Research Studies
For think tanks, charities and non-profit organisations
Who you ask decides what you find.
Most research hears from the loudest people who are always heard. The survey goes out, the confident and well-connected answer first, and the findings quietly reflect them. We design studies that go looking for everyone else, then weight their answers so they count.
Research built on the same values as your organisation
If your organisation exists to make things fairer, your evidence should be gathered fairly too. Ipsa Consulting designs and delivers research for organisations that need to understand their public, their community or their audience before they decide, campaign or build.
We'll take a kernel of an idea, a funder's brief or a full invitation to tender and turn it into a study you can stand behind: clear research questions, a sampling plan that reaches past the usual suspects, mixed methods that give you breadth and depth, and findings written in plain English.
How we work
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Shape the question with you
We start with collaborative workshops with your team to agree what you need to find out and why. We're honest about what your budget and timeline can deliver, and about the strengths and limits of each approach, before a single question is written.
Design for who's missing
We build the sampling and weighting plan first. For Exeter UNESCO City of Literature we created a scoring system that gave a higher, more equitable weight to responses from people who are traditionally marginalised, so their experience shaped the recommendations instead of being averaged away.
Mix the methods
A wide online survey gives you breadth. One-to-one interviews give you depth. Focus groups show you how people talk an issue through together. We combine them so each method tests what the others found, and we pilot and cognitively test questions with real participants before fieldwork begins.
Recruit and run the fieldwork
We recruit through your networks, partner organisations and targeted paid social, and we thank participants properly for their time. This is where our marketing experience comes in handy!
Turn findings into decisions Responses are scored against the criteria we agreed at the start, then grouped into themes ranked by weight. You get clear recommendations, the data behind them and a write-up of the method, so your board, funders and critics can see how every conclusion was reached. We can also author and design a report for you.
FAQ’s
Frequently asked questions about research studies
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Think tanks, research institutes, charities, CICs, foundations and purpose-led organisations across the UK. We draw a line: we don't work with organisations that harm people or the planet, and that applies to research as much as marketing.
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Yes, through a specialist panel partner, with the sample weighted to ONS population estimates. Where you need to hear from specific communities, we add targeted recruitment so smaller groups are large enough to report on in their own right.
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Studies start from £4,500 +VAT. The cost depends on sample size, the mix of methods and how much analysis you want us to do. We'll show you a costed breakdown by task, so you can see exactly where the budget goes.
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A focused study typically takes 6–10 weeks from first workshop to final report. We'll tell you at the start whether your milestones are realistic and, if they're not, what we'd change.
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Either. Some clients want the full study from question to recommendations. Others have analysts in-house and want us to design, field and deliver clean data with a technical report. We'll scope it around your team.
What our clients say…
Tell us what you need to find out
At Ipsa Consulting we believe that any organisation can take proactive steps to becoming more inclusive, listen harder and use that data to help our society take big strides forward.