Define Audience

Use Highlight’s powerful research grade tools to design the audience that fits your research needs.

 

What's the difference between "Completes" vs "Placements"?

• Completes = the total number of respondents you want to collect in your research.
• Placements = the total number of testers Highlight recommends placing physical products with in order to achieve the desired number of completions. Placements is only relevant for IHUTs.

How does Highlight help me find the right testers for my research in the fastest, most efficient way?

Use Qualifying Criteria to specify the consumers needed for your research. This is where Highlight's "Qualifying Criteria" comes into play.

• Take advantage of Highlight's Standard Profile Data to target on the 24 data points on record for every Highlighter.
• Additionally, use Custom Criteria for more specific targeting needs. Custom Criteria can be anything you want (e.g. "People who like ice cream" or "Play basketball at least once per month"). For each piece of Custom Criteria you add to your Audience, you can define qualifying questions or let Highlight's research experts do that part. 

When the project begins recruiting, relevant Highlighters are screened for their fit with the research, including meeting your audience's custom criteria. 

To ensure quality, Highlight automatically checks for general requirements like articulation, interest in participating, and availability to participate. 

What is a "Test Group" and how should I be thinking about it when setting up my project?

Create a Test Group for each unique group of testers—defined by a combination of products they'll test, qualifying criteria, and activities they'll complete.

A "Test Group" allows you to separate your overall Audience into the appropriate and necessary segments given your research goals. Test Groups are meant to be flexible to support whatever your study might need or insights you might be after.

Below are some examples of how you might leverage Test Groups in your project:

• Testers meeting some set of criteria vs testers meeting a different set of criteria
• Testers who are meant to try one set of products vs testers who are meant to try another set of products

What if I want a set portion of testers within a Test Group to meet one piece of criteria but I want another portion of my testers within a Test Group to meet another piece of criteria?

Use Quotas to create distinct buckets of people within a single piece of Qualifying Criteria.

For example, if you want 50% testers in a Test Group to be from the "Northeast" region and 50% of testers in that same Test Group to be from the "Midwest" region, you can use two Quotas to create that distinction.

What if I've already set up an Audience for a previous project. Can I reuse that same Audience definition to save time?

Yes, you can! From the Overall Audience Size step within Define Audience, you can choose to reuse a previous project's Audience as a starting point. If you do, we will copy over all of the Audience data. You can then modify as needed.

How does Highlight recruit participants for a study?

See Participant Selection & Recruiting for a detailed explanation.

How and when do I program the screener survey?

Our recruiting system incorporates the Audience requirements to screen, so you don't need to program a screener.

Example Audiences

IHUT Trial with 1 audience

IHUT Trial with 1 primary audience and 2 test groups

Concept test with 1 primary audience and 2 quotas

IHUT Trial with 1 audience:

• Example audience:
  • N=100 completes, N=120 placements
  • Age 18+
  • Dog owners
  • Primary or shared shopping responsibility for dogs
  • Current consumers of dog treat category
  • Open to trying jerky treats

1. When clicking into the audience tab for the first time, you will be prompted to add your total number of completes and placements. Once you add your completes, your placements will be automatically added as 20% overage. If your project was scoped with more than 20% overage you will need to manually update the number of placements. 
   
   After you have added your total completes and placements, click “Define Test Groups”. 
   
2. Give your test group a name and update the total number of completes (placements will be automatically updated to add 20% overage). For this example, there is only one test group in our audience so all completes will be added to this group. 
   
3. Then drag and drop your products and select the order you would like them tested (rotated or in the order shown). In this example we will test 2 types of dog treats and would like the testing order rotated. 
   
4. Next, add any criteria from Highlight’s standard profile data which can be found under the "Qualifying Criteria” tab on the right side. A list of standard profile data can be found here. For this test group we will add age and type of pets. 
   
   
5. Now we will add any custom criteria needed to define your audience beyond Highlight’s standard profile data. Custom criteria can be found under the "Qualifying Criteria” tab on the right side.
   
6. Once you click custom criteria you will be prompted to name your criteria. After you have added a name for your custom criteria, click the blue check mark. 
   
7. After your custom criteria has been added, click “Add Question”. This is how you will define how to screen for the custom criteria. 
   
8. Add your question and define the termination consequences for each answer choice on the right side. 
   
9. Repeat steps 6-9 to add any additional custom criteria. For this test group we will add custom criteria for primary or shared shopping responsibility for dogs, current consumers of dog treat category, and open to trying jerky treats. 
   
   
   
10. After all criteria has been added, click “Audience Summary” on the left side to review your audience set up. 
    
    
11. Once you’re done setting up and reviewing your audience, move your test group from “Draft” to “Ready” status. 
    
    
    

IHUT Trial with 1 primary audience and 2 test groups:

• Example audience:
  • N=150 completes, N=180 placements
    • N= 75 completes/90 placements for BBQ chips (test group 1 – 50%)
    • N= 75 completes/90 placements for Salt & Vinegar chips (test group 2 – 50%)
  • Age 18+
  • 50%/50% gender
  • Household Income $50k+
  • Primary or shared responsibility for purchasing food for household
  • Buyers of potato chips (past 6 months)
  • Non rejector of BBQ flavored chips (for BBQ group) and salt & vinegar flavored chips (for salt & vinegar group)
• Example Products Tested: 3 products total
  • Two BBQ chips: Honey BBQ Chips Prototype #1 and Honey BBQ Chips Prototype #2
  • One Salt & Vinegar Chip: Salt & Vinegar Chips Prototype

1. Add Total Completes & Placements
   When you first open the Audience tab, you’ll be asked to add the total number of completes. Placements will auto-populate with a 20% overage (e.g., 150 completes = 180 placements) but this value can be adjusted.
   
