Ethnographic or Immersion Studies

Ethnographic studies are highly-detailed explorations of why and how consumers think and behave the way they do. To conduct these studies we literally become immersed in our subject’s lives, meeting in their homes, exploring their cupboards and closets and generally getting “inside their heads”. We have conducted ethnographic studies to reveal fundamental changes in consumer attitudes in order to forecast macro market shifts and, on a micro level, we have used immersion research to explore and improve product attributes for new product concepts.

Some of the ethnographic techniques we have employed are:

  • Single and group interviews
  • In-home interviews
  • Shopping diaries
  • Lifestyle diaries
  • Photographic collages and documentation
  • Audio and video recordings
  • Product usage diaries
  • Longitudinal interviews
  • Projective psychological techniques

Ethnographic or immersion techniques offer the deepest investigation of consumer lifestyles and, in our experience, have often been a well-spring of unmet needs and wants which have enabled our clients to develop many new products.