Are you shocked by the news of President Trump contracting the coronavirus?
Curious about what’s happening with the key other factors like the economy, the fallout from the Black Lives Matter protests, and the coronavirus response? How will it affect your business? How will it affect the presidential election?
There are always “October surprises” in a presidential year and the news of President Trump’s coronavirus diagnosis is too unknown to address in this post. So I will address the other factors…
Today, we are releasing our 8th national consumer survey since the pandemic broke out — and the results are explosive. The confluence of three massive factors are driving this train towards an unavoidable 10.1 earthquake called Election Day.
Our data has now surveyed 33,307 Americans, modeled to 200 million+ consumers, 550 million+ connected devices, tracking 10 billion online decisions every day, and 1 trillion searches.
As Election Day nears, here is where things stand minus the health risks the president is currently facing….
Diving into the data (Wave 8 Research), I am going to focus on the 3 most important issues facing this country and your business right now:
1.HOW ARE CONSUMERS JUDGING THE ECONOMY AND HOW WILL IT AFFECT THE ELECTION?
It’s clear from what we are seeing that our economy is on very shaky ground right now, even though Americans feel like things are improving. It’s a paradox of sorts, including:
- THE GOOD: Americans are feeling slightly better about life returning to normal within the next 2–6 months. This number improved by 5% from last month’s data survey (Wave 6 Research).
- THE GOOD: There is a 19% increase in Americans returning to crowded activities (movie theaters, live music events, sporting events).
- THE BAD: 73% of Americans describe their personal financial situation as “struggling to pay for necessities” or just “getting by.” That number has stayed consistent from past surveys and is indicative of the angst surrounding family budgets.
- THE BAD: 81.1% of Americans are “worried” about their household’s financial situation.
SUMMARY: Americans found some acceptance of the COVID-19 health risks and re-entered/spent money in the public retail sector over the summer. These Americans spent their government issued coronavirus bailout checks — which made them feel good in the moment. But ultimately, they don’t know what’s going to happen in the future (financially) and while they remain hopeful, they are deeply concerned about their bank accounts and the economy.
2.HOW DO CONSUMERS CURRENTLY FEEL ABOUT BLACK LIVES MATTER PROTESTS, THE POLICE AND THE ELECTION?
Our data clearly shows that the support for the BLM movement has eroded after months of riots, including:
- We asked: “How are you likely to react when you see a Consumer Brand showing support for the group Black Lives Matter or other protestors in the country?”
- 71.6% of all Americans either don’t care or indicate they are less likely to purchase from that brand (a 5% increase from last month’s survey). Only 28.4% are more likely to purchase from a brand promoting BLM (an 11% decrease from last month’s survey).
- We asked: “Thinking about the recent civic unrest associated with Black Lives Matter in this country, how strongly do you agree or disagree that the Police can be trusted?”
- 53% of all Americans agree police can be trusted (an 18% increase from last month’s survey) and only 28.4% disagree that police can be trusted (a 24.7% decrease from last month’s survey)
- We asked: “As a result of the recent civic unrest associated with Black Lives Matter, to what extent has your opinion of President Trump and Joe Biden become better or worse?
- While Joe Biden has a clear lead in this question (33.9% of American’s opinion of Biden has become “better” while 25.3% of Americans have a better opinion of President Trump), Trump has improved his standing here by 32.5% since July.
SUMMARY: While Americans may support certain aspects of the BLM movement, it’s clear that they overwhelmingly want businesses and brands to stay away from advocating BLM positions (I also wrote about how this affects the sports industry HERE and HERE). In addition, as it pertains to the election, we are seeing a consistent trend in support for the police and President Trump’s response to the riots. This is by no means a winning issue for Trump, but the trend is moving in the right direction month-over-month (a 21.3% improvement for Trump since last month alone). The question is whether that momentum continues to grow until Election Day. Or does it stall? If it grows, Trump can pull out a victory in key swing states — but if it stalls, Biden is in position to win the presidency.
3.HOW DOES THE CORONAVIRUS AFFECT THE ELECTION AND WHO IS TRENDING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION?
*This data was conducted before President Trump’s coronavirus diagnosis.
While President Trump has lost a lot of support over his handling of the coronavirus, his numbers have drastically improved over the past month. Assuming he recovers from the coronavirus and returns to the campaign trail, can the trend continue and carry him to victory? TBD. Here is where we are right now:
- Since last month, 13.3% more Americans have a “better” opinion of President Trump due to his coronavirus response. This includes a 21.2% increase in Americans who consider their opinion of President Trump to be “much better” (compared to last month).
- We asked: “As a result of all you have learned and experienced related to the coronavirus pandemic in this country, you mentioned that you have changed the person for whom you intend to vote for President, in which direction has it changed?”
- Americans that switched from President Trump to Joe Biden remained flat since last month (and only increased by 17% since June).
- Americans that switched their preference from Joe Biden to President Trump grew 27.9% since last month and increased 37.5% since June.
- When it comes to whether the federal government can be trusted regarding the coronavirus situation, there is a 15% increase (in trust) by Americans since last month. This is a sly way of measuring President Trump’s standing (without mentioning his name).
SUMMARY: Joe Biden has a clear advantage heading into Election Day. But it’s also clear that the president’s health is an “unknown” at this point and key coronavirus and BLM metrics point to President Trump improving his standing. If this trend continues (and BLM riots continue, sympathy for President Trump + a coronavirus vaccine is announced before November 3), Trump can win.
But then again, with the president’s diagnosis, everything is in chaos right now. Despite what our data clearly says, we are witnessing an unprecedented state of uncertainty at this point (and no matter your politics, please pray for his speedy recovery).
I am giving you FREE access to all of our surveys (March, April, May, June, July, August, and September + our two surveys analyzing the protest culture on consumers) — just go to winbigmedia.com and click on the “COVID-19 Consumer Research” tab — my analysis of all the data is also found on this page.
Phillip
PS — No one in America is as thoughtful in this “weird” moment as James Altucher. If you want to improve your life, James is the #1 person I’d pay attention to right now. His recent article, “New York City is Dead Forever” has been read over 30 million times and has been attacked by Jerry Seinfeld and the woke mob. Our podcast chat focused on the data surrounding the upcoming presidential election. What are voters afraid of? What do they want? Who will they vote for? Here’s what I found…Listen now for the full breakdown: The James Altucher Show.