New service lets companies test draft statements before public release
CHICAGO – A major national polling firm confirmed this week that it has begun offering what it calls sentiment pre-testing to corporate clients, a service allowing companies to test multiple draft versions of a public statement against a representative sample audience before selecting the final wording for actual release.
How the service works
Firm vice president Marguerite Delacroix explained that clients submit several candidate versions of a planned statement, typically differing in tone, specific word choice, or level of detail, which the firm then tests against a demographically balanced panel to measure which version generates the most favorable immediate reaction along several tracked metrics including perceived sincerity and perceived evasiveness.
Delacroix said the service emerged from growing client demand following several high profile instances where a company’s public statement was widely criticized for tone, prompting executives to ask whether such reactions could have been anticipated and avoided through more rigorous testing before release rather than relying purely on internal communications team judgment.
Client industries
The service has attracted interest across a range of industries, though Delacroix said technology and financial services companies have been the earliest and most frequent adopters, both sectors having faced particularly intense public scrutiny of their communications in recent years.
One communications director at a mid-sized technology company, speaking on condition of anonymity because her company had not authorized public comment on its use of the service, said the testing had already helped her team avoid releasing a statement that internal testing suggested would have read as noticeably more defensive than intended.
Ethical questions raised
Several communications ethics scholars contacted about the service expressed mixed views, with some arguing that testing statement wording for clarity and genuine sincerity represents a reasonable extension of standard message testing practices already common in advertising, while others suggested the practice risks optimizing statements for the appearance of sincerity rather than sincerity itself.
Delacroix pushed back on the more critical characterization, arguing that the service simply helps companies avoid genuinely counterproductive miscommunication and does not, in her view, meaningfully differ from any other form of message testing long accepted as standard practice across the broader communications industry.
What happens next
The firm says it plans to expand the service’s testing panel size over the coming year and is developing additional metrics specifically measuring perceived corporate accountability, a category Delacroix said clients have increasingly requested as a distinct measurement from general favorability.
Further information on public opinion research methodology is available through the American Association for Public Opinion Research and PRWeek.
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Sample metrics tracked
Beyond perceived sincerity and evasiveness, the testing panels also measure what Delacroix called perceived specificity, essentially how concrete respondents feel a given statement actually is, a metric she said has proven surprisingly useful in flagging drafts that read as responsive on a surface level but leave test audiences unable to articulate what the company has actually committed to doing.
Delacroix said clients increasingly request this specificity metric alongside the more traditional favorability tracking, suggesting a growing awareness among communications teams that audiences are becoming more sophisticated at detecting genuinely empty corporate language even when it initially reads as warm and responsive.
Panel composition
The firm’s standard testing panel includes several hundred respondents balanced across age, region, and political affiliation, with clients able to request additional demographic oversampling for specific audience segments particularly relevant to their business, an option Delacroix said technology clients in particular have used to test statement reception among younger, more digitally engaged audiences specifically.
Results are typically delivered within seventy two hours of a client submitting draft statements, a turnaround time Delacroix said the firm has worked hard to compress given how quickly companies are often expected to respond to fast moving public situations.
Future service expansion
Delacroix said the firm is also exploring a version of the service tailored specifically for political campaigns, though she noted this expansion remains in early discussion given the additional regulatory considerations involved in testing campaign communications compared to standard corporate statements.
A note on transparency
Delacroix said the firm requires clients to disclose, in general terms, that message testing informed a released statement if directly asked by a journalist, though she acknowledged the firm does not require proactive disclosure and most clients have not chosen to volunteer this information publicly on their own initiative.
The firm says it will continue refining its metric offerings based on client feedback collected throughout the coming year.
A note on competitors
At least two other national polling and research firms have reportedly begun exploring similar statement testing offerings since news of this service spread through the communications industry, suggesting the practice may become more widely available across the sector in coming months.
The firm says it remains committed to refining the service based on ongoing client feedback and evolving industry standards.
Further updates to follow as the panel expansion moves forward this year.
Interested clients can contact the firm directly for a consultation on available testing packages.
More details to follow as the service continues to develop.
Stay tuned.
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