- Posted: December 13, 2016
The ARF partnered with GreenBook to assemble a forum of this highly charged topic. Ten industry experts were on hand, with ARF EVP Chris Bacon serving as moderator for the panel discussion. Here are excerpts from the event:
Gary Langer, Langer Research and formerly ABC News:
- There is no real “sample” of voters, only estimates of likely voters. This adds uncertainty, especially in predicting the electoral college vote
- Polling is not just about the horse race, as we use it to collect important information on what voters were thinking
Raghavan Mayur, TechnoMetrica Market Intelligence:
- You can never compensate for bad data
Cliff Young, Ipsos Public Affairs:
- We are in a political era of uncertainty worldwide. It is anti-establishment. This means we also need new methods (for polling)
- This was a “disruption” election, which globally accounts for only 15%. And in these elections, past behavior may not be a useful guide
Matthew Oczkowski, Cambridge Analytics:
- As with marketing research, it is all about finding the right consumer with the right message at the right time
- His role is to help clients win elections. Micro-targeting is a key component. He worked as a consultant for Trump team
Rick Bruner, Viant Inc:
- We need more random control trials (to improve polling). We also need more behavioral inputs
- Underlying values are important, like we do for marketing. For potential voters, this begins with “do I vote?”
Melanie Courtright, Research Now:
- Everything was different in 2016!
- We need samples representing the real population (of voters)
Jared Schreiber, Infoscout:
- The undecided and the indifferent voters matter a lot (swung to Trump)
Dr. Aaron Reid, Sentient:
- Traditional methods are not accurate enough
- Need to measuring the unconscious – people may have had conscious access to answer the researcher’s questions
Tom Anderson, Odin Text:
- Collected 3,000 Americans via Google Surveys one week before the election (inexpensive and predictive). Goal was positioning, finding out what candidates stand for via simple text
- Three issues: Non response bias; “Shy Trump” voter; voter identification
Taylor Schreiner, Tube Mogul:
- How will this (failure) impact CMO’s opinion of research
- We need more experimentation
- Let’s use this election as a teachable and learnable moment
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