Floodlight

Opinion polls, whether they are conducted in person, telephonically via an operator or IVR, or via the Internet, offer researchers unique insight into the public psyche on a certain issue or set of issues.  However, the validity of the data produced by these polls is critically dependent on how the polls are conducted, analyzed, and reported, and to some extent by whom.

Two weeks ago I wrote a blog post detailing the steps necessary for conducting a scientifically motivated opinion poll.  High quality opinion polls ask clearly worded, neutral questions, select poll respondents at random, include a population-representative sample of respondents, and survey a sample size large enough to account for sampling error.

It is fair to say that conducting a non-biased, solidly formulated opinion poll requires a large amount of both time and effort.

Opinion polls offer important insight into the thoughts and feelings of a population towards a certain person, issue, or subject, to be sure.  But do they actually serve to sway public opinion in one way or another, merely upon their release?   Do opinion polls act as tools of influence as opposed to education?

Major polling organizations argue that the polls exert authority over the public in the same way a discussion on public affairs would.  But do they actually influence the changing tide of public sentiment in one direction or another?

This issue often times represents a gray area in opinion polls.  Scientifically correct opinion polls conducted by reputable organizations are important tools in understanding public sentiment and accurately represent public attitudes.

The problem comes when organizations use the results of reputably conducted polls to distort or skew the beliefs and outcomes in a way that misrepresents the factual data in order to push a specific agenda.

In instances where information is poorly reported, full source information is often times not available or offered only partially.  It is important that those citing an opinion poll within their story cite the full and unabridged source material so that users can analyze these results on their own, independent of the news source reporting on the data.

Additionally, badly or incorrectly reported opinion poll data goes far to tarnish the credibility of public opinion polls as well.  When a poll is conducted in a biased or non-representative manner, the data is inaccurate and untrustworthy.  These poorly conducted polls become problematic when news agencies fail to distinguish between good polls and bad polls, reporting on the quality polls along with the inaccurate ones.

Opinion polling is not to be taken lightly and is a comprehensive, meticulous endeavor for those individuals and agencies that wish to conduct the polls properly. Luckily there are products like Floodlight on the market that have accounted for all of these scenarios and streamlined the polling interface to make data collection accurate and easy for those wanting to engage a specific audience.

If you read the news, especially the technology section, you will quickly notice a lot of hemming and hawing over privacy on social media sites.  You are guaranteed to find at least one article every couple of days talking about the egregious privacy violations of (insert social network here).

Privacy isn’t a paltry or arbitrary concern.  On our IVR blog, IVR Deconstructed, Plum writers have posted a slew of articles detailing myriad privacy infringements and violations committed by companies like Google, Apple and Facebook.

The rapidly rising popularity of social networks has meant that a huge number of people have become users and uploaded a vast amount of personal data to these websites.  Everything from personal information to location data and photographs have been readily uploaded and cached.  But happens to this data that has been so willingly shared?

A lot of times, companies like Google and Facebook disseminate user-submitted data to market research firms and companies interested in understanding a certain demographic of users.  Social networks are by-and-large free to subscribe to and use, so to earn money at least initially, websites had to appeal to advertisers and other companies by offering them the valuable information they were freely receiving.

Since their early days of operation, these social networks have seen users and even governments become increasingly privacy-conscious, demanding transparency in privacy practices.  The bottom line?  Users want to know exactly where their data is stored and whom it is shared with.

The caveat of this seemingly beneficial push for privacy is that these social networks have been extremely loath to implement preferred privacy practices.  They make the process as enigmatic as possible, setting up a labyrinth of pages and steps for users to go through to achieve the privacy settings they ultimately desire.

A survey was actually conducted asking users to compare Google and Facebook’s privacy policies with those of other organizations (government notices, bank credit card agreements and band [bank?] reward-program rules).  The results?  Seventy percent of respondents were able to correctly answer comprehension questions for government notices, followed by 68% of respondents who provided the correct answers for credit card agreement comprehension.

Only 39% and 36% of Facebook and Google privacy comprehension questions were answered correctly in comparison.  Those are pretty abysmal statistics.

Perhaps as a testament to the generally enigmatic nature of social networking privacy policies, another recently released Consumer Reports survey found that a full 13 million U.S.-based Facebook users do not use privacy settings in any capacity.

