| There are three ways to pre-test
your message: polls, focus groups and the brother-in-law test.
The cheapest and easiest way to test the message is to find one
person who represents the target audiences and talk to them. Ideally
this should be someone who can give you frank feedback, possibly
a family member (Robert Bray in Sin Works uses his brother-in-law).
Focus Groups are more expensive and several need to be done, with
different parts of the target population, as one focus group can
provide skewed results. They do have the advantage that researchers
can facilitate the groups themselves if need be.
Many politicians rely on polls to check their statements and policies,
to develop images, political positions and sound-bites. A typical
poll costs £10,000 but there are websites which offer poll
data on a number of issues.
Resources
US-focused resources include:
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