Chapter 4

Steps in Conducting IDIs

1: Understand question/problem 2: Create interview guide 3: Decide on best environment for interview 4: Recruit and screen respondents 5: Introduce respondent to interview process 6: Conduct interviews 7: Analyze respondent responses 8: Write report

Phase 3: Activities

-Conduct a debriefing analysis -Transcribe discussions -Content analyze responses -Develop report

Limitations of Observation

-Difficult to generalize findings -Cannot explain behaviors -Problems in setting up and recording behaviors

Characteristics of Observation

-Directness -Structure -Awareness -Observing Mechanism

Objectives of IDI

-Discover what subject thinks about a topic and why -Understand feelings, beliefs, opinions of subject and why they exist -Encourage subject to communicate as much detail as possible

Qualitative

-Discovery of ideas, feelings, preliminary insights -Exploratory, subjective -Open-ended -Semi-structured or unstructured -Short time frames -Small samples, limited generalizability

Advantages of Qualitative Designs

-Economical and timely Rich data -Accuracy of recording behaviors -Preliminary insights into models and scale measurements

Primary Qualitative Methods

-Focus groups -Hybrids -In-depth interviews -Netnography -Ethnography -Chat-based online focus groups -Video-based online focus groups

Goals of Qualitative Research

-Gain preliminary insight into research problems -Probe more deeply into areas that quantitative research is too superficial to access -Provide initial ideas about specific problems, theories, relationships, variables, and scale design

Objectives of Focus Groups

-Identify data for defining and redefining market problems -Reveal consumers' hidden attitudes -Generate new ideas for products -Discover new constructs and measurement methods -Explain changing consumer preferences

Disadvantages of Qualitative Designs

-Lack of generalizability -Difficulty estimating magnitude -Low reliability -Difficulty finding good investigators -Reliance on interpretation

Technology-mediated observation

Data collection using some type of mechanical device to capture human behavior, events, or marketing phenomena

Observation

Observation is the systematic witnessing and recording of behavioral patterns of objects, people, and events without directly communicating with them

Content analysis

Technique used to study written or taped materials by breaking the data into meaningful aggregate units or categories using a predetermined set of rules

Case Studies

The case study technique involves investigating one or more situations which are similar to the current problem or opportunity

In-depth interview

a structured process of a subject's being asked a set of semi-structured, probing questions by a well-trained interviewer usually in a face-to-face setting

Listening platform/post

an integrated system that monitors and analyzes social media sources to provide insights that will support marketing decision making

Purposed communities

online brand communities that can be used for research

Marketing Research Online Communities (MROCs)

purposed communities whose primary purpose is research

Theoretical sampling

selecting sample members based on earlier interviews that suggest that particular types of participants will help researchers better understand the research topic

Stratified purposive sampling

selecting sample members so that groups can be compared

Purposive sampling

selecting sample members to study because they possess attributes important to understanding the research topic

Sentment analysis/opinion mining

the application of technology tools to identify, extract, and quantify subject information in textual data

Sentence completion test

a projective technique where subjects are given a set of incomplete sentences and asked to complete them in their own words

Completion Techniques

-A person who wears Tommy Hilfilger shirts is _____. -When I think of Tommy Hilfilger shirts, I ______________.

Benefits of Observation

-Accuracy of recording actual behavior -Reduces may types of data collection -Provides detailed behavioral data

Goals of Quantitative Research

-Make accurate predictions about relationships between market factors and behaviors -Gain meaningful insights into relationships -Validate relationships Test hypotheses

Forms of Ethnography Research

-Participant observation -Nonparticipant observation

Phase 2 : Components

-Select a moderator and prepare guide -Begin the session -Introduce the first topic and continue -Close the session

Advantages of Focus Groups

-Stimulate new ideas, thoughts, ad feelings about a topic -Foster understanding of consumer behavior -Allow client participation -Elicit wide range of responses -Provide access to hard-to-reach participants

Quantitative

-Validation of facts, estimates, relationships -Descriptive and causal designs -Mostly structured -Good representation of target populations -Statistical, descriptive, causal predictions possible

Marketing Research in Action: Ethnography of News Usage

-What are two major differences between how you would obtain your news and how your parents would? -Do you feel overloaded with news facts and updates? -How has social networking impacted how you obtain and use news content?

Selecting the Observation Technique

-What types of behavior are relevant? -Are the behaviors complex? -How much detail must be recorded? -What is the most appropriate setting to observe the behavior?

