What Pharmaceutical Marketing Researchers Can Learn from Podcasters

A Moderating Technique for Generating More Authentic Respondent Conversations – One Where You Might Find Unexpected Insights

By Noah M Pines

ThinkGen

The Impossibly Long Discussion Guide

In conducting qualitative marketing research in the pharma industry, one common challenge that moderators face is when a discussion guide (DG) contains way too many questions. Those of us who have chalked up thousands of interviews and focus groups in our careers as moderators – we’ve all been there.

Once a DG has been through multiple layers of generation and review – starting with the researchers themselves, then out to the broader marketing team – you might be looking at 50-60 questions to ask in a 60-minute interview, not to mention a host of sub-questions and probes. You do a quick calculation in your head, and that’s basically one question every minute, or less when you factor in the obligatory niceties at the beginning and the doctor taking a call. Hardly enough time to get thorough answers from a respondent.

The assumption, oftentimes, is that we will scale back and right size the DG after having conducted a few pilot interviews and narrow down to a more reasonable and doable DG. And this works just fine in many instances.

But still, as a moderator, you often are left with little latitude to probe and to pursue fascinating and often fruitful tributaries of thinking shared by your respondent. You’re sometimes left feeling as though you only scratched the surface of the respondent’s opinions, beliefs and thought process. This should be particularly concerning when the research aim is to discover new or unexpected insights on a topic – or where your mission is to go deeper to understand latent motivators, emotional drivers and/or how habitual a certain behavior or decision might be.

Would Joe Rogan Be a Good Qual Pharma Moderator?

Or Larry King for that matter. Both are, in my view, Jedi Master interviewers because they serve up a few open-ended, thoughtful questions, and sit back to allow their guest to talk. Their goal is to spotlight their guest – the guest is the hero, not them. Both interview in a way that reflects their natural human curiosity and expert listening ability because they are keenly focused not on the next question on their sheet – but what their guest just said. Their priority is to listen then probe further. “What’s that all about?” is a frequent Rogan follow up. Neither of them packs their question with their own view – or their own ego for that matter.

Contrast their approach with the way that, if you watch CNN or Fox News, legacy media reporters often serve up their questions. They will typically – and for those of us who moderate, frustratingly – boldly insert their own platform into the question. Their point of view unabashedly informs the question. Or they give so much exposition that the viewer forgets it’s even a question to begin with.

One approach that we at ThinkGen have pioneered and advocate for in specific marketing research initiatives is what we call an “Open Mic” interviewing technique. It’s a moderating style that is prevalent in podcasting and (real) journalism where the interviewer allows the respondent to talk freely, giving the respondent more control over the conversation.

Open Mic prioritizes open-ended questions and minimal interruptions, creating a more organic and spontaneous dialogue.

The ultimate goal of Open Mic is to encourage the interviewee to share deeper insights, personal stories, sensitive emotions, or unanticipated details, often revealing more than they would in a traditional interview. We recommend this moderating approach in implementing Habit Lens(SM) research studies because it allows us to differentiate between a customer’s making a thoughtful decision versus where they are in "autopilot mode." I will elaborate on that later in the article.

How Do You Do an Open Mic Interview: What Good Looks Like

When we design an open mic topical guide where the intent is to more broadly explore a subject matter or theme, following are some of the key guidelines that we employ.

The first is to design the questions to be open ended. Open-ended questions are those which cannot be answered by a simple “yes” or “no” response. Often the way we serve these types of questions is up:

• “Please talk to me about your experience with …”
• “How do you feel when…”
• “Please discuss your thinking on…”
• "How would you explain that to a colleague... or a med student?"
• "Walk me, start to finish, through a recent case..."

The second guideline in an open mic interview is active listening. This means that the moderator is listening attentively without interrupting, giving the respondent more space to process and articulate their thoughts without pressure. As a moderator, ways of showing that you are listening actively are to maintain eye contact and to jot down the occasional note (when doing an in-person interview). Even saying things like "I hear you," or encouraging the respondent by commenting "that's very interesting," can help, particularly in situations when you're doing a virtual interview and/or not on camera. The moderator also should say something at the start of the interview such as, “Today, you’ll be doing the talking and I will be doing the listening.” This stage-setting element, in fact, creates a better rapport so that the respondent will open up.

