Article

Keeping customers in focus

Focus groups can offer specific information from potential users about whether they would approach a kiosk and what they perceive their benefits would be.

January 29, 2004

Not quite sure if your customers will use a product-location or job-search kiosk in the front of your store? Why not ask them. It seems logical that, before investing in self-service technology, companies would talk with the potential users to see if they would even approach a kiosk, let alone gain any benefits from it.

Surveys are one method for querying customers about kiosks. But the answers are one-dimensional and there is no opportunity to drill down on specific answers. Does the consumer dislike kiosks, or maybe does he not feel comfortable with technology? Does he feel the need to interact with humans? Does he not trust computers? Does he use ATMs or other pervasive self-service tools? Only focus groups with customers can hone in on these details.

Focus groups can help companies gain general information from users about whether they would use a kiosk and what their perceived benefits are. But companies do need to take a few things into consideration before moving forward with focus groups: they should be professionally done, they may need to be repeated in order to spot trends, and they're not inexpensive.

A focus group is live research. They typically consist of eight to 10 people brought together at a designated time and place and asked targeted questions by a professional moderator. Focus groups typically last for two hours per session. The subjects are specially recruited and paid for their time.

What's Important Focus groups let companies drill down on participants' answers with follow-up questions. Focus groups should be performed by third-party professionals. Each focus group can cost between $4,000 and $6,000, and there may be need for more than one session.

What focus groups offer

Francie Mendelsohn, president of Summit Research Associates, will this month engage in focus groups for a new kiosk system that will offer information about veterans of World War II. The four-kiosk system will be unveiled in Washington on May 29. But first, Mendelsohn wants to make sure the kiosk will be accessible and easy to use for its main audience.

"We need to get the `greatest generation' to use this kiosk. How will they react to it? We don't know until we watch them," Mendelsohn said. The system will be tested at a large retirement community and at a center focusing on accessibility for the disabled.

Mendelsohn explained that the first field test this month is not officially a focus group, in that the users will not be "sitting around talking." She said it is probably more appropriately called "usability testing." Participants will be invited to use the kiosk to look up names of WWII vets and those who contributed to the war effort on the homefront. The unit will be located in the lobby of their retirement community clubhouse.

A follow-on focus group at a center providing accessibility for the disabled will look for compliance with Section 508 disability laws. Mendelsohn said her organization and others involved in the kiosk project will take volunteers one at a time to the kiosk to test the application.

Volunteers will consist of center staff, members of the visually impaired community and federal employees who helped write the Section 508 legislation.

Participants will be given just enough instruction to get started, along with some specific veterans' names to locate on the kiosk. The purpose of this test is to make sure the users are able to access the information successfully and without outside assistance.

Paying the pros

Amy O'Connell, senior project director at Shugoll Research, a professional research firm that develops and conducts focus groups, said focus groups like those being planned for the WWII project can find a lot of valuable information.

"You can get below the surface to thoughts and feelings. It offers the opportunity to keep asking follow-up questions, like, `I saw you rated this a nine on a scale of one to 10. Why is that,'" she said. "You can find out the role of technology in their lives beyond kiosks. You can dive in and bore down to underlying factors."

The other benefit of focus groups, O'Connell notes, is that companies can pick and choose with whom they want to speak.

"They can have us recruit people who are early technology adopters, to ask if the technology appears ahead of the curve, or even middle-of-the-road users or technology laggards, depending on what the client needs to know."

O'Connell said it is important that companies use a professional firm such as Shugoll to do this legwork and the following focus groups. She reasoned that a third party is not close to the concept and has no investment in the findings.

Plus, researchers have experience in other categories and can borrow from that experience. Shugoll has researched the banking and retail environments, for instance, and that knowledge could come into play with developing questions about kiosks.

The role of the professional moderator is to break the ice in the early stages of the group, steer the questions and keep strong personalities in line.

Sometimes it is difficult to know how to get to the participants' underlying opinions. "If we get stuck because the participants aren't cooperating, we can move into role playing or story telling. We have techniques in our back pocket. If researching is not your main job, you may have a stilted script that you stick to," she said.

"You may only get one shot at talking to these people. It's live research. You have to maximize your time."

Especially with the costs involved in focus groups. Expenses include room rental, audio and video taping, paying the moderator's time, feeding the participants a light meal and paying the honorariums. O'Connell said it can cost between $4,000 and $6,000 to plan for a 12-person focus group. Eight to 10 people usually show up.

O'Connell suggests that companies conduct at least two focus groups on the same topic so they can spot any patterns more easily.

Factors that professionals cannot control that will render focus groups ineffective include bad weather on the scheduled day, and equipment that malfunctions during a demonstration.

One on one

O'Connell said that since technology usage is such a personal topic, companies might be wise to opt for one-on-one customer interviews before focus groups. One-on-one interviews are run similarly, but generally last 30 minutes each.

"People adopt technology on an individual basis. Heavy technology users can steer the conversation in a group setting," she warned.

"Focus groups are great for brainstorming new ideas and new applications. If the objective is to get feedback on a specific product or technology, though, we recommend one on one."

The research methods can be combined for gaining general information on what consumers like about a kiosk, what the perceived benefit is, and where they would use a kiosk.

Going it alone

Amy Garland, marketing manager at Healthnotes, said her company uses informal focus groups in-house to test software build-outs or new applications.

"We test products on our extended family; the accounting department, the sales team, significant others, local retailers. We have them play with the technology and offer candid feedback." Healthnotes once took an alpha version of a new application for pharmacies to a conference.

"Sometimes an application makes sense to us, but we learn a lot when we turn it loose to others." Garland said Healthnotes has considered formal focus groups, but noted that the cost is prohibitive.

"They really should be run by a third party to have that controlled environment. If the group is not structured properly, it's too easy to sway the group."

Mendelsohn agreed. "If you are testing technology in your own office and you are a technology company, chance are those users are already tech savvy. That's not necessarily the customer you need to reach."