What is involved
in User Group Planning and Moderation?

First, a Cypress Research Group project director will work with you to determine the logistics of your User Group Meeting: Where and when will it be held? Who should be invited? Do we pay for everything, or do our Users pay their own way? How often do we hold the meeting?

Second, your project director will moderate your User Group. What are the advantages to having a third-party moderate your User Group? To prevent you from wasting your money and time, or worse, damaging your relationship with your customers.

User Groups tend to fail for one of two reasons:
1. Issues that Users really want to address are brushed over, and the meeting looks and feels like a sales presenation. The Users leave disappointed and never go to another User Group again.
2. Users take this opportunity to ‘beat up’ the sponsoring vendor. The vendor leaves dejected and overwhelmed. Employees never want to go to another User Group again.

Both of these scenarios are avoidable! User Groups should be an open and constructive forum for moving both agendas forward – vendor’s and User’s. A third-party moderator ensures that the meetings are productive, that all voices are heard but none dominate, and that a proper balance between Users’ and vendors’ needs is found.

Third, the information gathered during a User Group (what the vendors agreed to do and what the Users agreed to do) is captured and documented. This information is feed back to our clients’ and the Users so that progress on the ‘action items’ can be measured and reviewed during the next User Group. We also ask for evaluations of the User Group by participants. This information is compared to evaluations of all other User Groups we’ve conducted in order to benchmark your performance and our performance during the Group.


Contact a User Group Moderator from Cypress Research Group