Once upon a time, a financial services company asked us to research high net worth individuals.
Our prospective client wanted in-person focus groups -- which
probably explained why they aggressively rejected our concerns
that only atypical millionaires are willing to fight traffic,
directions and parking so as to sit in front of strangers (as
well as one-way mirror, bright lights, hidden microphones) --
all to discuss personal finances, a topic many respondents find
harder to discuss than sex, all in exchange for small wages.
In other words? We had found the boundary of traditional
qualitative research. In further words? Soon thereafter,
a group of us (experienced market researchers and members of
QRCA, ESOMAR, AQR, as well as client side researchers) turned
to web conferencing for a new approach to qualitative research.
Namely, Channel M2 is an innovative field service offering recruiting
and virtual interview rooms that are people-friendly (millionaires
will always be a hard recruit – but less so if they can
be interviewed in their chosen venue via a web cam), user-friendly
(if you are online, you can M2), saves time (if you wish, do
more interviews per day), saves money (eliminate travel, videoconferencing,
and video taping costs) and produces improved data (more geographically
representative respondents, engages all 3 learning styles).
M2 provides the rich communication and collaboration tools available via in-person interviewing – but with a face and voice that online research has been missing.
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