A third and associated guideline is that there should be less of a formal framework and guidance to the discussion – more unscripted – than the traditional “question/answer” structure and cadence. Instead of 50-60 questions, the moderator will start with a DG containing 10-12 topics or themes that are to be discussed. The moderator strives to avoid steering the conversation too much, allowing the interviewee to take it in unexpected directions and to reveal themselves more fully.

As part of the process of active listening, the moderator should be thinking not about the next question or topic on the guide, but about what the respondent is saying – and, when appropriate, how to draw them out further. Choiceful probing. In this regard, a fourth guideline is that the moderator should be crafting follow up questions in her mind based upon what was shared to delve deeper into specific. Examples include:

• “That’s fascinating – can you expand on that…?"
• “What do you mean when you just said ________?”
• “Please go deeper into that subject matter…?”
• "I'm not sure I fully understand - can you explain that in a different way"
• “What is truly behind your thinking on that?”
• “What’s that all about?”

One of the hallmarks of an open mic interview is intervals of comfortable silence - or maybe uncomfortable silence. When you are doing a “full contact” 60-minute interview where the DG is packed with 40-50 questions, you fill the silence with the next question by necessity. But using moments of silence is an actual interviewing technique – like a caesura in music – where the participant might feel obligated to continue talking, leading to more revealing answers.

Our recommendation is that only a highly experienced moderator should do an Open Mic interview. An Open Mic interview conducted by an talented moderator can be exquisite theatre for those observing or listening. That expert facilitator, however, needs to be intimately familiar with the subject matter or therapeutic area and comfortable navigating a relatively unscripted, free-form conversation. In addition, that moderator needs to be extremely skilled at listening and appropriately probing around the right topics of interest to the client. Conversely, an inexperienced moderator might probe on the wrong topics, or worse, probe on everything. That can be either unfruitful, counterproductive, or excruciatingly frustrating to listen to.

Applications of Open Mic Interviewing

Open Mic facilitation isn’t the right technique for all types of marketing research studies. Undoubtedly, certain types of qualitative research studies benefit from not only structure and repetition, but also require a certain question cadence to get through the key topics. For example, research to test campaign ideas or visual aids benefit less from an Open Mic approach than pre-positioning or unmet needs exploration.

Open Mic interviewing is advantageous when the marketing team aims to surface key insights that benefit from expansive storytelling, emotion, and/or depth of thinking. Examples of studies where Open Mic technique is beneficial:

• Exploration of unmet customer needs
• Patient journey
• Latent/unconscious drivers and barriers of behavior
• Emotion-laden or other sensitive topics
• Emotional drivers
• Behavioral science needs, e.g., Habit Lens.

The value of an Open Mic interview is that you can hear the authentic story of a respondent, you can delve more deeply into topics of human interest, and/or look more thoroughly at a particular situation, occurrence, or process.

Using Open Mic in Habit Lens(SM) Research

We at ThinkGen pioneered the usage of Open Mic interviewing during the process of inventing our Habit Lens methodology. As many of our clients know, Habit Lens is a behavioral science framework we designed specifically for commercial teams in the pharmaceutical industry. Habit Lens reveals the mechanics of a habitual behavior and identifies ways to disrupt or sustain those behaviors.

More specifically, Habit Lens research explores and identifies drivers and barriers based upon the premise that most behaviors are automatic (vs. thoughtful) and reveals ways in which to trigger a re-think – an opportunity for a new product to be considered. It also reveals how to train a new habit and produce behavioral “investment” around that product.

We use Open Mic interviewing because respondents do not often consciously recognize or acknowledge that a given behavior is habitual. By giving the respondent the space to discuss their behavior more openly and with less direct questioning, we have found that the way that a respondent naturally speaks and acts during an interview yields a cornucopia of data points to assess as to whether a behavior is habitual or intellectually effortful – and where the marketer might find an opening to trigger a re-think.

Determining whether a particular behavior is habitual based on someone's speech, actions or communication involves paying close attention to specific verbal and non-verbal cues that suggest routine, consistency, and automaticity. Here are some ways you might discern a habitual behavior from listening to a marketing research interview:

