Navigating the challenges of focus groups

Focus groups are a great way to drill down into understanding the “why” behind stakeholder views. They can help to obtain qualitative insights to back quantitative results collected through surveys and polls. But focus groups have their own set of challenges, especially when Covid is forcing them to be held virtually.

Challenge 1: Recruitment

Recruiting participants is about communication and timing. How will you reach the people you need to hear from? How will you ensure a representative sample? How will you schedule your sessions to cater for different work and family demands? For a face-to-face focus group, most practitioners agree than 8-10 people is a good number but in the virtual world, 6-8 people is a more manageable number. Facilitating a discussion via Zoom is not the same as a discussion where the participants are seated next to each other. And just like with face-to-face sessions, you will inevitably have people pull out last minute and not show up so always recruit a few more for each session than you’d like, just to be safe.

Challenge 2: Timing

It used to be the case that to engage a representative sample, you needed to host a lot of after-hours sessions. You had to allow people who worked 9-5 to get home, prepare dinner, sort out childcare and travel to a venue.

In our post-Covid world, more people are working from home so you would think it would be even easier to get people to show up – especially when it’s an online session. Wrong! There is actually no simple solution to this one. I recently held two online focus groups – one at 6.30pm and one at 10am and only half of the evening participants showed up but all my 10am participants logged on. I would have put money on it being the other way. It just goes to show that taking time out of someone’s evening is still considered much more valuable than taking time out of their day which leads me to the next challenge.

Challenge 3: Incentives

Traditionally, incentives have been used to help coax participants into focus groups, offering them some small compensation for their time. It doesn’t always guarantee they will show up but incentives definitely increase participation rates. Incentives can be in the form of a gift card or voucher and while it can come down to budget, $60-$100 for 1.5-2 hours is considered a fair compensation for someone’s time. Sometimes budgets don’t allow for incentives but what you need to weigh up is the implications to your project if people don’t show up. It may work out just as costly if you need to do more research because your focus group sample was too small.

Challenge 4: Sample bias

Of course, you don’t always need incentives. There are people who will rock up for nothing more than instant coffee and some Arnott’s Assorted if it means they can talk about an issue or topic they are passionate about. The problem is, if you only recruit stakeholders who are already engaged in the issue, it can skew your sample and the resulting discussion. Incentives can draw out the less engaged members of a community and round out your sample so it’s more reflective of the broader population.

Challenge 5: Participation rates

There is simply no guarantee that every participant you have confirmed will show up to a focus group session – incentives or no. The more courteous participants might email or call to let you know something came up but the majority will just “ghost” you. As a facilitator, I try and speak to every participant before the session especially when we’re using an online meeting platform. I find it helps to introduce myself, see if they have any questions, check their level of skill with the chosen technology and brief them on what’s expected. I follow up with an email with all the information because if I’ve caught them while driving or out at the shops, chances are they will forget everything I said on the phone.

Challenge 6: Presenting the results

While focus group discussions are usually de-identified when reported to clients, there is still sometimes a request to see photos as “proof” the discussion took place. In a face-to-face focus group, it can be easy to take photos from angles that show the facilitator’s face while masking the identities of participants. Using an online platform is more tricky.

This year, we have all become familiar with the Brady Bunch-style screen shot showing a grid of faces looking into webcams and phone cameras. How then to take a screenshot of your participants and protect their identities? The answer is, you can give your client a grid of blurred-out faces or you decline. Anonymity should mean what it says and as a facilitator, you need to take that to heart. While we all love a good photo to break up a text-heavy report, never do it in an unethical manner.

Thinking about using focus groups for your next engagement project? Give our team a call.

Alysia Norris, Senior Communications and Engagement Consultant