Despite reports detailing flagrant privacy violations and a general lack of knowledge on how much information is actually being collected about users and how it is being used, a full 13 million Facebook users “do no use, or are unaware of, the privacy settings provided by Facebook.”

The real question is, can you blame them?  As someone who long ago deactivated and deleted their Facebook account for this very reason, I am thankful for my foresight and that I don’t have to try to make sense of these ridiculously confusing documents.  But what about those who do?  Shouldn’t these social media sites be more user-friendly and make their privacy policies much easier to understand?

Opinion polls are frequently referenced as a barometer designed to measure a population’s sentiment and feeling towards certain issues.  While opinion polls are used to determine thoughts on political and apolitical issues alike, the polls receive wide amounts of exposure in election years due to their usage in measuring public sentiment towards a certain candidate, issue or referendum.

Polls attempt to detail and describe the beliefs and positions of an overall population by conducting a survey composed of a mathematically representative sample of people in the attempt to quantify the values of a populace as a whole.  Opinion polls are a deeply ingrained practice in the American political system, with the first poll taking place in 1824 and continuing in prominence through today.

Opinion polls have indeed become a staple of market research in democratic countries, and there are hundreds of thousands of organizations worldwide that specialize in opinion polling.  But how accurate and representative are the polls? Opinion polls are designed and implemented with the intent of gauging overall perceptions or specific feelings a subject or group of subjects hold towards a topic.

The problem with this idea is that an opinion is a qualitative, not quantitative element.  How do you systematically and mathematically measure each and every person’s feeling about a particular issue by simply collecting data from a small group of people?  Is that not counterintuitive?

There are several qualities that distinguish good polls and bad polls.  Good polls ask questions that are worded clearly and are neutral in tone and structure.  Poll respondents are selected at random, and the sample size of a poll must be large enough that sampling error (which is a feature of every poll) is relatively small.

A bad poll, then, violates any one of the aforementioned elements of a good poll.  Asking leading or biased questions, allowing poll respondents to self-appoint themselves for participation, and polling a small, non-representative sample can skew the results of any poll and invalidate their findings.

In light of these basic polling standards, the next issue becomes how do polls (whether they are conducted in a scientific, organized fashion or not) influence overall public opinion?  Is public opinion already formed and solidified prior to polling, or does polling influence sentiment?

Tune in next week for a more in-depth analysis of these questions and their effects on public opinion overall.

It’s easy to conceptualize the idea of a robbery, a car jacking or a burglary because it’s possible to formulate a concrete image of an attacker, even if the details are imprecise.  It’s much harder to visualize network and cyber attacks, because while there are often tangible effects of attacks, the “attacker” in this scenario is much more abstract.

A recent survey conducted by Bit9 polled information technology professionals in an attempt to gauge the security climate of the business world.   According to an article posted by ComputerWorld, 64% of the more than 2,000 IT professionals surveyed believe their companies will suffer a cyber attack in the next 6 months.

So who is the most likely culprit for this attack?  At 61%, IT specialists largely agree that hacktivist collectives like Anonymous present the most threat to corporate security.  Other perceived threats include cybercriminals, nation states, corporate competitors and disgruntled employees.

Ironically, however, respondents cited malware as the most likely method of attack, which is a technique typically associated with cybercriminals, not hacktivists.  In terms of budget dedicated to staving off security threats, the majority of corporate budgets were dedicated to combating and preventing malware and phishing attacks.

So why is everyone so afraid of Anonymous?  For starters, the group is extremely high profile, and when they execute an attack, it makes international news.  Typically, Anonymous doesn’t conduct attacks at random (which is why it’s odd that so many IT professionals would have such a heightened level of concern about the group), but rather does so in a calculated, deliberate manner.

Per ComputerWorld: “The reason why most IT professionals fear attacks from Anonymous is the bad publicity such attacks generate.  If you’re attacked by Anonymous the world is going to know because the announcement will be on Pastebin in 24 hours.”

Both the intention behind the attacks and the resulting attention they receive make Anonymous attacks dreaded and feared among corporate communications professionals, although realistically it is far more likely that they will be targeted by a run-of-the-mill cybercriminal

Many of us would find it inconceivable to imagine a day without the Internet.  We wake up, hop online to check weather and traffic, stream music or podcasts on our way to work, and then proceed to spend hours at work checking and sending emails, doing research, and storing our business data on various cloud-powered programs.

