Believe me when I tell you that there is huge difference in the quality of insight from a children's group in inverse proportion to the number!

Let's remember why we are running a focus group as opposed to any of these options:

What we want and need from a focus group is insight. This means we want them to have time to listen to each other, understand what has been said, decide what they think and respond. This process cannot be managed if everyone is talking at once even if your client listening thinks what a great time everyone's having and what a popular moderator they have.

The children are there for one reason only. For them it could well be about the money. Children know that if they are promised money they have to do something to earn it. In this case they have to pay attention, answer questions and make sensible comments.Naturally I assure them at the beginning of the discussion that there are no right or wrong answers but children do not believe this. They live in a world of right and wrong answers and the huge accompanying embarrassment when their answer is wrong. Therefore building rapport and trust in the group is essential and this is much faster if you:

Spending time in the early crucial minutes after arrival to get your group in rapport (I use NLP techniques for this) will ensure that they work well together and stay 'on task'.

Clients often think that the more children in the group, the more they will represent their age group but this is not the case. Like hens, a pecking order quickly establishes itself and the children lower down the pecking order will become mute. The ones at the top will vie for the moderator's attention and the discussion will deteriorate into chaos.

Instead, recruit your group for maximum rapport and this will result in maximum insight. I can assure you that as few as four children in rapport and relaxed, trusting the moderator and each other will yield more insight than 10 children.

If you'd like to know more about Kids Brands Europe visit my website here. You can call me on 01628 660618 or email judy@kids-brands.com to discuss your Market Research project.