Focus groups often bring to mind iconic scenes from beloved shows like New Girl and Mad Men. In New Girl, Schmidt tried to land an ad campaign for sponges by enlisting his friends to give pre-determined suggestions in his focus group – leading to disastrous results. Similarly, in Mad Men, we see focus groups as a staple in the 1960s advertising world, where agencies carefully analyze responses to shape their campaigns and understand deeper consumer motivations. While these examples are dramatized, they showcase how effective focus groups can be in gathering insights to drive decision-making.

Most often associated with market research and political polling, focus groups also have great untapped potential for nonprofits. By using focus groups, nonprofits can connect with program participants, beneficiaries, or supporters to get invaluable feedback. 

Nonprofit focus groups are an excellent way to ensure that programs align with community needs and to evaluate how campaigns resonate with stakeholders. Before we dive in, let’s clarify: 

What is a Focus Group, (and Why Should Nonprofits Consider Doing Them?)

Focus groups are a form of qualitative research in which a group of people are asked about their attitude and/or feelings towards a product, service, concept, advertisement, idea, or program (Johns Hopkins, Student Affairs). Questions are asked in an interactive group setting where participants alternate answering questions from a facilitator. 

Focus groups are one of several ways nonprofits can obtain feedback from participants, including one-on-one interviews and surveys. While different methods will serve different purposes, focus groups and interviews will collect qualitative data. Ideally, your organization will access both qualitative and quantitative data. 

Consider the following questions for qualitative feedback: 

• “How would you describe your experience with X program/service?” 
• “What could our organization do differently or better?” 

These are prime questions for nonprofit focus groups that surveys can’t capture. 

Nonprofit Focus Groups: Benefits & Potential Downsides to Consider 

Nonprofit focus group benefits to consider:

• Gaining deeper perspectives from multiple participants at once.
• Empowering individuals by giving them the chance to share their stories.
• Building community among participants with shared backgrounds or experiences. 
• Providing a less intimidating setting than 1:1 interviews for some, particularly if there is a history of trauma for a particular population. 

Potential downsides of conducting nonprofit focus groups: 

• Need to have a facilitator. This can be either someone from your organization or a third party.  Active facilitation fosters a welcoming, inclusive environment and should help reduce power dynamics within the group. The facilitator should guide the conversation, ensure everyone has a chance to speak, and manage time effectively. 
• Less Depth than a 1:1 interview. While group discussions may not allow for as many follow-up questions as 1:1 interviews, skilled facilitation can still generate deep insights by creating a space where participants feel comfortable being vulnerable. 
• Some people may be intimidated by a group setting and prefer an individual interview or a survey. 

10 Tips for Conducting Authentic Nonprofit Focus Groups

The Society for Nonprofits has a great guide for conducting focus groups. Additionally, here are a ten best practices for organizing and implementing focus groups based on my own experience: 

1. Set expectations early 

Tell your participants exactly what the information will be used for and ensure you get consent beforehand (check out MemoryFox’s Ethical Storytelling Report for more suggestions). Give participants an idea of the duration of the session and honor the timing.

2. Set norms or “Community Agreements” 

Be intentional about how you want people to show up and spend 5  minutes reviewing those norms at the beginning of the focus group. It’s helpful to put it on a slide or have a visual of the norms. Some examples include, “active listening; listen to understand and not respond,” “uphold confidentiality,” or “take space and make space for others.” Drawing Change has a great guide on co-creating community agreements in meetings.

3. Compensate participants 

While this can be controversial, I believe that people should be compensated for their time and valuable feedback. If direct payments are impossible for legal or other reasons, consider providing gift cards. For example, Visa Vanilla gift cards work like debit cards and offer flexibility for online or physical locations. If that’s not feasible, at least provide lunch for participants.

4. Keep it short 

Be respectful of people’s time (and their attention spans!) Nonprofit focus groups should not take more than 2 hours, and 1.5 hours is ideal.

5. Keep it small 

Keep the group size fairly small, otherwise it will be difficult to hear everyone’s perspective. Ideally between 6-10 people would be a sweet spot.

6. Equity Considerations & Accessibility 

Ensure the group is not just made up of your favorite program participants, or the ones that you know have a favorable view of your program. This will likely lead to biased results. When I helped organize a series of focus groups for pre-k providers in Massachusetts, my team provided multiple sessions, including one in Spanish to make it accessible to Spanish-speaking populations. We also used available program demographic data to ensure we had diverse representation from both rural and urban areas and held separate sessions based on program types. This helped capture different experiences and made each group feel represented and valued.

7. Remember trauma-informed practices 

Use strength-based language to frame your questions, and always let participants know that they have full control over what they want to share. Check out MemoryFox’s Ethical Storytelling Report for more information.

8. Facilitation Logistics 

Have 2 representatives: One to facilitate, one to take notes. Ideally, it’s better to take direct notes and quotes. This will avoid summarizing in the moment, which often leads to making assumptions about what participants are saying. If possible, have a third party or partner organization facilitate. Participants are more likely to share honest feedback if they don’t fear repercussions. 

9.  Most important role: Listen 

Even if you are facilitating, your main role is to listen. This is not the time to defend a program decision or design. The goal is to learn from the authentic experiences of participants.

10. Analyze your results & take action 

After conducting the focus group, analyze the findings and share them with relevant internal stakeholders, including Program Directors and Leadership Teams so that they can make the appropriate changes. Even better, share it back with participants, so that they can validate the takeaways and correct anything.

Focus groups are also a valuable way to get feedback from staff! Many of them are eager to provide feedback or share their experience at your nonprofit. This could also be a good moment to collect video stories using MemoryFox.  

Additionally, consider integrating focus groups into your community engagement strategy. Rather than conducting a “one-off” session, hold them annually or bi-annually if possible. This approach provides consistent avenues for program participants to share feedback and helps gauge the impact of program policy changes on their experiences.