Marketing

Ethnographic market research

Ethnography is the study of human behaviour in its most natural and typical context

The study of human behavior in its most natural and normal setting is known as ethnography. Researchers in anthropology have long employed ethnographic methods to better understand different civilizations. Marketers are now altering their strategies to assist them create better products and services for customers.

When to use it

● To gain a thorough understanding of how customers utilize your products or services in order to enhance them.
● To uncover unmet consumer demands in order to more effectively innovate.

Origins

The term "ethnography" was coined by Gerhard Friedrich Müller, a history and geography professor who developed it as a methodology while on an expedition to Kamchatka (1733–43). For many years, ethnography had been recognized as a method of doing research on organizations in the field of management, but it wasn't until the early 1990s that these approaches were used to consumer research.

Understanding why customers make the decisions they do is at the heart of marketing. Marketers have typically depended on surveys and focus groups to get this data, assuming that if people are probed and asked in the correct way, they will provide helpful information. Unfortunately, reality is more complicated, and people aren't always able to explain why they act the way they do, nor are they always aware of what they desire. To address this issue, marketers realized that they needed to go much closer to their target clients and engage in participant observation.

These new methods began to offer significant new information about customer behavior. Academics and marketing consultancies picked them up in the 1990s, and they are now a typical part of the market research toolset.

What it is

Ethnographers are taught to watch and interpret what they see, with the purpose of providing a detailed, in-depth depiction of everyday life and practice. They acquire a 'insider's point of view' by purposefully immersing themselves in the setting they are researching, which is typically very different from what an outsider might develop.

In terms of market research, ethnography entails seeing customers in their natural habitat. If you work for a breakfast cereal company, for example, having breakfast with a family and watching how the kids chose and mix their cereals, as well as their parents' reactions, might provide you valuable insight into how you might position that product in the future. Ethnographic market research can be done to learn more about how existing products and services are used, as well as to identify potential breakthrough developments.

How to use it

For ethnographic techniques to work properly, the market researcher (that is, the ethnographer) should have the same role as the consumer. One way to achieve this is to recruit consumers to become ethnographers – you recruit them to take part in the study, and you train them to record their observations about a purchase decision, their thoughts and feelings at the time, and so on. This is not easy to do for an untrained person, but the benefit is that the researcher is an actual consumer, so his or her experience is exactly what you want to study.

The market researcher (that is, the ethnographer) should play the same role as the consumer for ethnographic approaches to work well. One way to accomplish this is to train consumers to be ethnographers - you recruit them to participate in the study and then instruct them to record their observations about a purchase decision, their thoughts and feelings at the time, and so on. This is difficult for an unskilled person to perform, but the advantage is that the researcher is a real consumer, so his or her experience is exactly what you're looking for.

Because the researchers must spend time acculturating themselves into the setting they are investigating before acquiring the trust of individuals around them, a full anthropological study can take months. Many businesses, however, employ a simplified version of the strategy that provides many of the same benefits and can be implemented in a couple of weeks. The following are the important components:

● Define the consumer groups you're interested in, as well as the aspects of their lives as consumers you'd like to learn more about. Consumers, for example, may be deciding whether things to buy at a store, a family waiting at an airport, or a couple deciding which financial savings product to purchase.
● Determine the best times and locations for you to observe them. This is self-evident in the store and airport scenarios. However, listening in on a couple's discussions regarding financial savings products is difficult. You might wish to join in on their dinnertime talks, for example.
● Take notes, record replies to contextual interviews, and use videos and diagrams as needed to collect a variety of qualitative data.
● Conduct a systematic examination, searching for patterns of behavior, inconsistencies (when a client says one thing but does another), and cultural features of the customer segment under investigation.

Top practical tip

EEthnographic market research is difficult to do successfully, and it can be stressful because so much time is 'wasted.' The most beneficial insights can be received in a matter of seconds, but you never know when they will appear.

If you're doing an ethnographic study, the first rule is to be patient: instead of jumping to conclusions, take your time getting to know the people who will be participating in the study. Second, be considerate to their desires. They will be pleased to have you around at times, and they will consider you an annoyance at other times. So plan ahead, make sure they feel at ease around you, and figure out how to get them talking and acting spontaneously. That's when the valuable information begins to emerge.

Top pitfall

The most difficult aspect of ethnographic market research is suspending your preexisting notions and judgments. We have a preconceived picture of how a product or service is utilized or why people purchase it. This may be mostly right, but the goal of this exercise is to find evidence that contradicts your current ideas. You must master non-directive interviewing so that you do not unintentionally 'lead' participants to the outcomes you desire, and you must actively seek out facts or insights that contradict your assumptions.