Beyond that, many of us use the Internet to shop, to book travel, and to catch up with our friends and relatives on a frequent basis.  For many of us, the Internet is an omnipresent facet of our daily lives that powers vital and non-vital communications alike.

While some of us have become critically dependent on network accessibility to power our lives, a new poll published by Pew research sheds light on the minority of the population that does not frequently utilize the Internet.  Per a recently released study, “one in five U.S. adults still does not use the Internet at all.”  A full 20% of the American public is not accessing the Internet or going online for any reason.

To many of us, this statistic is inconceivable.  The reason most cited for this non-use?  Disinterest. Among non-users surveyed, they don’t use the Internet because they don’t find it relevant to them in their daily lives and they don’t need it to look up information or for communications purposes.  An additional reason cited was cost, with users stating that Internet usage was too expensive, or that they could not afford to purchase a computer.

In terms of demographics, there are several very specific groups non-Internet users typically fall into.  According to an article published on CNN, “59% of U.S. seniors don’t go online.  Also, nearly 60% of U.S. adults who never completed high school don’t use the Internet.  And they’re mostly poor—nearly 40% of people with an annual household income under $30,000 don’t go online.”

This poll demonstrates that broadband access is a critical factor in both Internet usage and the desire to access the Internet.  Mobile devices do enable people to access online content, with many citing their smartphone as their primary vehicle for online access.

This study ultimately demonstrates that once users are able to access online content, they are more likely to become frequent and even avid users, using the Internet to not only find content, but to share information they have found and create new content as well.

Technology is an omnipresent staple of personal and professional life for millions of people.  In a testament to its cultural permanence, websites have become brands that have in turn become proper nouns and verbs.

Have you found yourself Facebooking the night away?  When many people speak of wanting an Apple, they aren’t referring to the fruit.  Come across an event, concept, person or term you aren’t familiar with?  Just Google it.  Have something short and sweet to say?  Well that garners a Tweet.

While these terms may not have been added to the formal lexicon quite yet, nearly everyone will know exactly what you are saying when you bring them up without requiring further explanation.

Whether you use Google to locate information, Facebook to advertise your business, or the iPhone is your smartphone of choice, these top technologies influence the way we live, work, and communicate.  So how are these companies perceived?

ABC News and the Washington Post recently conducted a poll of a thousand randomly selected American adults utilizing both landlines and cell phones in order to measure public perception of the top technology companies.

The study only inquired about four companies, Google, Apple, Facebook, and Twitter, and asked a single question: “Overall, do you have a favorable or unfavorable impression of (insert company name here)?  Do you feel that way strongly or somewhat?”

The results are actually quite surprising (from the perspective of someone who frequently writes about technology that is).  In the top spot, with an 82% favorability rating was Google.  Beyond that a full 53% of people have a strongly favorable perception of the company, with only 9% having an unfavorable view of Google (perhaps they need to check out some posts published on the Plum blog and accessible here and here.

Apple came in second with a 74% favorability rating with 13% viewing the company in a negative light.  Facebook pulled off a 58% favorability rating with 28% holding an unfavorable view.  Rounding out the top four, Twitter had only a 34% favorable rating with 36% of respondents holding an unflattering opinion.

The poll’s execution method certainly leaves something to be desired in terms of methodology.  Because pollsters contacted respondents telephonically, there was an element of self-selection involved, which could ultimately compromise the results.

In addition, a sample size of a thousand people is not enough to gauge the thoughts and attitudes of an entire nation, simply because it represents a miniscule percentage of the population.

What this poll does demonstrate is that individual brand perception, especially that of major corporations, is almost implicit.  People have intimate personal and professional interactions with these brands and products on a daily basis, and come to form very distinct and strong opinions surrounding them.

For those companies that received positive reviews, they can congratulate themselves that their widespread marketing efforts have been able to engender positive feelings from consumers.  Those who didn’t fair so well can examine both specific incidents and overall brand presentation in an attempt to understand their customers’ negativity and work towards improvement.

If this poll shows us anything, it’s that these technology companies are an important part of our daily lives, and they aren’t going anywhere.

World War II.  Casablanca.  Winston Churchill.  Jazz. Rita Hayworth. Pearl Harbor.  The Slinky. Frank Sinatra. Yalta and Potsdam. Howdy Doody. The Fountainhead. Swing. V-J Day.  Film Noir.

The 1940’s were a decade of change, transformation, and metamorphosis.  They began amidst the Great Depression, with a war mounting across the globe that would come to define the decade.  A tumultuous ten-year period that forever altered the course of history, and saw both destruction and innovation.

