Costing a Qualitative Project: Four Key Factors That Impact Price

Let’s be honest. There is no such thing as a standard qualitative bid. Each project is unique and complex, with many variables to consider. However, understanding those variables, and how they impact price, can help you better design research projects that meet your budget constraints and minimize surprises. Here are four factors to consider:

1. Recruiting. The more participants you recruit, the greater the cost. Qualitative research is directional. Therefore, a large sample size is simply not needed. We recommend 6-8 respondents per key segment for most projects. To ensure that you end up with the number of respondents you want, we recommend over-recruiting by 20%.

2. Incentives. Three things influence incentives: 1) the difficulty of the recruit. The harder it is to find participants, the more you need to pay to make sure they show up. 2) the respondent’s time commitment. Do you need them for 30-minutes, two hours, or two weeks? 3) the location of the research. Do they need to drive downtown and pay for parking? Or can they be at home on the couch in their sweats?

3. Location Fees. Time is King. The more time you spend in a facility, or licensing a technology platform, the greater the cost. Determine in advance how much time you will need to accomplish your goals and set the length of the research sessions accordingly.

4. Professional Fees. Professional fees can account for 50%+ of a project’s cost. Professional fees generally include discussion guide development, project management, moderation, and a final deliverable. If you have the budget, consider hiring a full-service research firm. If you don’t, and you have staff who can learn to handle some of the professional tasks, consider hiring a coach for your first project to teach you best practices and help you optimize the success of your project

Five Tips for Better Research

1. Become your competitors’ good customer. Eat their pizza. Install their app. Test drive or rent their cars. Understanding your competitor makes you instantly sharper about what distinctions and benefits you should be promoting.

2. Establish realistic screening requirements to get the most out of your qualitative research. Identify the essential criteria needed to meet objectives and avoid those "needles in a haystack" that are time-consuming and expensive to find.

3. Think tech. With participants recruited for online studies, no travel is needed, results are provided faster, and you can easily recruit nationwide in a single study.

4. Sometimes a qual recruit can’t be completed without a list, but the challenges can be daunting. Consider: the accuracy of the list, the type of contact, and the size of the list. With careful preparation, planning, and patience, you can still have a successful recruit!

5. If you’re putting anything less than 30% of your project muscle into the design stage, securing the foundation of the project, you may be wasting your valuable time and research dollars. What fills that 30% proportion of time? Planning for success.