Your 'Master Class' Chance to Learn Do It Yourself Polling Secrets

Mario Canseco knows how to find out what people want. He's vice-president of one of North America's most successful polling organizations, Angus Reid Public Opinion.

And one of the things a lot of people seem to want is an answer to this question:

How do I survey customers, employees or the general public without paying a zillion dollars to some big polling company?

You can get the answer by attending The Tyee's Master Class on Sunday, April 28. Spend just five hours and 200 dollars and walk out empowered with knowledge about the new world of public opinion research -- including how to conduct effective surveys on your own. There are still spots left in the class and you can find out more and register here.

Join us and you'll be served lunch and a glass of wine in the Tyee's newsroom setting -- and the money you spend may save you ten or even a hundred times that in market research costs down the road.

"Polling and market research are changing dramatically because of speed," say Canseco. "Gathering information from a pool of respondents can be done online in hours, when it used to take days on the phone and weeks of face-to-face interviews. The key is to know how to conduct the research, identify target markets (whether you're testing a soda or launching a political campaign), and have a questionnaire that will provide you with the insights you seek."

Poorly crafted surveys produce false results that can send you off on a wild goose chase, warns Canseco. "Stacking the deck in favour of an outcome, with a biased questionnaire, will result in bad data that will guide a poorly made decision. People who rely on polling, or would like to in the future, need to be able to spot the differences and ensure that their research is sound."

Date changed, now on April 28

This Master Class was originally slated for Saturday, March 23 but due to a scheduling conflict, it's been postponed to Sunday, April 28. The hours remain the same, however, starting at 10 a.m. and finishing around 3 p.m.

The Tyee asked Canseco to discuss some basic misunderstandings about the art and business of polling he consistently encounters. He cheerfully obliged.

"Too often people make a basic mistake: the correlation of an issue (any issue) to predict a sudden change in political support. Economic confidence in the U.S. was at 22 per cent when Obama faced the electorate in 2012. It did not stop him from getting 51 per cent of the vote. People vote for a wide variety of reasons -- not just one. You have to know how to identify the difference between data that just shows correlation, and data that is more likely showing causation."

Another big problem, says Canseco, "is the assumption that all polling has to be done by telephone, and that any new approach is skewed. I have had the opportunity to work in 34 elections where the outcome has been predicted properly using online methodologies, and it is ultimately that same level of discipline on sampling and analysis that should guide any polling project.

"I'm not surprised to see retired academics continuing to question the validity of online methodologies -- they are utterly unprepared to offer an accurate assessment of the industry. Plus, with response rates as low as nine per cent in nationwide telephone surveys in North America, how much of a balanced sample are you truly getting?"

Using concrete examples from his own work (from deciding to alter product packaging to a look inside the provincial Liberal campaign), Canseco will spend the morning running through a primer on qualitative research (like focus groups) and quantitative research (like surveys), followed by an in-depth look at what the findings of this research means. The afternoon will have you break into groups to develop your own surveys and questionnaires for a product or candidate of your choice. Mario will then provide your group with the feedback required to refine your survey and tackle the findings. After a solid day of polling workshops, we guarantee that 20 out of 20 students will be satisfied.

Please don't delay in registering. To get started just click here. If you are a Tyee Builder, don't forget to inquire about your discount.

Tyee Master Classes help strengthen democratic skills and proceeds fund more journalism at The Tyee.

For information about more Tyee Master Classes being offered this spring click here.