Internet has taken the world under its control in many aspects and in the marketing world; it plays a vital role these days. Through online, the marketing people get informative opinions on their products and services. An online focus group is the group of people who give honest opinion on the research. A focus group is a qualitative research through which a set of people are asked about the opinion towards a product or service, concept or ideas, advertisement and packaging.



A market research through online focus groups acts as an important tool to get the feedback about new products and with other topics also. In earlier days these focus groups were known as Traditional focus groups. When people meet each other in person, they are screened before getting into the group. Usually they are about six to ten members in a group with a moderator and their sessions last more than one to two hours. As the discussion is not structured, the moderator encourages the group to come up with their own ideas and thoughts. A video camera records the full discussion for future reference. Focus groups are into many types and they are as follows:

Two way focus groups - In this, one focus group watch and another focus group

discuss.

Dual moderator focus groups - One moderator will help in progressing the session smoothly and the other will look whether all the topics have been covered.

Dueling moderator focus groups - Two moderators will take opposite positions in the discussion purposely.

Respondent moderator focus groups - Sometimes one or more respondents from the group will be asked to act like a moderator temporarily.

Client participant focus groups - Sometimes clients participate as representatives in the discussion, either secretly or openly.

Mini focus groups - Minimum number of members will be available in the

discussion.

Teleconference focus groups - Group members discuss the topic through telephonic conference.

Online focus groups - Group members will interact through computer and internet.

Nowadays these are done through online with the advent of internet where the response will be immediate. The online focus group will be a real time interaction within the group of people. Generally the group will consist of eight to ten participants and a moderator will be available with them. Through this type of groups, the travel expenses and time can be avoided. They are much faster compared to traditional groups.

But online focus groups have some disadvantages too:

The researcher will have less control over the group, so that time will be wasted due to irrelevant issues on the topic.

The moderators must be trained highly.

Groups might be quite variable and it is tough to get them together.

Due to minimum number of members in a group, the figure doesn't represent the whole population.

Even though the online focus groups have some disadvantages, they help the companies in their market research. Some of the companies do market research through online focus groups as they explore their thoughts and ideas, creative stimulation on the decision about the product, a reality check on the proposed path, get to know more about the customers' thoughts which help to respond with them better. Thus online focus group helps the company in many ways.