I've been arguing against the validity of focus groups for some time now and I'm certainly not alone. They are not effective tools for innovation, insight generation or validation. But now they are outright dangerous.
Focus groups lend themselves to being gamed. We saw it very early in the dot com boom where the same people would show up regardless of how you worded the screener. It didn't matter which firm you used, or whether you wanted someone with 1 year of experience online, 3 years of experience or a PhD in computer science. Marla and Jim would be in the submitted names. They were professional focus groupers and had registered with every research house in town.
So the market reacted and higher end houses worked to identify and screen these people out. But now a new variation appears to be at play. One where cheating the marketers is not only the order of the day, it's a business.
A friend of mine loves focus groups. Let's call him Dan. As an actor, focus groups allow him to make some easy cash between gigs. The other day I met Dan for lunch and he informed me that he had a focus group to attend after our meal. Nothing unusual.
What was unusual was he had notes. While we were waiting for the bill he was studying them quite intently. I was quite perplexed and asked him what the notes were for. He smiled awkwardly and said he had to be a gay man between jobs with two kids from a previous divorce. He was trying to memorize his previous work history and his views on dating sites. My jaw hit the table.
His recruiter didn't call with a screener. His recruiter called with briefing notes on who he was to "become" for the session.
I pity the marketer still using focus groups. It's only going to get worse.
Image Source: Oliver Ingrouille
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