As mentioned in a previous blog post, KRC maintains an expansive and proprietary Media Poll Database that tracks PR/thought leadership polls picked up in the news. To date, we have logged over 900 unique polls with this tool. Each poll is categorized by features like methodology, topic, tone, and pickup. When designing a new poll with a PR client, we use this database to surface polls on similar topics that have been conducted in this area, identify white space in a given category that our clients can tap into, analyze which outlets may be realistic media targets for the results, and inform methodological recommendations.
There are two questions we often get from clients seeking top tier media coverage.
1) Do top tier media cover these polls?
2) How are polls that are picked up in top tier media different than those picked up elsewhere?
Rather than rely on past experiences alone, we decided to study the issue. An analysis of our media poll database contents sheds empirical insights on these questions:
1) Yes, top tier media do cover PR/thought leadership polls. In our database there are 40 from the New York Times, 23 from the Wall Street Journal, and 34 from the Washington Post, among others. PR polls covered by top tier media are most likely to be found in the form of mentions in online blogs or in op-eds.
2) Media polls picked up by top tier media are different from other polls in that they are:
- 10% more likely to have used and identified a third party research partner,
- 15% more likely to have used a phone survey methodology,
- 8% more likely to have a sample size of more than 1,000, and
- 16% more likely to have covered a business topic.
