Welcome Back

Hey, everyone. It's Brenda, and I wanna welcome you back.

Why This Lesson Matters

In this lesson, we're going to be talking about discussion boards.

So now that you've gone through five out of six lessons that discuss the various types and formats of focus groups, it may start to be obvious why I had to break this up into so many lessons. I needed to be absolutely sure that this section was presented to you in a way to help you absorb all this information.

What Discussion Boards Are

Moving along to discussion boards, they are kind of a different type of focus group because they're not live, so you don't have to show up at a specific time. Instead, everything happens on your own schedule and it's in the form of writing. You will be doing a lot of writing, and the moderator may ask you to do some other tasks.

How Discussion Boards Work

How it works, basically, is that you log in to a private platform, where the researcher posts questions or prompts or, like I said, they might give you little tasks, and then you respond when it works for you.

This is a great format for you because you don't have to be on. You don't have to be on camera. You can just log in, and you can just write out your feedback and get paid for it.

Why Some People Love This Format

I'll get into the pay in just a minute, but first, a lot of these studies run over a few days. And they sometimes could stretch up to a week. So each day, new questions are gonna get posted. And then you'll be expected to check in, respond, and then sometimes interact with other people and what they're saying.

And if you're like me, I like reacting online to other people, so this is your chance and to get paid for it.

One thing that's nice about this format is that you get time to think because you're not put on the spot like you would be in a live focus group. So your answers you'll find are a little more detailed and relaxed, which if you really study that for a minute, that's how you wanna be on all the other focus groups and the other types of formats, I mean.

A Good Starting Point

So that said, if I was just starting out, I would definitely want to book discussion boards and then unmoderated studies and product tests. And then work my way up to the live focus groups where I have to be on camera.

Pay Range

Now as far as what a discussion board pays, the range is typically between $50 and $150 for the full study. It can depend on how many days the study is and how involved it is.

The Trade-Off

I will say this. Discussion boards can be a little tedious. But you're getting paid to be tedious, so just go with it. Some people just feel like it's a lot of writing. But what's nice about it is you get to do it on your own schedule. So you can do a lot of writing in between jobs, on your lunch break, or when you would be watching Netflix.

Moving Forward With Confidence

I know this is a lot of information to take in, and it might feel like a lot all at once, and that's okay. That's the reason I wanted to walk you through all of it so that when you start applying for focus groups, nothing feels unfamiliar to you or confusing.

If you're on the focus group job board, you'll start to notice that the focus groups fit into the formats that we discussed. And something will click for you. And you'll think, oh, okay. That makes sense. And then you can apply with more confidence.

What’s Next

The next module, I'm going to go into how to book a focus group. So I'm going to break that up into several lessons so that you can walk through it slowly and absorb the information.

Just take it one step at a time, and you'll be fine.

I wanna thank you for being here, and I will see you in the next module.