Remember this when you read your next opinion poll

by | May 4, 2005 | Communicating, Politics | 2 comments

From The Tyee:

The Professional Marketing Research Society, which represents Canadian pollsters and market researchers, reports that about four out of every five respondents contacted by Canadian pollsters refuse to participate. Because of answering machines and call display technology, half the calls that pollsters make are never answered.

2 Comments

  1. Thursday
    Thursday on 7 May 2005 at 15:47

    I’ve got my “letter to the editor” ready to go when the story starts to drift to what polls say instead of what candidates say…

  2. Rob
    Rob on 7 May 2005 at 19:32

    Heh. This reminds me of Declan’s superb post on the “media failure two-step”:

    Step 1) Cause something (bad) to happen through your reporting.
    Step 2) Report on this (bad) thing from the perspective of an innocent bystander.
    And then you just repeat indefinitely.

    Got it? Need an example? No problem, start with the basic step.

    Step 1. Write 10 columns/posts about the latest poll results
    Step 2. Write a column/post complaining about how the media has nothing but ‘horserace’ coverage

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