Do you have the information you need to make the important decisions your association faces? How helpful was your most recent research project with helping you understand the context for your deliberations and evaluating your alternative courses of action with fact-based information?
If your answer is “No! We don’t have the information we need!” and “The research wasn’t helpful at all in decision making!” then it’s time to rethink how your association is approaching research.
The majority of association research dollars is devoted to periodic member surveys. Those surveys almost always cover a range of topics, largely related to the collection of member demographic and profile information and gauging how well the association serves members—the-who-are-our-members-and-what-do-they-think-of-the-job-we’re-doing-research. That type of research definitely has its place. But isn’t particularly helpful at evaluating alternatives for action and informing decision making.
If you have ever taken a survey or participated in a focus group for a major corporation then you could probably tell what the corporation was up to. That’s because most for-profit businesses, particularly major corporations, invest almost all of their research dollars in projects designed to help them make decisions. They ask questions such as:
- How well will this potential product be received in the market and who is our best target customer?
- Why isn’t this product performing up to expectation and what do we need to do to fix it?
- Which advertising campaign will perform best with our target market?
This type of research is decision-focused research because everything about the research is designed to help make an important decision. It’s a powerful approach to making sure your research dollars are well-spent.
We have developed an easy-to-read ebook that will describe how decision-focused research works and how you can get started.
Decision-Focused Research for Association Executives: How to Get the Information You Really Need will show you:
- How decision-focused research can ensure your research is asking the right questions
- What questions to ask as you develop your research
- Best practices for writing a research plan
- How to decide between qualitative and quantitative research
- What types of decisions can be made with 12 different types of survey research
- Six things to consider when deciding if DIY research is right for your project
Download the free ebook today. And we’re here to help when you’re ready to get started. Just contact us to learn more.
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