   If you want to reuse an audience from a past project, click Reuse a Previous Audience.
   
   After you have added your total completes and placements, click "Define Test Groups" to set up your audience requirements.
   
2.  Define Test Groups
   Name each test group. In this example, we have 2 test groups: BBQ Chips and Salt & Vinegar Chips. Name the first test group and the click New Test Group to add the second test group.
   
   
   Enter completes for each group. The platform will auto-add 20% overage for the number of placements. In this example, the audience is split evenly - 50% (75 completes) for BBQ Chips, and 50% (75 completes) for Salt & Vinegar Chips.
   
   
   
3. Assign Products
   In the Test Group Products section, drag and drop the products for each test group and select how you want them tested (rotated or in order shown). In this example, the BBQ chips group will test two chip products using a rotated order, while the Salt & Vinegar group will test a single chip product.
   
   
4. Add Audience Criteria - Standard Profile Criteria
   Start with adding any criteria from Highlight’s standard profile data which can be found under the Qualifying Criteria tab on the right side. A list of standard profile data can be found here. For this example, age, gender, income, and household shopping responsibility can be found in the standard profile data.
   
   
   For gender quotas, add a 50/50 split by setting min and max quotas for male and female.
   
   
   
   
5. Add Audience Criteria - Custom Criteria
   Next, add any custom criteria needed to further define your audience that go beyond Highlight’s standard profile data. These can be added under the Qualifying Criteria tab on the right side panel. In this example, custom criteria include buyers of potato chips within the past 6 months and non-rejectors of BBQ or Salt & Vinegar flavored chips.
   
   Once you click custom criteria you will be prompted to name your criteria. After you have added a name for your custom criteria, click the blue check mark.
   
   For custom criteria, you can either:
   Select Highlight Defines Qualifying Question and the Highlight team will write it for you. (If you would like Highlight to define the question for you, no extra work is needed for that custom criteria.)
   
   OR
   
   Click Add Question to create the question yourself and set termination consequences for each answer choice. You can edit the question and answer options on the right side pane. 
   
   
   You’ll need to repeat the process detailed in Step 5 for each custom criteria. In this example, that means creating another custom criteria for non-rejectors of BBQ flavored chips (specific to the BBQ Chips test group) and another for non-rejectors of Salt & Vinegar flavored chips (specific to the Salt & Vinegar Chips test group).
   
   
6. Add-On Activities
   If your project includes extra activities (photos, videos, etc.), drag and drop them into the Add-On Activities section.
   Only include these if scoped, since they incur additional cost.
   
   
7. Review Audience Summary
   Click "Audience Summary" to review your audience setup for each test group to confirm everything is correct.
   
   
   
8. Finalize your Audience
   Once you’re done setting up and reviewing your audience, move each test group from Draft to Ready status to finalize.
   
   

Concept test with 1 primary audience and 2 quotas:

• Example audience:
  • N=300 completes
  • Parents of children in diapers
  • Primary or shared responsibility for purchasing diapers
    • 70% currently purchasing mainstream diapers (Pampers, Huggie, Luvs, store brand)
    • 30% currently purchasing premium diapers (Honest, Millie Moon, Coterie)

1. When clicking into the audience tab for the first time, you will be prompted to add your number of completes per stimulus. Once you add your completes per stimulus, your completes will be evenly distributed across stimuli to make up your total N size. 
   
   After you have added your number of completes per stimulus, click “Define Audience”. 
   
2. Give your audience group a name. We will start with the 70% who are currently purchasing mainstream diapers. 
   
3. Next, add any criteria from Highlight’s standard profile data which can be found under the "Qualifying Criteria” tab on the right side. A list of standard profile data can be found here. For this test group we will add parental status criteria. 
   
   
4. Now we will add any custom criteria needed to define your audience beyond Highlight’s standard profile data. Custom criteria can be found under the "Qualifying Criteria” tab on the right side.
   
5. Once you click custom criteria you will be prompted to name your criteria. After you have added a name for your custom criteria, click the blue check mark. 
   
6. After your custom criteria has been added, click “Add Question”. This is how you will define how to screen for the custom criteria. 
   
7. Add your question and define the termination consequences for each answer choice on the right side. 
   
8. Repeat steps 5-8 to add any additional custom criteria. For this audience group we will add custom criteria for parents of children in diapers, primary or shared responsibility for purchasing diapers, and mainstream diaper purchasers. 
   
   
   
9. Next, we will create the audience group for the 30% currently purchasing premium diapers. Since the audience groups are identical other than the type of diapers purchased we will start with duplicating the first audience group. Click the “Duplicate” button above the first audience group. 
   
10. Update the name of your newly created audience group. 
    
11. Next, update the percentages of total audience for each audience group. For this example, Mainstream Diaper Purchasers will be 70% and Premium Diaper Purchasers will be 30%. 
    
    
12. Now we will update the custom criteria to be for premium diaper purchasers. In your premium diaper purchasers audience group scroll down to the mainstream diaper purchasers custom criteria and select the edit button to update the name. 
    
13. Click the blue check once you have updated the name for the custom criteria. 
    
14. Then update the termination consequences for each answer choice on the right side for the question so a premium diaper brand must be selected. 
    
    
15. After all audience groups have been added, click “Audience Summary” on the left side to review your audience set up. 
    
    
16. Once you’re done setting up and reviewing your audience, move your audience groups from “Draft” to “Ready” status.