Improving Qualitative Research with AI

How CRIS by Delvinia enabled qualitative research to be carried out faster and less expensively while working together with quantitative data to create better insights.

Research Challenge

Incorporating qualitative insights into the decision-making process is a goal for most brands, but traditional qualitative methods are time-consuming and expensive. In fact, the average qualitative project can take up to six weeks, including recruiting participants, field (which can sometimes involve travel), and reporting. When decisions need to be made rapidly, it is often necessary to forgo qualitative data and rely solely on the quantitative. Industry-wide, only 25% of projects incorporated both quantitative and qualitative elements (GRIT 2019 Insights Practice Report), likely for the key reasons of cost and time. It’s not that companies don’t want to do both, it is that often it’s just not feasible.

We wanted to find a way to incorporate qualitative insights in a way that would be timely and affordable, allowing the best possible breadth of data to be used in making decisions for any brand.

Research Solution

We conducted a comprehensive U.S./Canada study among small business banking clients designed to understand their usage and attitudes around both personal and business banking. Over 400 Americans and close to 250 Canadians participated in the study, which included a rigorous quantitative component managed by Phase-5 and one-on-one interviews with the AI-enabled virtual moderator CRIS by Delvinia for the qualitative component, all in a seamless participant experience. CRIS (Conversational Research Insight System) replicates a moderated experience in a secure text-based environment, by following a guide and probing for more detail just like a moderator would.

Results

Normally, a large-scale quantitative study such as this would include a very limited qualitative component, or none at all. By using CRIS, we got qualitative feedback with literally everyone in the study, and could match their qualitative responses to their quantitative characteristics. The entire participant experience was only 25 minutes, extremely manageable for most people. The entire study, including both qualitative and quantitative components, was completed in 3 weeks. This is a target that would ordinarily be extremely difficult to reach when including qualitative insights.

Thanks to this combination, we were able to parse out qualitative insight based on any of quantitative variables, all without having to conduct research with multiple different groups. In this project, adding the qualitative to the quantitative survey was done for about the cost of 4 focus groups. Here, the cost allowed all 650 participants to be interviewed as well as collecting the quantitative data, garnering better data, more efficiently, and at a better price point.

RBC - Methodify
Delvinia

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