Whether it's to hear how customers react to a new product, to check employees' pulse after an internal crisis, or to gauge community opinion of pending legislation, surveying
can be a PR person's best friend. In this article, we look at several research tools marketing communications professionals can use to measure opinion and refine a message.
Keeping in mind that nearly all surveys - i.e., focus groups, direct mail surveys, phone surveys - are essentially exploratory, PR professionals that we spoke to said that cost
and time constraints often play into their decisions about what types of methods to use and how much weight to give the responses.
"It's tempting to run with the findings of a focus group and say the rest of the world feels the same way," says Bruce Jeffries-Fox, director of PR at AT&T. "But it's
using them inappropriately."
Nearly all of the people we surveyed stressed using a combination of methods to attain qualitative and quantitative responses. Here's what they're using:
Focus Groups
Cost:
$40-$50 for each participant
$750-$1,000 for the recruiter
$500 for the facility
$3,500 - $4,500 to develop the discussion guide and do the analysis.
(Based on an eight-member group, the cost per-person would be around $700.)
Benefits: Can get qualitative and emotional data.
Challenges: Relatively expensive if third-party surveying is used. Typically
no more than 10 people can participate at a time.
Telephone Surveys
Cost: $385 per-person for 100 people to be interviewed for approximately
five minutes.
Response Rates: 10% to 30%
Benefits: It's difficult to actually get people on the phone, but once
you do, the chance of them providing feedback is much higher than direct mail.
Challenges: Costly and time consuming.
Direct Mail Surveys
Cost: $350 per person for 100 people for a five-minute survey. Cost
includes printing, postage and data entry.
Response Rates: 3% to 15%
Benefits: Can hit people many times to get a response.
Challenges: Small percent of those who receive mail participate in the
survey and analysis turn-around is long, sometimes six months.
Online Surveys
Cost: $39 per person for 100 people for a five-minute survey.
Response Rates: 15% to 25%
Benefits: Low cost and higher response rates.
Challenges: Respondents may misrepresent themselves. You need to "pull"
the audience to your survey (see PRN, Feb. 28.)
Sources: Priya Souza, manager, marketing & ebusiness communications for North American distribution, Merisel, Inc., 416/240-7012; Doug Magee, VP of research for MGA
Communications, 303/298-1818; Bruce Jeffries-Fox, AT&T, 908/221-8191)
Focus Group Follies
One of the pitfalls of focus groups, according to industry experts, is the lurking of "professional respondents" whose primary objective is to secure the cash incentive, not to
offer their feelings about the issue on the table. You can keep them out by making sure that you or your third-party surveyor ask a few pointed questions during the screening
process of the potential facilitators. Some examples are:
- When was the last time the respondent participated in a group? It should be at least six months ago.
- Does the facility keep track of what the respondent last participated in? Professional respondents are slippery devils, often participating in many groups hosted by a single
facility.
(Barbara Klein Womack, director, Research Engine, 412/471-5400.)