Some tips to convert your qualitative research method to online amid the COVID-19 pandemic

Eventhough doable but conducting online qualitative research undeniably has some limitations and drawbacks if we compare it with face to face interaction.

Photo by Andrew Neel on Unsplash

Just to be honest here, we are all new in this kind of situation hence both the qualitative moderator and participants have the same level of nervousness and unfamiliarity towards the online platform and how the discussion will work. Me with Nielsen Indonesia have tried several online discussions which both me and client agree it worked really well.

Based on my personal experience in the past 2 weeks as “online qualitative moderator”, I wanted to share some tips for fellow qualitative researcher to run an effective and smooth interview during self-isolation period these days :

1. Use your laptop exclusively to talk to the participants while put your discussion guide in separate platform- in this case I use my tablet. Avoid to open your discussion guide on the laptop you use as an online meeting platform because it will distract your focus on screen.
2. Use a headset because it is clearer for the participants to hear us and the other way around.
3. Utilize whatsapp group to coordinate with your participants prior the FGD and additionally you can also utilize it to ask the following up questions post the interaction.
4. Break the session into two part. As the focus level would be much lower in the online session, hence in my case I break the group into two part: Pre-session and main session. Pre-session is used to familiarize them with the online platform tools and explain the ground rules of the online meeting-this happen the day before the main group start. The benefit of doing this is both moderator (me) and participants are already familiar to the setting and the environment which help to cut the time and unnecessary confusions.
5. You need assistance to serve your clients’ questions. Ask one of your team member to dedicate on client servicing, it includes create whatsapp group consist of him and client only (not you the moderator). She/he will be responsible to be a messenger from client to you, she/he will need to curate the questions and send it to the moderator through online chat feature ONLY in the right moment. Because most of the times client’s questions would be varied and way too many and sometimes not coming in the right time, so having one person dedicated to this particular part can help you to stay focus on the participants and run the discussion smoothly.
6. Utilize other research tools to compensate the limitation of online discussion. As there is time limitation we have in the online group discussion (The ideal length of discussion would be around 1.5–2hours) You can use other platform to answer some uncovered questions such as google forms.
7. Wear a casual dress. Most of you might think that we should wear a formal attire to run the discussion but I would recommend not to do it because it would intimidate participants who wear casual shirt, because we are all at home anyway.
8. Prepare a bottle of water next to your table to stay hydrated and encourage the participants to do the same.
9. Take a 3 minutes break. After more than an hour of discussion I would ask the participants to turn off their camera and just do whatever they want. Most of them used it to go to the toilet, eating some snacks, or just having a small physical movement to reduce tension. It really helps to break the boredom and gain back their focus.

This picture was taken in the middle of discussion of my Online Focus Group while waiting for the participants to take a short break

Any thoughts or other tips on how you do the online qualitative group/in-depth interview, please drop the comment below ;)