks to Online Focus Groups

The Context

With the research relying totally on surfacing insights in a restrictive 1-2 hour window, any issues with technology or connectivity quickly erode the effective duration of the group, lead to a loss of interaction, and an inability to both capture and analyze the data. 

One-Shot

The synchronicity of the method means if you don’t cover what you need to during the limited 1-2 hour window, there is no opportunity for follow up questions. Once it’s over, it’s over. You might be able to send a few follow-up emails but these are very much at the goodwill of the participants and merging this data back into the data captured in the group can be a real pain. 

Lack of Magic

While expert researchers can undoubtedly work magic in a physical Focus Group to surface the data they need, it is impossible to recreate the energy of a face to face group and repeat this magic in an online setting.

In the words of a researcher, we recently spoke to: Online Focus groups feel like a 1:1 interview with 5 people watching! 

As much as Online Focus Groups feel like a natural, digital contingency to a face to face Focus Group, the reality is that they represent a poor substitute for the real thing.

2. In-Depth interviews (aka IDIs or User Interviews)

When it comes to qualitative data research an in-depth interview (referred to as a User Interview in UX Research contexts) is one of the most common approaches. A skilled interviewer engages in a probing conversation with a qualified interviewee, capturing their thoughts in a notebook or computer. All qualitative researchers will have used this approach at some point, as it is versatile across a range of study topics, adaptable to challenging field conditions, and excellent for not just providing information but for generating understanding as to motivations. 

Drawbacks to In-Depth Interviews or User Interviews

However, there are a number of significant limitations with the approach, not least the time it takes to arrange interviews, to undertake them, and to process the information subsequently. 

The output can also be mixed as you are often asking probing questions where the respondent has to recall events or actions from the past. They help generate richer insights than focus groups, as the 1:1 dynamic lends itself to a better quality engagement but the synchronous nature of them means that they lack the accuracy of approaches like mobile ethnography.

3. Mobile Ethnography

Mobile Ethnography (also referred to as Digital Ethnography) is an agile, remote research methodology that represents one fast-growing approach that offers many similarities to Focus Groups but differs in several key areas, the main one being context.

Mobile Ethnography is an agile, remote qualitative research methodology that leverages the power of smartphones to connect Brands and Researchers with Participants on a more intimate level, allowing for richer insights into their real-life, in-the-moment, and in-context behaviors.  

The Indeemo Mobile Ethnography App can be installed on a Participant’s phone and allows researchers to connect directly with Participants and to gather rich, insightful information about their everyday lives. 

Unlike a Focus Group, the Indeemo Dashboard and App creates a more personal, intimate 1:1 connection making it more comfortable for the Participant - encouraging more honest and insightful responses. Participants can complete their tasks where and when most comfortable with no third parties or other Participants affecting them, thus reducing their need to analyze or alter their real feelings and attitudes. 

Furthermore, given the remote nature of the approach, it is COVID proof in that it is a methodology that can be run right now. It is a new methodology that has yet to gain widespread acceptance so some researchers are likely to default to traditional approaches. 

Similarly, the tool is only as powerful as the service and support that complements it i.e. you still need to ensure you attract and reward high-quality respondents to ensure insights captured are representative of the target audience you are looking to learn from.

Key differences between online Focus Groups and Mobile Ethnography

Advantages of Mobile Ethnography compared to Focus Groups

The asynchronous method is what truly makes mobile ethnography a powerful research tool. Instead of relying on what participants tell you in a 1-hour group, Mobile Ethnography allows them to show you what they repetitively do over a longitudinal period of time. This also allows for more time to analyze the real-time responses and creates an opportunity to establish an ongoing dialogue and to probe participants with more thorough questions. 

The data collected is also more insightful and thanks to the ability to analyze all responses almost instantly, better collaboration between clients and moderators can be achieved. Contextual video capture also allows for a true, ‘in-context’ insight where you get to watch the Participant making their decision ‘in-the-moment’ rather than listening to them explain previous experiences through a post-rationalized lens.

Longitudinal and Asynchronous versus One-off and Synchronous

Another way to look at Mobile Ethnography is through the dimension of time. As Mobile Ethnography is longitudinal and studies typically take place of a period of days, researchers get more time to get to truly understand participants. Unlike online Focus Groups where users log in on a Zoom call for an hour, with Mobile Ethnography you get to remotely “walk in their shoes” for a period of days. Simply put: 

• Knowledge increases with time

• Trust increases with time

• Proof increases with time

“If you were making your next strategic business decision - which would you prefer: what a participant tells you about past events captured in a front of a group of strangers in a 1-hour window or contextual, in-the-moment data recorded by respondents over a period of days capturing, repetitive, real-life behaviors?” Eugene Murphy, CEO of Indeemo

The importance of Privacy

Finally, it is worth noting that mobile ethnography is particularly useful for research topics where the participants are unlikely to want to divulge sensitive data in a public setting. 

This can range for use cases from academic, to healthcare to finance, as well as an increasing number of settings where participants are sensitive about sharing *real data* with strangers. 

With Mobile Ethnography, participants share data from the privacy of their own homes with no one else watching. Or, to put it another way, with Mobile Ethnography, there is never anyone else in the “room” (including the researcher)

Why we believe researchers should use Mobile Ethnography as an alternative to Focus Groups

In summary, Focus Groups represent a key research tool for most qualitative researchers for good reason. There is no doubt that there has been an explosion in video communications tools that act as meaningful substitutes for meetings in the guise of online Focus Groups. 

However, these online Focus Group tools do not represent a viable substitute for traditional, face to face groups. It’s impossible to achieve the same group dynamic online where everyone is talking over each other and half the participants are struggling with wifi. In short, online groups are stunted and they do not offer a viable digital alternative to face to face groups.

Can a 1-hour Focus Group on Zoom offer the same richness of data as a week-long longitudinal study using a remote qualitative research app like Indeemo? The power of seeing repetitive behavior first hand over a longer duration offers rich insights that may not be unmasked in a one-hour online Focus Group. 

If you are considering migrating qualitative research online you need to think 1:1. You want to avoid relying on recall and focus on generating rich insights through observed behavior. If you do proceed with a 1:1 approach would you prefer a 1hr, synchronous post rationalized approach where respondents tell you about their experience or a longitudinal, asynchronous approach where they repeatedly show you how they actually behave.

If you share our view that the latter approach makes most sense then it is time to explore mobile ethnography as an approach.

Get in touch now and we will schedule a call ASAP to discuss your research requirements.  

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