The percentage match calculation methodology between a political candidate and an online user is based on the Swiss smart voting project: smartvote.ch
1. The match is calculated taking into account answers to every question.
2. Every question can be assigned a weight:
| Weight | Points |
| Normal | 1 |
| Very important | 2 |
| Not important | 0.5 |
3. We use the following table to calculate the match between a politician and a voter for every single question:
| User answer | Politician's answer | |||||
| Yes | Probably yes | Probably no | No | Total | ||
| Yes | 150 | 75 | 25 | 0 | 250 | |
| Probably yes | 75 | 100 | 50 | 25 | 250 | |
| Probably no | 25 | 50 | 100 | 75 | 250 | |
| No | 0 | 25 | 75 | 150 | 250 | |
| Total | 250 | 250 | 250 | 250 | 1000 | |
For example: if a voter chooses “yes”, and a politician chooses “probably no” as an answer for the same question, politician gets 25 points.
4. The points are multiplied by “weight points” assigned to that question (see number 2).
5. We sum up all the points for all the questions. Points are calculated for every politician individually.
6. We simulate the points of the “ideal politician”. If a voter answered “yes” to all the questions, the ideal politician would get 150 points for every question. If a voter answered “probably yes”, the ideal politician would get 100 points for every question. If a voter answered “no opinion”, we ignore these questions.
7. Points obtained by a politician are divided by points of the ideal politician. This is how we get percentage match between a politician and a voter.
8. When we calculate percentage match between a candidate and a political party, first of all we calculate the position of the party on every question. The position of the party is calculated using the principle of “average”. For example if 10 members in the party answered “yes”, 10 members answered “probably yes”, 5 members answered “probably no”, the position of the party becomes “probably yes”.
9. The next steps while calculating percentage match between a political party and a voter are based on the same principles as described in steps 1-7.
10. Questions are grouped by topics. Percentage match is shown in each category:
- Social
- Children
- Security
- Economy
- Government
- Transportation