It is difficult to sit at a computer, with social networks, online shopping, streaming music, and other advanced forms of technology readily accessible, and not think of the 40’s as a mythic time far removed from the present.

Around the country and probably the world today, people will be hearkening back to the 1940s, thinking of what life was like for the people who lived it.  Why?  Because the United States Census Bureau will be releasing detailed data, including individual forms handwritten forms, filled out 72 years ago as a part of the 1940 census.

Census forms providing information on more than 132 million Americans are set to hit the web, and will included information like respondent birthplace, citizenship status, occupation, race, info about wages and income, employment status, education levels, and even information on the cost of housing.

This is the first time that individual information will be unsealed, and will allow historians to study trends in an exceedingly in depth manner.  The census was conducted in 1940 with the goal of understanding how far reaching the effects of the Great Depression were on the American populace.

For researchers, pollsters, and anyone with a general interest in survey methodology, the 1940 census data will offer an in depth glimpse at the evolution of wide-scale market research prior to the tech revolution.

The U.S. Census Bureau will be compiling information into an easily accessible, conveniently searchable format that will allow website visitors to view maps, find specific statistics, and even view digital images of the original census forms.  In depth U.S. census data remains sealed for 72 years in order to ensure confidentiality.

Some interesting initial statistics from the 1940 census?  Per NPR, the three most populous states were New York, Pennsylvania, and Illinois.  Only 5% of the population had college degrees.  The top five industries were manufacturing, agriculture, retail, and personal and professional services.

Per CBS News, 68% of women between the ages of 20 and 34 were married compared to 2010 where 55.6% of women had never been married by the age of 34.  The same goes for men, with 65.6 % having never been married by age 34 in 2010, compared with 43.9% in 1940.

Historians, statisticians, and market researchers alike will inevitably be perusing the data for tips, advice, and even interesting tidbits that can help them reflect upon and potentially enhance the methods and methodology still in place today.

So says Dorothy as she clicks her ruby slippers while trying to return to Kansas from Oz.  And its true, we all love returning “home” after a long day’s work, “home” for the holidays, and “home” to relax.  So what exactly makes a certain place (city or country) the best place to call home?

A simple Google search will bring up thousands of results based on scientific and non-scientific surveys that compile a specific list of the world’s most attractive locales to inhabit.  Do you like adventure?  How about nightlife?  The arts? Open space?  There are hundreds of lists that cover a wide variety of individual preferences.  So how is one to choose?

The lists released by international governmental and non-governmental organizations typically use scientific measurements in order to compile the data and often base the results on quality of life variables.  Quality of life variables include healthcare, family and community life, material wealth, job security, political stability and security, climate and geography, political freedom, and work-life balance.

The results are interesting, and there is a fair amount of variation.  A survey conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has released a survey based on work-life balance (defined as the average length of a work day, the employment rate of women with children, and the time devoted to leisure and personal care).  The results?  In ascending order Estonia, Slovenia, France, Portugal, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Belgium, Finland, The Netherlands, Norway, and at #1 Denmark.  The citizens who are able to call Europe home seem to have it pretty good.

How about a survey based on the world’s best property conducted by The Telegraph, a UK based newspaper? The variables measured within this survey are markedly different than the quality of life survey, and focus primarily on the trappings of city life including real estate and nightlife.  The top ten places to live in this survey?  In descending order Hong Kong, New York City, North Island (NZ), Turks and Caicos Islands, Tasmania, Maui, Buenos Aires, Barbados, Victoria British Columbia, and Cape Town.

Another survey published by Human Resources Consultants International lists the top 15 best cities to live in the world in 2012 based on the afore mentioned quality of life index.  Once again in descending order Vienna, Zurich, Geneva, Auckland, Singapore, Vancouver, Munich, Monte Carlo, Frankfurt, Arlington, Sydney, Bath, Copenhagen, Honolulu, and Oslo.

There are certainly some notable trends within the lists, in spite of which factors are being measured.  Europe typically comes out on top regardless of what variable is being surveyed, bigger cities were not often mentioned, tropical locations featured prominently, and the United States barely made any of the lists (aside from New York and Hawaii).

While all three surveys mentioned were commissioned and conducted with the intent of measuring very different features and qualities of a location, there are marked similarities in the results.  So is there really a superior place to call home?  The answer is all relative and can vary significantly depending on what is individually important.  But I bet very few people would complain while sunning themselves in their backyard on Maui or Turks and Caicos.

