When your values aren’t reflected in contemporary public opinion you don’t just give up. You work to win people over.
Fortunately public opinion is a fluid thing that we can squeeze, pump and stir and sometimes just opening a little gate lets it rush into a brand new space.
We’re really interested in what people think about issues, it’s always fascinating and often nothing like what you expected.
Naturally we need to use the right sort of research for the job and be thorough in our methodology and approach.
But in truth it’s not that hard. Essentially we just ask people what they think and they tell us. We’ve found that Australians are pretty forthcoming with their opinions.
The tricky bit is figuring out how to change what they think and how they behave. That’s what’s so fascinating to us and what really matters to our clients.
For example if we’re working for a candidate and we confidently determine that their two party preferred voting intention is 48% that sure is vital information. But just telling them how much they’re going to lose by isn’t overly helpful. They want to know how they can get to 51% and win.
Whatever the job we need to develop hypotheses – the things we think might work – and field test them.
Then we have to ruthlessly chuck out the stuff that doesn’t work. Even more importantly we need to refine and improve the things that do work to squeeze out every last drop of movement that we can.
In the end we’ll find the language and ideas you can evoke to activate the right frames so you can shape public opinion.