Comments on: Election Lessons

By: Gerald Miller

Gerald Miller — Mon, 11 May 2015 18:47:33 +0000

Thumbs up again. Messaging seems the main thing (as ever). How can a big and one would thing sophisticated organization like the Labor Party not see the message(s) that need to be delivered and consistently deliver. Brand Management 101.

By: Sue M

Sue M — Mon, 11 May 2015 12:09:51 +0000

Watching the BBC election coverage from Florida makes you realise how lucky we are. The BBC is a model of clarity and fairness, polar opposites of what news, if any, we get here in the U.S.

By: Richard Bedwell

Richard Bedwell — Mon, 11 May 2015 10:19:04 +0000

Sheilas point on online polling is almost certainly right. It’s probably also true that, as we all know, online provides a perception of greater anonimity and maybe it’s more easy to lie about your intensions than when your responding to ‘a real person’ either face to face or over the phone.
What is also interesting is that now the public has seen the impact of having something closer to a multi-party system how much the talk is of bringing in a different voting system -rejected previously.
Did any ‘poll’ use a PR way of indicating preference?

By: Tim C

Tim C — Mon, 11 May 2015 09:41:22 +0000

DO YOU THINK THE TV DEBATES AND INTERVIEWS WITH LEADERS HAD ANY AFFECT?

By: Sheila

Sheila — Mon, 11 May 2015 09:30:42 +0000

Hi Brian. Nice one. I agree with your analyses and especially your comments regarding the poll inaccuracies. I would also add that the opinion polls may have been more wrong than usual because of the difficulties in recruiting representative samples and applying correct weightings when using on-line research methods. There are lots of things that can go wrong and polls have been wrong in the past however, I suspect there may be a correlation between the declining accuracy of the pollsters and the increase in internet surveys. Best wishes. Sheila

By: Mike Sommers

Mike Sommers — Mon, 11 May 2015 09:16:22 +0000

I don’t think the MR industry should beat itself up too much for those opinion polls being “wrong”. I’m sure they correctly measured the ‘opinion’ and broad intentions of the two major political tribes. All they missed was ‘differential turnout”. The Tory tribe were whipped up into such a fearful tizzy that the vast majority of them did what they said they were going to do and voted. Ed’s complete lack of charisma meant that the Labour tribe found it a bit easier to be distracted from their professed intentions by, say, long queues at the polling booth or rain or the TV schedule and therefore not to bother. There was no ‘late swing’ to the Tories. They were just better at getting their core support motivated.