Political Traction: How it's done

Political Traction takes a closer look at the top public affairs issues being discussed in Ottawa to evaluate how well these issues resonate among everyday Canadians.

Jaime Watts team at Navigator conducts a daily opinion scan to identify the issues most talked about in Ottawa by parliamentarians, national editorialists, and on political talk show programs.

Navigators goal is to use this data to calculate the share of voice for the top issues discussed in Ottawa.

The share of voice will express the weight of the top issues discussed in Ottawa as a percentage of the attention dedicated to each issue each week.

Question Period

Navigator tracks the questions and answers during federal Question Period. The team assigns a point value to each question. Points reflect the importance of the question.

The Navigator point system gives greater priority to questions asked and answered by MPs, according to their leadership position in the House of Commons.

Results are then complied by issue and added to Navigators tracking formula.

Public Affairs Programs

Every week Jaimes team watches a collection of Canadas leading public affairs programs. They track the top issues being discussed across all programs. Issues are ranked by the broadcast minutes dedicated to each topic. This data is used as part to help determine the share of voice.

National Editorials

Navigator reads a collection of Canadas leading columns and editorials. They measure the number of occurrences for each issue mentioned in their editorial list. This information is used to help determine top issues.

Calculating share of voice by topic

To determine the share of voice of the three (or four) topics most frequently mentioned across broadcast, in editorials and columns, and during federal Question Period, Navigator applies the appropriate data to an algorithm (see all the algorithms here) to express the attention dedicated to each issue as a percentage of the total conversation across platforms.

'Zoomed in' top issues

Following a calculation of the total share of voice, Navigator calculates the share of voice of the top three or four issues when compared to one another. This will offer a closer look at the conversation taking place around these issues: Who is saying what? How are they saying it? What does it mean?

For this calculation, Jaimes team ignores the miscellaneous topics mentioned throughout the week in thezoom-inalgorithm.

What are Canadians saying? How does Canada compare?

Once Navigator has identified the top-of-mind issues in Ottawa, they evaluate their overall impact against the everyday public affairs conversations happening amongst Canadians. They accomplish this by determining the extent to which Ottawas conversation mirrors broader Canadian conversation. Navigator creates a keyword library for each issue. This library is constructed by using vocabulary taken from Ottawas conversations.

UsingRadian6technology, Jaimes team scans social media for mentions and impressions of keywords in their issues library. They put emphasis on where engagement occurs online: Twitter, Facebook, news blogs, forums and video. Their goal is to evaluate the extent to which Canadians:

• Share Ottawas concerns
• Are disinterested in these topics
• Take a different view

'Zoom in' top issues

To take a closer look at the social media conversation occurring on the top four issues, Navigator uses analgorithmthat divides the number of posts on a topic by the number of posts on the top three (or four) topics.