Worst of times, best of groups

Undoubtedly, we are living through trying times and experiencing a lethal mix of health scare, economic doom, nerve wrecking uncertainty all of which has made us realize our fragility and vulnerability. But as they say, even the darkest clouds have a silver lining. In these days of gloom and doom we are observing a few behavioral shifts which are certainly bringing a bit of joy to us. Some of these e.g. community bonding, altruistic inclinations, are the big ones and are likely to have a deep impact on life and society. Some are seemingly small shifts such as acquiring a new skill, following a healthier regime, will hopefully bring about a positive change to people’s lifestyles in the future.

One such change is the way people are engaging with research! A couple of years back I had written an article in Research World about the challenges of engaging people with research in an age when attention spans are shrinking faster than the speed of light. And now I am going to write that in the midst of all this gloom and doom, consumer engagement with research has unexpectedly increased, at least when viewed through a Qualitative research lens. That is, to my mind, a silver lining, however thin, in these dark days.

New moms online

Face to face focus groups with brand new mothers has always been problematic for us. I know many of my colleagues look forward to researching baby care products and baby food as they find talking about babies with moms cute and adorable. But they develop cold feet when they realize how difficult it is for the recruitment team to bring the mothers to the group facility. Convincing new mothers to participate in a focus group in a group facility is a tough job. Luring them by offering baby-sitting services sometimes worked. In India, till COVID struck, online groups were unimaginable and neither clients nor agency seriously thought of online groups seriously.

 When one of our clients wanted us to improvise and polish a baby care range concept with new mothers during the lockdown period, we were not sure whether to be happy or worried. Soon we realized that we have less to worry about as we didn’t have to convince them to part with their babies to attend a group as the only option that we now had was an online group. Within a week, the recruitment team was able to convene an online group with new moms. The group which was planned for the regular 1.5 hr ran for nearly 3hrs without the mothers checking their phones or watches. They chatted, listened to each other, critiqued the concepts, gave ideas for improvement and thoughts for future work. The fact that they were at home along with their babies gave them a sense of security and comfort which they miss in a facility. The mothers sat on their beds holding their babies with one arm, putting them to sleep when required, grabbing a cup of tea, munching snacks while being fully engaged with the conversation on their laptop or phone screens. At times they would switch off their webcam as they had to feed the babies, but at no point did they disconnected the audio to take a pause from the ongoing conversation. I couldn’t remember seeing a group of mothers so relaxed and so eager to participate in the discussion and contributing so enthusiastically. The client who was observing the group without being visible to the participants was convinced that online groups work better with new moms and even when the country unlocks itself he would insist on online groups only for this target group.

More attention from Gen Z

Gen Z poses a different problem; they are easy to access but hard to engage with. They are notorious for their short attention spans, and moderators anywhere in the world will vouch for the frustration they have as they tried their best to hold their ‘now there, now gone’ attention. Our online experience with GenZ in these times was completely different! We were conducting a series of workshops with GenZ to help a client develop a communication for one of their confectionery products. We had planned for 2.5 to 3hr session (with breaks of course) as it required the participants to create communication ideas. The sessions lasted for more than 4 hours and gave us some rich insights about their lives, their honest views of people around them, their love and hatred for brands and some truly inspiring creative ideas. What made the Gen Z behave so differently? I would attribute it to the general feeling of ennui that they are experiencing in life in the lockdown period. The workshop gave them an opportunity to interact with people outside of their everyday social network; it stimulated their minds, made them think about themselves and allowed them to leverage their creative instincts. What more can one want in these dry and dull days!

Going forward

So what do we take away from this? Going forward online should become the first option to connect with consumers in Qualitative studies unless it is not possible as they may not have access to internet or ‘experiencing/evaluating’ a product is a key objective of the study. In such situations, of course, only a physical connection would work. In countries like India where internet penetration is high and yet online groups were never considered till the lockdown happened, it has been an eye opener for the research fraternity, and I am quite sure that we will see a big shift to online in the post lockdown period. Difficult target groups like new moms and GenZs are best suited for online research as are other difficult segments like high net worth individuals.

It may be argued that in the post lock down period the participants will not be as enthusiastic to talk and invest as much time as they are doing right now. And that is right, it will not be the same certainly. But online will also allow us the flexibility to conduct groups at unusual hours which suit the participants. Gen Z participants told us that they will be happy to be part of online research from ten in the evening to anytime beyond midnight as it is their social media time.

We have already planned that, post lockdown, our GenZ groups will be over a pizza, chocolate mousse and wine dinner (delivered to participants by online food delivery service providers!) starting at 10pm with no fixed closing time!