• The respondent tends to use phrases that are indicative of a high frequency of that behavior such as “I always,” “I usually,” “Every day,” or “I can’t help but.”
• The behavior is described in a casual or matter-of-fact way without much thought, explanation or rationale. The respondent may talk about the behavior as if it's second nature, without providing reasons for doing it, which implies it's something they do automatically. For example, "I just get up at 6am without an alarm. It’s like clockwork."
• We often observe that people engaging in a habitual behavior may not express difficulty or hesitation when talking about them. There’s an ease in their tone, suggesting they don’t think about it much or make an effort to perform the behavior. The action is ingrained "Oh, I just grab a coffee as soon as I wake up. It’s my thing."
• We observe that the respondent’s cadence of speech might accelerate when describing a habit. They’ve grown so used to it that their brain has made the external description a quick, fluent burst of information.
• Habitual actions often carry less emotional intensity when spoken about by a respondent. They are mentioned in passing or with little excitement because they are routine. In contrast, new or one-off behaviors tend to be associated with stronger emotional expressions like excitement, frustration, or nervousness.
• The respondent might talk about performing the behavior at specific, recurring times, signaling it’s routine. For example, if they say, "I always check my emails right after lunch," this suggests the action is part of a customary cycle in their day.
• If the respondent refers to the behavior as something they've been doing for a long time—such as “I’ve been doing this for years” or “It’s something I’ve done since medical school”—this shows that the behavior is not recent but a long-established habit. If a behavior was taught by a respected mentor, that too can signify its more ingrained.
• We all know that habitual behaviors are often difficult to change. If the respondent speaks about the behavior in a way that suggests they are resistant or indifferent to changing it, it’s likely a habit. For example, "I’ve tried stopping, but I just can’t."

When looked at holistically by one of ThinkGen’s Habit Lens experts, one can infer when a customer’s behavior is habitual, as opposed to spontaneous or occasional.

Let’s look at the opposite phenomenon, the situation where a customer behavior is requiring of mental effort. We tag this as “pilot” behavior, in contrast to “auto-pilot,” or habitual behavior. When a behavior is thoughtful, it suggests intentionality and conscious decision-making. To detect thoughtful behavior based on someone's verbal and/or body language, the listener should spot specific cues that indicate deliberation, awareness, care and/or hesitation. Here are some indicators that can help you tell when a behavior is thoughtful:

• The first is that you hear a lot of detailed justification. The respondent will strive to clearly explain the reasons or rationale for their behavior, indicating they’ve thought it through. They may say things like: "I decided to do this because...", "I thought it would be best to...", or "After considering my options, I chose to..."
• The second thing to listen for is consideration of alternatives. If a respondent talks about weighing a variety of different options before deciding on a course of action, it indicates the behavior was deliberate rather than automatic.
• Third, if a respondent pauses to reflect or hesitates while describing the behavior, it suggests he or she gave it careful thought before acting. Unlike habitual behaviors, which are automatic, thoughtful actions may require a moment of mental review, planning or foresight. For example,? "I wasn’t sure at first, but after thinking about it for a while, I decided to..."
• A respondent might talk about the time and effort that went into performing a given action. Some decisions in medicine are so consequential that they are reviewed at multiple levels. Examples to listen for are "I made sure to double-check everything before submitting it." "I went out of my way to ensure it was done properly."
• If the behavior is described by the respondent in terms of its future impact or long-range consequences, it demonstrates that the respondent was thinking ahead and acting thoughtfully. For example: "I thought this would be better in the long run because... "I knew this decision would affect us down the road, so I wanted to be careful."
• Lastly, if the respondent recognizes that a behavior or decision wasn’t easy or that they were uncertain about how to act, it shows they took the time to reflect before making a choice.

Again, when doing an Open Mic interview, these types of insights are more likely to emerge because the respondent isn’t under pressure to simple spew an answer to a question every minute or two minutes. When they are encouraged to tell stories about themselves, about their lives, about their patients and the experiences with their patients, these kinds of learnings can come through – allowing the marketer to glean more about what is really going on, and where they have an opportunity to make an impact.

Conclusion

Open Mic interviewing, a moderating technique we employ frequently among our highly experienced moderators at ThinkGen, can add value to certain types of qualitative marketing research initiatives. Also referred to as “free-form interviewing,” “conversational interviewing,” or “long-form interviewing,” it is more unstructured and unscripted way to give the respondent more space to speak, think, and ultimately reveal a deeper and more expansive set of ideas around a subject matter. Even unexpected ones.

Those of us who consume long-form podcasts like Joe Rogan or Andrew Huberman can see how this is done beautifully. It’s not a question-answer process, but more a question, listen, and then choicefully follow up process. Interviews conducted this way are characterized by more surprise and spontaneity. Not only can Open Mic allow the marketer to discover more authentic insights, but it can allow for the respondent’s human, empathetic and emotional side to reveal itself.