Smarter Market Research: Stories (A Small Business Alternative to Focus Groups)
Following up to my last post: If it’s true that traditional market research has a bias towards answers given in the convention form, what’s that mean for your business?
Are conventions the ideal type of answer for those seeking insight into their customers’ behavior?
I think no. As the insightful commenter mentioned on Gladwell’s blog, conventions such as “It’s a good value” and “It tastes good” don’t really convey the complex set of factors that go into how we choose a brand—at least not anymore.
Conventions may have been adequate during the broadcast era, perhaps because large companies had been the first to identify and promote several of the “classic” forms of conventions in the way we know them today. It was easier for consumer products companies to fend off smaller niche competitors in this model.
You and I make modern brand choices under different circumstances. Froogle and similar services are drastically changing how can compare prices. Today’s buying decisions occur in an environment completely saturated with marketing messages. We’re processing much more information than during the peak of the broadcast area.
In today’s “narrowcast” market space, stories provide the richer information we need to stay competitive. In particular:
- Unexpected ways and reasons your customers are using your product/service
- Which factors are most persuasive to a particular market segment: perhaps a market segment you weren’t aware of
- What customizations users need to make in order to integrate your product/service into their existing frameworks
In many market spaces, stories are extremely useful for the front end of marketing. Stories relay well. They are compelling sales tools, especially when they demonstrate your understanding of a prospect’s problem. A good story will always beat a vague testimonial by the semi-anonymous John Doe of Long Island, C-level executive.
The downside is that stories seem more difficult to process. How will we put them into SPSS? How will we turn them into measurable goals? How do we rank these “complex” reasons?
The good news for the nimble venture: stories let you simplify, not complicate, your market research.
Gathering Stories
Because conventions are, well, conventional, they’re the kind of answer many of your customers will think you’re expecting. If they’ve ever been interviewed by a marketer, they’re anticipating you will ask them to rate items from “very important” to “not important”, or worse, to answer multiple-choice questions.
So there are some barriers to overcome. Step one, be clear. You’re looking to understand this customer. Make it personal. The more conversational your style, the more likely you are to have a real conversation.
A great way to get people talking is to vary the kind of questions that you’re asking. Remember “how, why, when, where, and who”? If at first a customer is giving one word or conventional answers, try coming at their experience from a different angle. Some people may give single-word answers to any question beginning with “what”, but “why” will really get them talking. Everyone has a different trigger. Once you find it, start taking notes!
Hearing Stories
This is important, and a particular reminder to people on the research side of marketing.
Once you have a story, before you do anything else, simply hear it. Don’t start highlighting words and putting them in databases just yet. You see, a large part of a story’s value is in their telling. They can excite. They can incite.
Carefully study your stories. Consider the decision-making techniques your customer uses. Think as if you’re participating in literary analysis. Who are the characters? What are their motivations? Identify actionable items as you go, but focus the majority of your observation skills on the complex, personal reasons your customer chooses your brand. Patterns will emerge, outside of and more complex than conventions. Maybe they’re chains of events that onramp towards choosing your product. Maybe they all include contact at a particular market presence point. Or maybe there’s a particular experience each of your users has that causes them to decide to switch from your competitor.
Ensure that the right decision makers see the right stories, at least in some form (maybe summarized and condensed in a digest with the other). Think of whom else you can pass it along to. Can it go in your newsletter? On your blog? Will this influence a prospect that sales with working with right now? (Don’t forget to follow up your interview with a thank you note to the customer, mention any changes you’ll be making as a result. Hearing and acknowledging good customer service activities on their own.)
Before it vanishes into the black void of a database, use the momentum of the right story to initiate some quick and creative improvement in your product and communication.