Editor's note: Linda M. Lynch is market research director at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, Quincy, Mass.

When I started my research career at a full-service market research firm, I had no experience planning or conducting a focus group, but I soon learned. Our firm’s facility had a modest conference room with an observation room that fit five or six (slim) observers and doubled by day as an employee’s (very small) office. Our focus group amenities were sparse. Day and night, participant refreshments consisted of office-brewed coffee (with Cremora), water from the hallway water cooler and a couple of boxes of Dunkin’ Donuts. But we had an ace staff of recruiters who cold-called from the telephone directory or sometimes from a customer list. We recruited to spec and manually kept track of ineligibles to inform our client if unexpected recruiting difficulties emerged. We understood the reasons for particular recruiting specifications so that, when necessary, we could suggest ways to adapt the specs without compromising the research. We paid a competitive honorarium and our moderators were superb and wrote insightful reports.

We forced ourselves into our client company’s skin so that we truly understood the research objectives, what the client hoped to learn, what decisions they would make and what they hoped to accomplish as a result of the groups. We asked lots of questions so we could really understand the product, service or ad campaign being tested and then we could anticipate and further probe participant comments that would be of special interest to our clients, so we really could walk in the client’s shoes. We usually took the initiative on this immersion, with most clients quite pleased to share their details. More than once clients remarked that we understood their product/service/company better than many people working at their organizations. In a phrase, we were good!

Thus, des...