The British Polling Council (BPC) is an association of
market research
Market research is an organized effort to gather information about target markets and customers: know about them, starting with who they are. It is an important component of business strategy and a major factor in maintaining competitiveness. Mark ...
companies whose
opinion polls
An opinion poll, often simply referred to as a survey or a poll (although strictly a poll is an actual election) is a human research survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions ...
are regularly published or broadcast in
media in the United Kingdom
There are several different types of mass media in the United Kingdom: television, radio, newspapers, magazines and websites. The United Kingdom is known for its large music industry, along with its new and upcoming artists. The country also has a ...
.
The BPC was established in 2004, twelve years after the perceived failure of opinion polls to come close to predicting the actual result of the
1992 United Kingdom general election
The 1992 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 9 April 1992, to elect 651 members to the House of Commons. The election resulted in the fourth consecutive victory for the Conservative Party since 1979 and would be the last tim ...
. BPC members use a range of fieldwork methods (telephone, door-to-door, and internet) and statistical tools.
Members
The following organisations are members of the BPC (founding members in bold):
*BMG Research
*Bradshaw Advisory
*Censuswide
*Deltapoll
*Electoral Calculus
*Focaldata
*Forefront Market Research
*Hanbury Strategy
* Harris Interactive
*
ICM Research
ICM Research is a public opinion research company that was founded in 1989. ICM is a subsidiary of Creston Insight, a marketing services company, and is a member of the British Polling Council.
History
When ICM was initially established, the initi ...
*
Ipsos MORI
Ipsos MORI was the name of a market research company based in London, England which is now known as Ipsos and still continues as the UK arm of the global Ipsos group. It was formed by a merger of Ipsos UK and MORI in October 2005.
The company ...
Opinium
Opinium is a market research and insight agency established on 7 September 2007. It is headquartered in New York and London. Its Chief Executive is James Endersby. The agency works across five practice areas: Brand & Communications, Product & Se ...
*
ORB International On Friday, 14 September 2007, ORB International, an independent polling agency located in London, published estimates of the total war casualties in Iraq since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.SavantaComRes
*Sky Data
*Stack Data Strategy
* Survation
*Techne
*WA Communications
*Yonder Consulting
*
YouGov
YouGov is a British international Internet-based market research and data analytics firm, headquartered in the UK, with operations in Europe, North America, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific. In 2007, it acquired US company Polimetrix, and sinc ...
NOP (now known as GfK) was a founding member, but is no longer a member as of 2018.
See also
*
Evaluation
Evaluation is a
systematic determination and assessment of a subject's merit, worth and significance, using criteria governed by a set of standards. It can assist an organization, program, design, project or any other intervention or initiative ...
*
Quantitative research
Quantitative research is a research strategy that focuses on quantifying the collection and analysis of data. It is formed from a deductive approach where emphasis is placed on the testing of theory, shaped by empiricist and positivist philosop ...
*
Psephology
Psephology (; from Greek el, ψῆφος, psephos, pebble, label=none) or political analysis is a branch of political science, the "quantitative analysis of elections and balloting". As such, psephology attempts to explain elections using the ...
*
Social research
Social research is a research conducted by social scientists following a systematic plan. Social research methodologies can be classified as quantitative and qualitative.
* Quantitative designs approach social phenomena through quantifiable ...
*
Statistics
Statistics (from German language, German: ''wikt:Statistik#German, Statistik'', "description of a State (polity), state, a country") is the discipline that concerns the collection, organization, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of ...
*
Statistical survey
Survey methodology is "the study of survey methods".
As a field of applied statistics concentrating on human-research surveys, survey methodology studies the sampling of individual units from a population and associated techniques of survey da ...
Elections in the United Kingdom
There are five types of elections in the United Kingdom: elections to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom (commonly called 'general elections' when all seats are contested), elections to devolved parliaments and assemblies, local electi ...
*
Politics of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom is a unitary state with devolution that is governed within the framework of a parliamentary democracy under a constitutional monarchy in which the monarch, currently Charles III, King of the United Kingdom, is the head ...
*
Market research
Market research is an organized effort to gather information about target markets and customers: know about them, starting with who they are. It is an important component of business strategy and a major factor in maintaining competitiveness. Mark ...