Setting Up a Multi-Persona Discussion

A Discussion Chat project runs 3-8 personas through a guided conversation. The setup looks similar to Interview Chat, but the choices you make about who to invite and which format to pick change the output more than you'd expect.

The 3-step setup

1. Create the discussion project. From the homepage, "Create New Interview" → pick "Discussion Chat (Group Discussion)." Name it after the question you're testing, not the format ("Sparkling coffee pricing debate" beats "Group chat 3").

2. Pick 3-8 personas with deliberately opposing views. This is the most important choice. Five personas who all happen to be price-sensitive will produce a polite echo chamber, not a discussion. Aim for 2-3 supporting a position and 2-3 against, or at minimum, 2-3 personas whose day-to-day context would naturally produce different opinions on the topic.

3. Choose a format and start.

Focus group — Moderator keeps things moving and surfaces consensus/divergence. Best for acceptance tests, attitude research, concept screening.
Debate — Clear pro/con sides argue positions. Best for A vs B comparisons.
Roundtable — No preset positions, equal airtime. Best for exploratory research.

How the moderator behaves

The moderator persona is configured to:

Open with a clear question
Call on quieter personas ("X, what's your take?")
Pull back talkative ones ("Let's hear from others")
Surface disagreements ("Why do your views differ so much?")
Summarize what the group has agreed on vs. what's still contested

You can insert your own questions mid-discussion. The moderator will naturally route the conversation toward them.

Three concrete examples

Focus group on pricing (5 personas): 2 price-sensitive + 2 quality-first + 1 social trendsetter. Goal: find where the group converges on a price band and where it splits.

Debate on subscription vs. one-time purchase (6 personas): 3 supporting subscription (small business, individual user, heavy user), 3 supporting one-time (mid-size business, light user, privacy-sensitive). Goal: see which side's arguments hold up under pressure.

Roundtable on a new fitness app (5 personas): fitness beginner, advanced enthusiast, weight-loss focused user, senior user, rehab user. Goal: surface unmet needs across segments.

What you can do during the discussion

Watch in real time
Insert new questions
End early (once the group has converged or hit a wall)
Let it run to natural completion (moderator signals when no new ground is being covered)

What you can't do

Replace personas mid-discussion. The conversation is continuous — dropping a new persona in disrupts the thread, and removing one breaks the dynamic.
Edit transcripts as they generate. Transcripts are saved when the discussion ends.
Run more than 8 personas. Beyond that, turn-taking becomes unmanageable and quieter voices disappear.

When to skip Discussion and just do Interview

If you don't yet know what the contested points are, run Interview first. Discussion is most valuable when you already have a hypothesis about where opinions will collide — the value is in watching the collision play out, not in discovering disagreements from scratch.

Common setup mistakes

Picking 5 personas with similar profiles. You'll get 5 versions of one opinion. Vary demographics, life stage, or values.
Choosing Debate when you actually want exploration. Debate forces positions. If your topic doesn't have a clear "pro/con" framing, use Focus Group instead.
Setting no duration guidance. Without a target (e.g., 30 minutes minimum, 60 minutes max), the moderator can run short or drag on. Use the duration setting if the platform offers one.

Interview Chat vs. Discussion Chat
How many personas to include