When conducting a bulletin board focus group, engaging participants is a breeze compared to engaging clients. This week a researcher asked us what strategies we had developed for engaging clients in a bulletin board focus group.
We came up with three ideas off the top of our heads:
- Send teaser highlight reports of provocative respondent posts.
- Schedule daily conference calls to discuss the boards and if any change in direction is needed.
- Design the discussion guide to require client input by leaving it blank on the last day “to be filled in with additional questions raised in the discussion.”
We hear from a lot of researchers who really don’t want their clients engaged. Some researchers are of the opinion that engaged clients tend to muck up the works. However, if you are a researcher (or client) who wants clients engaged, do you have additional tips, tricks or techniques to share?