While shopping, have you ever stumbled upon an item that you would very much like to purchase?  Instead of doing so immediately, have you ever done a quick Internet search to explore your options?  A large majority of consumers have, and as someone who has ordered items online, there is a very specific reason I have forgone store purchases: price and convenience.

Often times, items are significantly cheaper online than they are in store.  Because a large number of consumers own smartphones, locating competitive pricing information online while in a store has become increasingly effortless.  Consumers are finding that goods online often come at a much cheaper price point and are relatively convenient to purchase.

A market research firm (ClickIQ) recently conducted a comprehensive study dissecting consumer behavior and found that “29% of consumers who use a smartphone to research a product while at any retail store end up purchasing the item from an online only retailer.”

How did ClickIQ conduct this study?  They polled around 3,800 U.S.-based consumers in order to discover how their mobile device plays into their in-store shopping experience.  Their findings were quite interesting, in that there were very definitive differences in shopping behavior based on both age and gender.

The consumers most likely to make a purchase online as opposed to in-store?  Research found that they were more likely to be men at 55% to 45% female.  They were also more likely to be younger, with those between the ages of 30-39 utilizing their mobile device 26% of the time, with those between 18-29 using their mobile device 25% of the time while shopping.

There were also several retailers that were uniquely affected by consumers visiting in order to conduct research as opposed to making a purchase.  Best Buy, Walmart, and Target were all high on the list, but Best Buy and Target had better in-store customer purchase rates, whereas Walmart lost 24% of purchasers to Amazon.

So why were consumers more apt to purchase online as opposed to in-store?  About two-thirds stated that price was their determining factor, 14% cited availability, 8% features, and 7% free shipping.

This research demonstrates the type of competition huge retail stores face from the online marketplace.  Because online retailers are not operating in a physical storefront, they are able to eliminate many overhead costs (and often taxes) in order to make their products competitive.

The appeal of online shopping is hard to dispute, especially when you have looked at a product in-store and know exactly what to expect.  You want something in grey instead of red?  Just pop online and it can be yours in 2-3 days.

These behavioral insights into shopper’s preferences can be extremely valuable to online and physical retailers alike, and there is no doubt that this consumer data will be utilized by both entities to appeal to shoppers’ interests and desires.

There is no shortage of educational rankings, on both a global and national level, for prospective students in a variety of academic disciplines to view when attempting to make their scholastic decisions.

There are myriad higher education rankings that order undergraduate, post-graduate, and doctoral programs based on a variety of factors.  Variables assessed include (but are not limited to) reputation, graduation rate, student selectivity, and faculty resources.

But do these rankings matter?  How great of an affect do these numbers have on the student selection and application process?  According to a University of Michigan study that assessed the effect of rankings (very meta), it was confirmed that various rankings have significantly affected the number of applicants and admissions to universities.

In the United States U.S. News & World Report rankings are known as the most influential source of college ranking data, and the list has been compiled annually since 1983.  In fact, according to Wikipedia, this study’s ranking order is so influential that a one-rank improvement leads to a 0.9% increase in the number of applicants to any given university.

The variables used by US News to designate rankings have changed over the years, but they weigh various criterion in order of importance to come up with both a mathematical equation and a survey that contribute to the final rankings data.  Based on the weight a category has been given (for example faculty resources like average class size, student-faculty ratio, and faculty degree level have been appropriated greater weight at 20% than alumni giving rate at 5%), the numbers will all contribute to the final number that determines actual rank.

A variety of surveys utilize weighted response rates in order to be representative, accurate, and thorough when compiling and releasing data.  The US News survey is no different, and while percentages may vary based on popular opinion and cultural norms, the concept of weighting elements has not.

Just yesterday, US News’ rankings of a variety of institutions for 2013 were released.  Medical school, graduate education, graduate business school, engineering, and law were all among rankings distributed.  Factors varied based on the academic discipline that was being ranked.  Law school rankings included a bar passage rate component whereas medial school rankings include a ranking for primary care, which asses the percentage of graduating students who enter primary-care residencies in family practice, pediatrics, or internal medicine.

Unfortunately, the results are available only via purchase, so I am unable to offer the top 5 rankings in each category, but the survey itself is an excellent demonstration of weighted respondent data being used to great effect.