Exercise #4 Scenario:

At Fedex, executives count on the voice of the consumer to guide decision-making about new services. Fedex conducts extensive consumer research before adding a new service, and they tend to prefer the open-ended, creative feedback gained from qualitative research techniques like focus groups, to the structured feedback from large-scale quantitative surveys. Two months ago, you were hired by Fedex as their marketing research manager. Your new boss, the marketing VP, has asked you to pull together a plan for qualitative research to explore the unmet needs of loyal Fedex users, hoping to identify potential new service ideas.

1. What are 3 advantages you observed of a face-to-face focus group versus online?

2. What are 3 advantages you observed of an online focus group versus face-to-face?

3. What are 3 situations when qualitative research like focus groups should not be used?

CRITICAL THINKING:

1.Based on this information, other than focus groups, what is another qualitative research method you would recommend to your boss? Describe the method and why it is a good choice given the research objective. Be sure to support your information with specific examples and observations.