Real-time online focus groups are a great way to quickly and economically solicit respondent input. Responses tend to be brief, however, because of the 90-minute format. And, it is generally recommended that the size of real-time, online groups be limited to 6 to 8 respondents. Respondents check into the forum several times a day over the course of a number of days. The moderator posts new questions to the forum each day.
Visual stimuli can also be uploaded to the site for respondent evaluation.
This approach typically leads to a transcript of 100 pages or more, full of rich material for insight mining. To get an idea of how this works, take a look at a demonstration Brainchild Forum we conducted for Guardian Angel. The respondents were all MBA students at The Sloan School of Management at NYU who agreed to help evaluate a new product that allows people to assess whether they've consumed too much alcohol to drive. Call today for information and pricing on The Brainchild Forum.