The Problem: It’s always a struggle to find out what people really think.
The Solution: Replace focus groups with comedy sessions to get a true insight.
During a course at London Business School, after a student in the class made an observation and the whole class laughed, the professor said that such laughter was a good sign that everyone in the room was thinking the same way, but afraid to say it, perhaps for fear of looking stupid.
Although focus groups have produced some useful insights, they have also produced plenty of failures, with people often saying things they don’t mean.
Polling has also been subject to failure, including ‘shy Tories’ in the UK not admitting they were going to vote Conservative at the next general election, which distorted the poll results.
Research has shown that Google trends can offer a good insight into how people really think, one of the few places where they will ask the questions they aren’t willing to do so in public (especially if they are on private browsing!).
I think there is another way.
Based on that first observation at London Business School, we should be using comedy to work out how people feel.
Successful jokes have to reflect what people are thinking, they have to make sense in their lives, and they have to do so at scale.
Want to know what people think of your brand? Ask a comedian to make jokes about it and see which ones get the most laughs. Or get influencers to produce funny memes online and see which ones get the most shares and likes.
Want to know if people will buy a product? Make a joke about how the people you think would need or want the product behave without it and see if people laugh, and the punchline becomes, ‘why don’t they just use [insert your product here]’.
If there are nods in the audience, it’s likely to be worth producing the product. If it’s blank stares and silence then it’s back to the drawing board.
The advantage of using comedians for market research is that people don’t know they’re being researched, so they react more honestly.
And it costs less; instead of paying people to attend a focus group, they pay you to attend the comedy show.
Cheaper, better, and more honest customer feedback, what company wouldn’t want that?
Now you know that if you answer 'my company' to the above line and people laugh, it's time to move jobs!
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