The Fallacy of Focus Groups

Another headline ripped out of Harry Beckwith's Selling the Invisible. If you have read any of my other posts, you know I am in my annual re-read of one of my top five favorite books of all time. Thanks again Harry!

The idea of a focus group seems solid. Gather a group of consumers. Show them your brilliant idea. Let them tell you why it will never work, never sell, never go anywhere.

There are several well known problems with focus groups.

• A dominant personality can overshadow others in the group. There goes the group feedback.
• Focus groups are conducted in an artificial environment which can make it difficult to extrapolate the results into the real world.
• Forward thinking is not a strong suit for focus groups. To my knowledge, no significant new product or service has ever been championed by a focus group. In fact I shudder to think the ideas that have been mauled to death by a focus group.

Which brings me to Dan Conetta. Dan is an individual who has greatly influenced my thinking over the previous 30 years.

I was working for Dan in the convenience store business 30 years ago as a merchandiser. I was young and anxious to make a good impression. So almost everyday I would visit the competition and see what new products they were rolling out. "Dan - 7-11 is trying a deli at the the store on 49th Avenue." "Dan - Stop and Go has an ATM at their beach location." I am fairly certain I was wearing him out when he called me into his office one day.

He wanted to know why I was so obsessed and spending so much time watching the competition. I told him I was looking for good ideas for our stores. Revenue generators!

And to this day I remember what he taught me. Jeff - you are playing follow the leader. Just because the competition does something does't mean that we should. The danger of playing follow the leader - what if the leader is an idiot? The companies you are following are a lot bigger than we are. They can afford to make mistakes that we can't.

You are a smart guy. Wouldn't you rather succeed or fail based on programs you developed, rather than copying someone who may be an idiot? There is nothing wrong with failure, as long as you learn from it and don;t make the same mistake twice.

Why don't you channel this energy in a new direction. Let's focus on the following the customer. See how they behave and then develop our own products and services based on their behavior - not the competition.

"The very best marketing comes from observing consumer behavior and inserting your message into their behavior."

This approach has worked for thirty years and it appears it is still working. Focus on the consumer's behavior.  I think I will stick with it.