01. What topics do Independent and Democratic voters want Democrats to discuss?

Results from a survey of 1000 likely Independent and Democratic voters conducted 2.21.24 - 2.23.24

I read a lot of political news. Too much really. Every 3rd article or so, I read a pundit or strategist claiming to speak with authority about what voters want Democrats to say or what Democrats should talk about to win the next election.

I'm also a research strategist. I help big businesses and entrepreneurs figure out what new brands to start and products to launch.

When I look at the data these prophets are using to justify their opinions, I can't say I'm impressed. Not that there's anything wrong with, say, a public opinion poll or a sojourn to a diner, they aren't predictive, strategic methodologies.

It should be no surprise then that researchers have concluded that nobody knows which political ads work and why.

We don't know what Democrats should say because the methodologies being used to make those determinations are not designed for that purpose.

So, let's try something different.

Our objective

We are going to try to answer 3 questions:

1. What topics should Democratic leaders discuss more to increase voters' support for the Democratic party?

What do voters wish Democratic Leaders would say about those topics?
What messages will voters share with their communities?

Why not just ask what messages will increase vote share? We can only measure that a few times a year. And each year is different. What worked last year may not work this year, as the article linked above outlines.

But sharing? That's something we can measure regularly.

Our methodology

Our process has 3 steps.

First, we need to answer questions 1 and 2. To do that, we will survey a sample of 1000 likely Democratic and Independent voters. For this experiment, it's not worth the resources to include Republican voters.

Next, we will turn those open-ended survey responses into messaging concepts. Finally, we will run our survey again, this time testing those concepts for their shareability. This test will be less like a message test and more like a value proposition test.

This post though, will only answer question 1. Once the analysis is complete, I'll follow up with the answer to question 2.

If there's enough interest, I'll run a follow-up survey to answer question 3. In future surveys, I'll be able to test all 3 questions at once.

Why not just skip to question 3?

Generally speaking, we try to avoid guessing what voters might want to hear. If we do that, we might be missing out on the best potential messaging concepts because we can't read voters' minds. To make matters worse, we're all infected by our own substantial biases. That's why we listen first, then we propose ideas based on what we have learned.

The ask

I'll just be honest, this is too expensive and time-consuming for me to do as a hobby. That's probably why you haven't heard about anyone trying it before. But here's what I can promise:

• With 800 paying subscribers I can answer all 3 questions monthly
• With 1600 paying subscribers I can answer all 3 questions every 2 weeks

Otherwise, I'll probably run this experiment quarterly, but that's not going to yield the most valuable results.

So, what do voters want Democrats to discuss?

A few more things before we answer that. First, on its own, the answer to this question is interesting, but it has very little strategic value.

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Just because we know what topics voters would like Democrats to discuss, that does not mean we have any idea what voters want Democrats to say about those topics.

For that, you'll have to wait for the next post. Until then, I won't offer much, if any commentary. I'm just presenting the findings.

With that in mind, please understand that these findings are not in any way representative of my personal opinions. Frankly, the results disappoint me. I also know that if Democrats built their campaigns around my preferences, they would lose. So, I do not want them to do that. I want them to do what works.

So, based on this survey, here are the top 20 topics should Democratic leaders discuss more to increase voters support for the Democratic party

We polled abortion and reproductive rights separately. I still can't decide if that was the right choice. However, if we were to combine the 2, that topic would be second behind immigration.

Gun control is a great example to illustrate where public and pundits don't alway see eye to eye. I'm not going to shame anyone, but I've read multiple articles over the past few weeks expressing worry that voters had become complacent about gun violence. This survey suggest that those fears are unfounded.

Now, we're going to break the data down into different segments of the audience. If there is a segment that you'd like to see represented that isn't, let us know. I had to cut a few segments, like non-binary people, from the section on gender, for example, because we did not collect enough responses to make me feel confident in the results.

How do different age groups vary in their responses?

What about variations between races?

What about variations between genders?

How does population density impact the results?

What about partisanship?

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Remember, we only polled Independents and Democrats. Adjust your expectations accordingly.

Finally, education levels

Where does that leave us?

Right now, nothing in this data is actionable for the same reason an issue poll cannot be actionable. Just because we have some data on what topics voters say they want Democrats to discuss, we are lacking 2 things required to turn evidence into a suggestion for strategic action.

First, we need to know what voters want Democrats to say about these topics so that we can generate messaging concepts. Then, we need to test those concepts in an environment that, at the very least, simulates real world conditions.

It's only then that we can feel confident in any suggestions we make.

You'll have the access to that next bit of data and analysis in the coming days. To generate the second piece of data, evidence that suggests action, we'll need to run another study.

The good news is that study can load us up with data to create and test our next round of messaging.