Polls?

[Gabriel Lobu]

Are Polls Usefull?

[exasko]

I think so, depends on what your polling. I think getting info. on the people who come to your website, that's important. Also, if you were to see there likes and dislike it could help you in where to move as a company/website...

Polls are nice... so IMO yes polls do help :)

[projo]

Useful or not
they can be fun,
they can be overdone.

[exasko]

I think anything can be overdone... flash in example. tho, one poll I think can help out a website...

[Vanitha]

Mostly it's usefull

Moreover it's depend upon the purpose and place using it......

Most of the times it's used to view customer's idea

or in other word we are getting the feedback from the viewers......

[Chicken]

Polls are often not useful because of flaws in the way the question was asked or the answer choices. To give you an example, this poll is horribly flawed and the results would not be useful:

Q: Which forum script is better?
> vBulletin
> phpBB

First, the question is completely subjective in that you haven't defined what you're really asking about. Better in what way? What do you really want to know? What opinion do you want to poll members about, in order to help you make a decision?

Second, you are comparing a free script with a paid one. While that might be OK for certain questions, you're going to get responses based on cost, and as I said, what do you really want to know?

Third, you are assuming that the people answering have used both scripts (extensively enough to be qualified to respond). Often this isn't the case. You will get people who use vBulletin choosing vBulletin and people who use phpBB choosing phpBB, so the answers become more of a popularity and usage poll more than which is "better" (which -as I said, isn't clear enough).

Can a poll be useful? Yes. Are most polls horribly flawed and thus the resuling data is useless? Yes. It is often possible to word a poll to nearly guarntee one answer or another. Often this is done for personal gain or financial reasons. Happens all the time in politics, education, etc.

Political example (secretly sponsored by some company offering some sort of paid services to the county for after school programs):

Q: Do you feel there are enough after school activites for today's kids?
> Yes
> No

More than likely, people will choose "no" and soon after that you'll see that same company lobby for a measure (from which they'll benefit), in the next election and ads that say:

"85% of Californians feel that there needs to be more after school activites for today's kids... vote Yes on Prop 45"

First of all, that wasn't even the question asked by the poll. Second the results were used to urge people to vote on a proposition that would raise their property taxes (that info is almost always left out of those political VOTE YES ON ads).

I'll reword the question:

Q: Do you want yor property taxes increased by 5% to support after school activites?
> Yes
> No

I guarantee you that although people do support and want after school activities, the majority would vote "no" and the results of the poll would be reversed (with ~85% voting "no").