The methods, mapped
| Method | What it answers | When | Cost band |
|---|---|---|---|
| Litigation focus group | How do ordinary people react to these facts? What story do they build? | Early, pre-suit through discovery | Low to mid, per session |
| Mock trial | How does the built case perform under adversarial pressure? Verdict leanings, damages | Late discovery to eve of trial | $10,000 to $60,000+ |
| AI jury simulation | Both of the above, on a rerunnable venue-matched panel, plus version and venue comparisons | Any stage, repeatedly | 10 to 20% of a live mock |
| Community attitude survey | What does this venue's jury pool believe about the parties, the industry, the case type? | Venue decisions, change-of-venue motions | Mid; survey-firm pricing |
| Voir dire research | Which juror profiles help or hurt, and what should we ask in selection? | Pre-trial | Consultant-quoted |
| Shadow jury | How is the actual trial landing, day by day? | During trial | Premium; scales with trial length |
| Post-trial juror interviews | What actually decided it, for next time? | After verdict, where permitted | Low to mid |
How to sequence them
- Case assessment: a focus group or a simulated panel read on the raw facts. The question is what case you have, before deciding what to spend on it.
- Venue decisions: community attitude data or simulated panels compared across candidate venues.
- Story development: iterate themes against panels. This is where rerunnable simulation pays for itself; live exercises are too expensive to repeat per revision.
- Pre-mediation: a damages-focused panel read on the anchors both sides will argue.
- Trial-ready: for the largest exposures, a live mock trial on the final story, and voir dire research to prepare selection.
- During and after trial: a shadow jury if stakes justify it; post-trial interviews wherever the court allows, because verdicts are the only ground truth this field ever gets.
The economics that changed the sequence
For decades the toolkit was rationed by price: one live exercise late in the case, everything else reserved for the largest matters. Simulation reprices the early and middle stages. When a panel read costs 10 to 20 percent of a live mock and returns the same day, testing the story becomes routine work rather than a capital event, and the live formats get saved for what they alone do: real humans, in a room, reacting to your best version. The cost structure across all formats is detailed in the cost guide.
Common questions
What is the most reliable jury research method?
No single method predicts a jury; each samples the venue differently. Reliability comes from convergence: when the focus group's language, the panel's themes, and the mock trial's deliberations all point the same way, trust the direction. Our methodology page covers how we validate the simulated version.
What does jury research cost overall?
From a few thousand dollars for a simulated panel read or single focus group to well past $60,000 for consultant-run mock trials, with shadow juries priced per trial week on top. The cost guide has the format-by-format numbers.
Which method first on a new case?
The cheapest honest read on the raw facts: today that is a simulated panel or a single focus group. Both tell you what story the case wants to be before you spend to perfect it.