Evaluation of the Climate Action Incentive Payment Advertising Campaign
Executive Summary

As part of the Government of Canada's carbon pollution pricing system, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) is responsible for the delivery of the Climate Action Incentive (CAI) payment to residents of Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick, through their respective income tax and benefit returns for the year 2018. The CAI is intended to help Canadians in these four provinces with this transition.

Household climate incentives will be claimed using filings; individuals could claim the CAI payment when filling out their 2018 Income Tax and Benefit return this year. The incentive payment amounts are based on two considerations: 1) family composition, and 2) by province of residence. It also is important to note that individuals in rural and small communities would receive a 10 percent rural supplement as part of the Climate Action Incentive, in recognition of their specific needs.

The Canada Revenue Agency launched an advertising campaign in March, to support the government's Climate Action Incentive payment to be implemented in the four provinces previously mentioned. The ad campaign was conducted exclusively in those provinces. The ad campaign objectives included:

• 1) Encouraging Canadians to file their tax returns to claim the Climate Action Incentive payment; and
• 2) Driving target audiences to the CAI advertising campaign Web page on Canada.ca, where additional information could be found.

This research is mandatory, given that the Treasury Board (TB) requires all Government of Canada advertising campaigns that cost more than one million dollars to be evaluated.

Research Objectives

The purpose of the quantitative research is to assess recall of and reactions to the advertising campaign. At the highest level, the purpose of the research is to evaluate the effectiveness of the advertising campaign. More specifically, the research objectives included:

• 1) The Pre-Campaign Evaluation used the standardized Advertising Campaign Evaluation Tool (ACET) Baseline online survey, to assess pre-campaign awareness of the subject matter, including: a) Aided and unaided awareness of general Government of Canada advertising, along with advertising related to the CAI campaign topic; and b) Aided and unaided awareness of the subject matter, and
• 2) The Post-Campaign Evaluation used the standardized ACET Post-Campaign online survey, which assessed: a) Aided and unaided awareness of general Government of Canada advertising, along with advertising related to the CAI campaign topic; b) Aided and unaided awareness of the subject matter; c) The message recall; and d) Intention to act.

Target Population

As specified in the Statement of Work (SOW), the target audience for the research includes members of the general population of Canada 18 years of age or older, who live in one of four provinces: Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Ontario, and New Brunswick.

A pre-advertising campaign survey was implemented in February 2019. A post-advertising campaign survey was implemented in May 2019. Detailed quotas are discussed in the sampling section below.

Research Usage

In order to promote prospects of a successful ad campaign, concept testing research was required to evaluate the relative effectiveness of concepts with members of the target audience, verify that the concepts drew the attention of specific populations, and recommend possible modifications to the concepts that would increase effectiveness going forward. Pre-and post-advertising campaign evaluations sought to demonstrate the effectiveness of the selected advertising campaign by measuring (and comparing) awareness of the subject matter with the audiences.

As suggested above, advertising campaign evaluation of the nature catalogued in this report is mandatory for all advertising campaigns in which media buys exceed $1 million. The pre-and post-campaign ACET surveys are used for all major Government of Canada advertising campaigns in order to consistently evaluate these campaigns, and comply with key requirements in the Government of Canada Communications Policy.

Expenditure

The survey entailed the expenditure of $38,782.73, including tax.

Consent

Corporate Research Associates offers this written consent allowing the Librarian and Archivist of Canada to post, in both official languages, this Methodological Report.

Political Neutrality Statement and Contact Information

I hereby certify as a Senior Officer of Corporate Research Associates that the deliverables fully comply with the Government of Canada political neutrality requirements outlined in the Communications Policy of the Government of Canada and Procedures for Planning and Contracting Public Opinion Research. Specifically, the deliverables do not contain any reference to electoral voting intentions, political party preferences, standings with the electorate, or ratings of the performance of a political party or its leader.

Signed Peter MacIntosh, Executive Vice-President Corporate Research Associates pmacintosh@cra.ca 902-493-3882