Insight Library

A collection of practical, no-nonsense guidance on getting clearer, faster, more useful insight.

Most research advice is either too technical or too simplistic.

This library is different. It’s a set of short, practical notes based on decades of real projects — written to help marketers make better research decisions without spending more money or adding more complexity.

We cover when to use focus groups, when to switch to surveys, how to recruit properly qualified participants, how to design questions people actually want to answer, how to manage fieldwork, and how to get deeper, clearer results.

Everything here is written to be useful — whether you work in Marketing, Innovation, NPD, Category, or Insight.

1. When to use focus groups vs surveys

How to choose the right approach - and avoid wasting time or budget

2. Recruitment & participant quality

Getting the right people, not the people who know how to qualify

3. Questionnaire design

The biggest driver of insight quality — and the most overlooked.

4. Fieldwork management

Making sure good research stays good throughout fieldwork.

  • Why survey speed matters — and what slow surveys signal (Coming soon)

  • Spotting poor-quality responses early (Coming soon)

  • How to avoid bias creeping in during fieldwork (Coming soon)

5. Getting better results

Practical ways to get clearer, more actionable insight.

  • How to get respondents to give more thoughtful answers (Coming soon)

  • Why people misread pack messages — and how to fix it (Coming soon)

  • Understanding contradictions in consumer responses (Coming soon)

6. Our approach

How we get focus-group depth — from a survey.

  • The thinking behind our Depth Surveys (Coming soon)

  • Why fewer questions lead to deeper answers (Coming soon)

  • How we design surveys that respect respondents — and get better results (Coming soon)