Election Day is a week away. On Nov. 8, many Americans will be heading to the polls to cast a vote for the next president of the United States. Before doing so, it is important to educate yourself on where each candidate stands on the major issues, and you want to ensure that you vote for the person who shares the same political views as you do.

An important question to consider in regards to this is do you know where your political compass points towards, and are you likely to vote for the candidate that lines up with the issues you believe in?

It is easy to become absorbed in the controversies that often surround politicians, while losing sight of the policies and issues each one stands by. This election cycle in particular has been engulfed in controversial stories in the media that are not about political policy. While it is certainly important for voters to take those things into consideration, they should not be the only factors influencing who they believe should be president.

An easy place for voters to start in terms of learning more about which candidate they align with is to take an online political awareness quiz. A popular website that many voters have used is ISideWith.com. In fact, according to their homepage, over 44 million people have used the service to see which presidential candidate (or candidates) they match up with.

Using ISideWith.com, you can take a quiz that contains a series of questions about various political issues including domestic policy, education, immigration, the environment, the economy, and foreign policy among others.

The interactive quiz allows you to refine your answers beyond simply yes or no as well. The options for each question also include middle ground on various issues in the event that you do not lean fully to right or left on a given policy or issue.

Users can also rate how strongly they feel about each question, which is factored in when the results are calculated at the end.

Once you complete the quiz, all of your answers are compiled and analyzed. It then brings you to a webpage containing the results, which displays all of the presidential candidates running in the current election, and they are rated with a percentage of how closely you align with each of them.

There is also the option to see the ratings of where all of the major political parties rank in terms of the stances you took on each issue. This includes third parties as well, which can be helpful when considering who you should vote for.

Now are we saying that all you should do is take an online quiz and then vote for the highest rated candidate at the end? No, but it is a good place to start.

Next, voters should do more research into each option. Find out more about what candidates have said in the past about the issues that matter to you. It could also be beneficial to see if their opinions have changed over time.

The bottom line is that it is necessary for you to make an informed decision at the polls, and it is important for you to vote for the candidate who is most in line with what you believe in.

Don’t forget to vote on Election Day, your opinion matters.