Projective Techniques

-Word association tests -Sentence completion tests -Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET)

Netnography

a research technique that draws on ethnography but uses "found data" on the internet that is produced by virtual communities

Define focus groups and explain how to conduct them.

A face-to-face focus group is a small group of people (8 to 12) brought together for an interactive, spontaneous discussion. Focus groups can also be conducted online. The three phases of a focus group study are: -planning the study, -conducting the actual focus group discussions, & -analyzing and reporting the results. In the planning of a focus group, critical decisions have to be made regarding; -whether to conduct face-to-face or online focus groups, -who should participate, -how to select and recruit the appropriate participants, -what size the group should be, -what incentives to offer to encourage and reinforce participants' willingness and commitment to participate, and -where the group sessions should be held.

Focus Groups

A focus group is a formal process of bring a small group of people together for an interactive, spontaneous discussion *8-12 participants plus moderator *Session lasts 90 minutes - 2 hours *Respondents paid $40-$200 *Overall cost $2000-4000+

Focus group moderator

A person who is well trained in the interpersonal communications; listening, observing, and interpretive skills; and professional mannerisms and personality. His or her role in a session is to draw from the participants the best and most innovative ideas about an assigned topic or question.

Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET)

A visual research technique used in in-depth interviewing that encourages research participants to share emotional and subconscious reactions to a particular topic

Nonparticipant observation

An ethnographic research technique that involves extended contact with a natural setting, but without participation by the researcher

In-depth Intrview

An in-depth interview is a formal interview process in which a well-trained interviewer asks subject set of semi-structured questions in face-to-face setting

Understand in-depth interviewing and focus groups as questioning techniques.

An in-depth interview is a systematic process of asking a subject a set of semi-structured, probing questions in a face-to-face setting. Focus groups involve bringing a small group of people together for an interactive and spontaneous discussion of a particular topic or concept. While the success of in-depth interviewing depends heavily on the interpersonal communication and probing skills of the interviewer, success in focus group interviewing relies more on the group dynamics of the members, the willingness of members to engage in an interactive dialogue, and the moderator's abilities to keep the discussion on track. In-depth interviewing and focus groups are both guided by similar research objectives: (1) to provide data for defining and redefining marketing problem situations; (2) to provide data for better understanding the results from previously completed quantitative survey studies; (3) to reveal and understand consumers' hidden or unconscious needs, wants, attitudes, feelings, behaviors, perceptions, and motives regarding services, products, or practices; (4) to generate new ideas about products, services, or delivery methods; and (5) to discover new constructs and measurement methods.

Bulletin board

An online research format in which participants agree to post regularly over a period of four to five days

Ethnography

Ethnography is a form of qualitative data collection that records behavior in natural settings to understand how social and cultural influences affect individual behaviors and experiences

Identify the major differences between qualitative and quantitative research

In business problem situations where secondary information alone cannot answer management's questions, primary data must be collected and transformed into usable information. Researchers can choose between two general types of data collection methods: qualitative or quantitative. QUALITATIVE METHODS -May be used to generate exploratory, preliminary insights into decision problems or address complex consumer motivations that may be difficult to study with quantitative research. -Useful to understand the impact of culture or subculture on consumer decision making and to probe unconscious or hidden motivations that are not easy to access using quantitative research. -Qualitative researchers collect detailed amounts of data from relatively small samples by questioning or observing what people do and say. -These methods require the use of researchers well trained in interpersonal communication, observation, and interpretation. -Data typically are collected using open-ended or semi-structured questioning formats that allow for probing attitudes or behavior patterns or human/mechanical/electrical observation techniques for current behaviors or events. -While qualitative data can be collected quickly (except in ethnography), it requires good interpretative skills to transform data into useful findings. -The small nonrandom samples that are typically used make generalization to a larger population of interest questionable. QUANTITATIVE or survey research METHODS -Place heavy emphasis on using formal, structured questioning practices where the response options have been predetermined by the researcher. -These questions tend to be administered to large numbers of respondents. -Quantitative methods are directly related to descriptive and causal types of research projects where the objectives are either to make more accurate predictions about relationships between market factors and behaviors or to validate the existence of relationships. -Quantitative researchers are well trained in scale measurement, questionnaire design, sampling, and statistical data analyses.

Netnography

Netnography is a research technique that draws on ethnography but uses "found data" on the internet that is produced by virtual communities

BuzzMetrics

Nielsen's BuzzMetrics program can track trends and the data can be used to develop brand association maps like this one.

