Here’s a challenge… This client wants to grow. They wanted to launch a new service aimed at small and medium businesses. They had £20K to spend on research, and they needed Qual and Quant research, done to a standard where they could be confident that they should launch their service, and what it should look like…
Qual Street and Structural Thinking worked out a method that included four group discussions with small business decision makers, an on-line post task blog (where participants surveyed their own staff about the ideas they’d explored in the groups), then we followed up with an on-line survey of 500 small business owners…all for £20K
Together, client and agency, we invested in some great stimulus for this project. The idea was to get stimulus as close as possible to the real thing, so that respondents could give us ‘real’ responses. So Harp from Studio HB designed a mailer which described to the concept – and really looked like a mail drop.
Our client was really flexible too, so they let us video them describing the benefits of the new idea – like the kind of Q&A you would get from a sales person.
Once we had great stimulus (and all done for very little expense) we were ready to go…
Most qual groups are considered a success when there’s plenty of chat. But in these groups we had 30 mins of complete silence. Kath got respondents writing detailed information about their reaction to the new product idea. It was worth it. We got really strong, considered individual responses. Our concept was a ‘system 2’ idea – not something you’d sign up to straight away, so giving time and space to think about the concept paid dividends.
After specific responses, Kath brought the group together to build and develop thinking – because conversation truly is a powerful, creative tool…
Individual responses and group builds – the right way to squeeze out insight.
Decisions don’t get made a vacuum in businesses, so Kath asked the respondents from the groups to take the idea back to their businesses and canvass wider opinions. Feedback from the companies’ workforces was then recorded on a bulletin board, so the conversation kept going after the group – and broadened it out too.
Kath took what we learned from the qual stages to help with Structural Thinking’s questionnaire design, and we spend time writing the debrief together so that our outputs were fully integrated. The quantitative part of the project provided the most vital business outputs: the numbers to help the client have confidence in the launch of their offer. So the qual did a classic ‘inductive’ job to build the theories and the quant validated them…h3.
You can get the business insight you need within budget with creative, joined up thinking with other team mates.
I love love learning and so I invest time and resources into exploring social psychology, neuro science, creativity and new techniques in research. Read all about it and help yourself to the ideas that will deliver your business the insight it needs
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If you want to chat to Kath about a project
or some ‘free thinking’ call her on 07738 180 529.
Alternatively you can email kath@qual-street.co.uk
Business address for formal correspondence is
Gresham House, 5-7 St Pauls Street, Leeds, LS1 2JG
Company registration no: 8359749