Ethnographic Research for Business - The Basics

Brianna Sylver has a great overview of the various ways to conduct 'market resrearch' as related to business. I'm most interested in her straightforward explanation of Ethnography for Business:

Ethnographic Research 

Use: Offers direction for strategy and product development
Cost: $$$
Average time: 3.5 months

Ethnographic research is an emerging, qualitative research method and, quite possibly, the least understood. In its purest form, ethnographic research is about entering the natural habitats of your users, seeking to understand through participation, listening, and observation the behaviors, values and motivations of a culture. When used appropriately in a business context, this methodology can be very powerful in providing direction for strategic planning and product development initiatives. Yet, the continued bastardization of the method in applied settings has qualified practitioners of the approach continually backtracking—trying to validate its strength and value—as the price tag for ethnographic research projects tends to be higher than that for your average focus group.

Contrary to popular belief, ethnography is not just about doing an interview in someone's home. Nor is it about taking a video camera into a person's work and, voilà, you now have all the contextual data required to successfully develop your new product.

In order to reap the maximum rewards possible from ethnographic research, you first need to exploit being in the user's natural environment (i.e. home, work place, or place of leisure). You need to immerse yourself in the details, from the step-by-step tasks performed to accomplish the goals of an activity, (like "preparing dinner") to noticing areas of people's homes where they've channeled their earnings. Attention to detail is what will give insight into what your users value and aspire to. This, coupled with what they tell you, helps create a holistic understanding of who your customers are, and consequently, how your offering might need to align with their needs, behavior patterns and values.

Fieldwork is a bit messy, as the protocols for ethnographic research are largely non-directed and unscripted. So it's only in the analysis of that data that you uncover the real nuggets of information that offer the AHA! and new insight into who your customers are.

Additionally, sufficient time for analysis needs to be given to ethnographic-based initiatives. Fieldwork is a bit messy, as the protocols for ethnographic research are largely non-directed and unscripted. So it's only in the analysis of that data that you uncover the real nuggets of information that offer the AHA! and new insight into who your customers are. Expecting recommendations to be delivered immediately after fieldwork is complete is not only unrealistic, but if acted on, seriously compromises the depth of insight yielded.

To recap, ethnographic research is best leveraged in product development, when needing to:

• Define both articulated and unarticulated needs of your user
  
• Get an up close and personal look at your user's context—the environment in which they'll use your product and the meaning that it might offer to their lives
  
• Uncover micro-trends in customer behavior that could impact the market's acceptance of your product
  
• Learn the differences between what people say they do versus what they actually do

User insight gained from ethnographic research can be very powerful in:

• Identifying new growth opportunities for your organization
  
• Defining target markets for new offerings
  
• Developing "design criteria" to scope and prototype the development of a new product or service

Listening Labs 
Use: Assess the customer experience provided by an offering
Cost: $$
Average time: 2 months

Listening labs (or product walkthroughs) are another emerging, qualitative method that has proven to be useful in product and service development. This method works best when leveraged to understand the customer experience that one has with an offering.

Oftentimes, this approach is confused with usability research. Yet, there is stark difference in how a usability test is conducted versus a listening lab. In a listening lab, specific tasks are not assigned to users, nor are the tasks time-based as they are in usability tests. Rather, the overarching goal of the service is stated, such as "book a hotel room" (in a reservation system). The learning is gained through seeing the non-directed paths that users take to accomplish that goal and hearing how the customer experience at each stage of the process aligns or is in dissonance with their expectations.

When used only as a "last check" technique—as is often the case—the true rewards that can yield from listening labs are short-changed.

Listening labs are an excellent methodology to leverage once functional prototypes of your product or service exist. To be of most value within the product development process, it's important to leverage this method early and often. When used only as a "last check" technique—as is often the case—the true rewards that can yield from this approach are short-changed. The focused feedback gained in this methodology has the power to transform an experience created around an offering, often making the difference between an experience that is perceived as just being "OK" to one that people talk about positively amongst their peers.

To recap, listening labs are best leveraged in the product development process to understand the experience that your customer has interacting with your product or service. User insight gained through this method can inform the:

• Definition of a product or service's information architecture, features, form and/or function
  
• Development of "design criteria" to inform next stages of a product or service's development

Core77 has the full breakdown.