Discuss Purposed Communities and market research online communities (MROCs)

Observation methods can be used by researchers in all types of research designs (exploratory, descriptive, causal). The major benefits of observation are the accuracy of collecting data on actual behavior, reduction of confounding factors such as interviewer or respondent biases, and the amount of detailed behavioral data that can be recorded. The unique characteristics that underline observation data collection methods are their: (1) directness, (2) subject's awareness, (3) structure, and (4) observing mechanism. The unique limitations of observation methods are: -the lack of generalizability of the data, -inability to explain current behaviors or events, & -the complexity of observing the behavior.

Discuss observation methods and explain how they are used to collect primary data.

Observation methods can be used by researchers in all types of research designs (exploratory, descriptive, causal). The major benefits of observation are: -the accuracy of collecting data on actual behavior, reduction of confounding factors such as interviewer or respondent biases, and -the amount of detailed behavioral data that can be recorded. The unique characteristics that underline observation data collection methods are their (1) directness, (2) subject's awareness, (3) structure, and (4) observing mechanism. The unique limitations of observation methods are lack of generalizability of the data, inability to explain current behaviors or events, and the complexity of observing the behavior.

Quantitative Research

Quantitative research is research that places heavy emphasis on using formal standard questions and predetermined response options in questionnaires or surveys administered to large numbers of responders Qualitative research is research that relies on the collection of data in the form of text or images using open-ended questions, observation, or "found" data

Phase 1: Decisions

Participants -Who should be included? -How many groups should be held? -How will participants be recruited and screened ? Size Location

The Focus Group Process

Phase 1: Planning the Study Phase 2: Conducting the discussions Phase 3: Analyzing and reporting the results

Discuss the growing Field of social media monitoring.

Social media monitoring is observational research based on analyzing conversations in social media. It provides marketing researchers with a rich source of existing, authentic information from the "river of news" tat is being organically shared in social networks online. One strength of social media monitoring is that researchers can observe people interacting with each other unprompted by the potential bias of interviewers and questions.

Observation research

Systematic observation and recording of behavioral patterns of objects, people, events, and other phenomena

Debriefing analysis

The technique of comparing notes, thoughts, and feelings about a focus group discussion between the moderator, researcher, and sponsoring client immediately following the group interview.

Explain other qualitative data collection methods such as ethnography, case studies, netnography, projective techniques, and the ZMET.

There are several useful qualitative data collection methods other than in-depth interviews and focus groups. These methods include ethnography and case studies, which both involve extended contact with re¬ search settings. In netnography, qualitative researchers analyze text and images produced in online communities. Researchers may also use projective techniques such as word association tests, sentence completion tests, and the ZMET, which use indirect techniques to access consumers' feelings, emotions, and unconscious motivations. These techniques are less frequently used than are focus groups but are still considered useful approaches.

Moderator's guide

a detailed document that outlines the topics, questions, and subquestions that serve as the basis for generating the spontaneous interactive dialogue among the focus group participants

Projective technique

a family of qualitative data collection methods where subjects are asked to project themselves into specified buying situations and then asked questions about those situations.

Ethnography

a form of qualitative data collection that records behavior in natural settings to understand how social and cultural influences affect individuals' behaviors and experiences

Focus group research

a formalized qualitative data collection method for which data are collected from a small group of people who interactively and spontaneously discuss one particular topic or concept

Scanner-based panel

a group of participating households which have a unique bar-coded card as an identification characteristic for inclusion in the research study

Groupthink

a phenomenon in which one or two members of a group state an opinion and other members of the group are unduly influenced

Word association test

a projective technique in which the subject is presented with a list of words or short phrases, one at a time, and asked to respond with the first thought [word] that comes to mind

Participant observation

an ethnographic research technique that involves extended observation of behavior in natural settings in order to fully experience cultural or subcultural contexts

Case study

an exploratory research technique that intensively investigates one or several existing situations which are similar to the current problem/opportunity situation.

Consumer-generated media

blogs, bulletin boards, and social platforms

Quantitative research

data collection methods that emphasize using structured questioning practices where the response options have been predetermined by the researcher and administered to significantly large numbers of respondents

Social media monitoring

research based on conversations in social media

Qualitative research

research methods used in exploratory research designs where the main objective is to gain a variety of preliminary insights to discover and identify decision problems and opportunities

Mechanical/electronic observation

some type of mechanical or electronic device is used to capture human behavior, events, or marketing phenomena