The more you understand about someone, the more you can connect with them. When a non-profit organization truly understands what makes their target market tick, that organization has a much greater chance of pulling in new donors, cutting down on donor turnover, and developing them into loyal supporters. One excellent way of understanding donors is through focus group marketing research.
Focus groups delve deeply into people's thoughts and feelings.
While survey research can answer the question of how many , focus groups do more to answer the questions of how and why . Through focus groups you won't find out how many people are loyal to your organization, you'll learn what causes loyalty to develop. You can't predict the response rate of a particular prospect mailing, but you can explore how that mailing will be received and interpreted, what it makes recipients think about your organization, and what changes are necessary to clearly communicate your message in a way which will get response. Done properly, focus groups can be one of the most rewarding and important investments an organization can make to gather knowledge and understanding. But they also have the potential to become a nightmare of missed opportunities, unexpected costs, and vendor management headaches.