The Handbook for Focus Group Research - Improve the Effectiveness of Your Focus Group and Your Marketing Skills

by Thomas L. Greenbaum, Roy Bostock (Foreword)

In 1992, over 100,000 focus groups were conducted in the United States. In an era when business survival depends on finding a market niche and pleasing the customer, focus groups are a vital method of testing new products, services, advertising, and packaging and an indispensable way to elicit attitudes, preferences, habits, and suggestions directly from the customer. Thomas L. Greenbaum has been a leader in focus group research for more than twenty years. Addressing organizations that hire focus group professionals, Greenbaum explains how to select and evaluate moderators and facilities, and how to control the costs of research. For marketers who conduct their own focus groups, he reviews the latest technology, including computer images and satellite videotransmissions, and explains how and when to use expressive drawing, conceptual mapping, laddering, and other innovative techniques to yield more and better information. Greenbaum predicts the number of focus groups will continue to surge, to perhaps 200,000 a year by the late 1990s. Current users of focus groups will rely more on qualitative research, he asserts, and many new users, including service firms, nonprofit organizations, and government agencies, will discover the value of focus groups. In addition to new clients and new techniques, the industry also faces new threats, including recruitment scams and lowered professional standards, that could undermine the credibility of all focus groups. Greenbaum guides clients and practitioners in meeting these challenges.

222 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 1993