Choose Between Percentages & Frequencies

Is it better to say “73% of our 70 products currently meet all applicable ANSI safety standards” or “51 of our 70 products currently meet all applicable ANSI safety standards”?

• A classic finding in consumer research is that percentages are easier than raw frequencies for a person to understand and remember. Therefore, if ease of comprehension is important, present the percentage format. This would be especially true if your statement has lots of elements to understand and remember aside from the frequency itself. The ANSI safety standards example has enough gobbledygook to meet that criterion.
• If you’re asking prospects to average a set of frequencies, use percentages when your prospects have low motivation to understand the results, but present raw frequencies if the prospects aim to be highly confident of the results. Researchers at Bentley University in Massachusetts, University of Kansas, and Columbia University concluded that people who are clearly interested in the results will work harder to analyze the data when they’re presented raw frequencies than when presented percentages to average. The averages will be more accurate, and the people will be more confident of the calculations. So it’s best to say, “51 out of the 70 case mountings and 13 out of the 18 leveling devices meet your specifications,” and expect the prospect to calculate the percentages.
• If you’re asking prospects to calculate a percentage of a percentage, do the work for them and present the outcome. For instance, say: “73% of our 70 products currently meet all applicable ANSI safety standards, and of those 73%, you’ll find that 80% meet the parameters you’ve stated in your proposal. So this means that 41 out of our total set of 70, or between 58% and 59% meet both the ANSI safety standards and your parameters.” Research at University of Miami and University of Minnesota suggests that most consumers come up with erroneous frequency conclusions when calculating percentages of percentages.
• Unless absolute precision is required, ease the cognitive load for all parties by rounding off percentages once you’ve come up with the final result. “About 60%....” is easier for the prospect to work with in their head than “Between 58% and 59%.”

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