When someone comes over to your house, it’s perfectly natural to do a quick once over before they arrive. Plump up the cushions, brush those biscuit crumbs off the sofa, cram that pile of dirty dishes into the dishwasher – whether you’ve got family coming over or are hosting friends for a catch-up, everybody wants their house to look its best! But, when it comes to doing paid market research from home, especially in-home interviews, researchers would actually rather you didn’t have a last minute tidy up. Yes, really – however strange it might feel, put the duster down and ignore those urges to quickly spruce the place up. Here’s why:
It could affect your behaviour
A researcher isn’t there to judge the cleanliness of your kitchen sink. They just want to know how you use a product or service in your own environment, on a day-to-day basis. For example, if the study is on kitchen storage and the research is gathering information on your storage habits, they’re going to be looking at how you move around the room and utilise your current storage solutions. Tidying, cleaning, and changing the area might affect the way you do this. Basically, if you have shoved a pile of post from the kitchen table into one of the kitchen drawers that you would usually use for something else, it will have a knock-on effect when you come to use that drawer – which will have an impact on the whole study.
It could hide areas that need improvement
The idea of an in-home interview isn’t just to have a snoop inside your house. Rather, the researcher will be looking to identify any pain points. Or potential areas of improvement that their product or service could help resolve. In order to get to know you and identify things that do and don’t work for you, they need to really understand your rituals, your routines and your traditions. How else are they going to get a true understanding of how their product can benefit your life at home? By cleaning and
Researchers want authenticity
In-home interviews are carried out to gain insights into how people really live at home. In order for the research to be authentic, interviewers will observe everything. From your verbal responses to
They’ll want to see the whole the house
When taking part in market research such as an in-home interview, it’s not unusual, in some cases, for researchers to want to see every room in the house. This is to get a real feel for your needs and a deeper understanding of your living space. And by every room, yes, that includes the spare room that is currently used as a dumping ground! That means there’s no point in gathering up any mess from your coffee table and dumping it in your bedroom. Because the researcher will most likely want to see that room too. Besides, if they need to take any measurements, they will do so using a laser. So you don’t need to worry about that pile of ironing
In conclusion, when you take part in paid market research from home, researchers are looking for ways to help, not criticise. It’s all about identifying how you interact with different products and services and uncovering pain points so that they can improve their offerings and help to solve your problems. Remember, you’re not alone. We all have mountains of washing piling up that desperately needs to be sorted – the difference is who is brave enough to show it so that solutions to real-life problems can be developed!
Want to take part in paid market research with Angelfish? As with all of our market research projects, you will get paid between £50 and £100 for taking part in an in-home interview. Paid market research from home is fun, it’s flexible, and best of all, it’s a great opportunity to get your voice heard by big brands. If you want to get involved, sign up to our panel today.
