Proving the Value of Public Relations

I was honored this year to be asked by Paul Holmes to serve as a judge for the Sabre Awards.  It was my first judging experience and I found it very rewarding and learned a lot.  Across the five categories I judged there was a lot of great work by obviously talented professionals.  With so much great work, it often comes down to which entry does the best job of demonstrating, through an effective measurement effort,  stated objectives were met or exceeded.  While there were good examples of this practice, there were many more submissions that simply failed to demonstrate the true success of their impressive campaigns. 

Here are the three most common oversights of the non-winning entries I reviewed: 

1. Objectives Not Measurable - The majority of the stated objectives in the entries, as written, were not measurable.  One cannot measure, ‘Increase Awareness’ or ‘Generate Coverage’.  One could measure, ‘Increase Awareness From 10% to 25% in the Next 12 Months’ or ‘Generate 1,000,000 Impressions in the First 6 Months of the Campaign’.  (See my previous diatribes on measurable objectives here) 
2. Strategies Masquerading as Objectives - If objectives are ‘what’ we want to accomplish, then strategies are ‘how’.  Sentences beginning with action words like, ‘leverage’, ‘educate’, ‘promote’ or ‘communicate’ are almost always a strategy and not an objective.  Also, media coverage is almost always a strategy and not the objective.  The vast majority of award entries had one or more strategies posing as objectives.
3. Measurement Misaligned With Objectives- By misaligned I am referring to an objective that is an outcome (or influence) supported by measurement of only outputs (or exposure).  If we are trying to create awareness or change an opinion, we can not demonstrate success by only reporting on the number of impressions generated.  Great programs articulate the desired business outcomes, write PR objectives aligned with these outcomes, and then report on the metrics directly tied to the PR objectives.   

In summary, many of the entries made the hard stuff (great creativity and execution) look easy, and the easy stuff (writing proper objectives, measuring the correct metrics) look hard.  Better than the other way around I guess.  And lots of room for improvement.

Look for 2008 to be a year of increasing accountability for the public relations profession.   Add in the very real possibility of an economic recession and, more than ever, the pressure will be on to prove the value of public relations. 

1.  Focus on efforts to measure the influence of blogs, social media and other online properties

There is a high level of agreement that blogs, discussion groups, social media and other online properties are shaping the way consumers learn and think about products and brands.   First generation attempts to measure their influence on consumers have been done using predominately traditional media metrics like Impressions.  In 2008 expect to see a stronger push toward specialized metrics to measure online engagement/dialogue rather than just exposure.  

2.  Ongoing shift  of PR measurement budgets towards Outcomes rather than Outputs

Historically the majority of public relations dollars have been spent measuring Outputs (Exposure) rather than Outcomes (Influence and Action).  Studies suggest the split has been perhaps 60%/40%.  Expect 2008 to be the first year where the split is closer to 50%/50%.

3.  Renewed efforts by content providers to reconcile copyright issues

Many of you may have recently received a letter from Burrelles/Luce notifying you as of April 2008 they will be adding copyright royalty fees automatically on behalf of content owners based on the average numbers of copies of print or electronic clips distributed.  Expect other content aggregators to follow suit in 2008.  

4.  Increased use of Marketing Mix Modeling for ROI determination

Procter and Gamble’s proactive outreach about their Marketing Mix Modeling (MMM) project (read more here) sparked a lot of industry debate in 2007 (and we suspect projects for modeling vendors).  The new Da Vinci agency being formed for Dell has already stated their ambition to combine art and science to tie marketing activities directly to business outcomes like sales and market share.  Look for MMM to be part of the science used by Da Vinci and for it to become mainstreamed in 2008.

5.  Additional efforts to find a ‘single metric’ measurement solution

For many in public relations measurement the Holy Grail is a single, powerful metric of success.  Microsoft took this approach with their ambitious measurement system development project last year as did the Canadian Public Relations Society (read more here)before them. Perhaps Da Vinci will also be seduced by the allure of the single metric.

I’m sure many of you have followed the spate of consolidation that is sweeping our industry.  Echo Research (research firm) has acquired KWHR Network (measurement firm), which had a global reseller agreement with PRNewsWire (wire/distribution service).  Bacon’s (content aggregator) bought Delhaye (measurement firm) and rebranded as Cision (silly name from expensive branding process/firm).  TNS Media Intelligence (advertising services) bought Cymfony (measurement firm) and cleverly renamed it TNS Media Intelligence/Cymfony (doubt this gem came from expensive branding firm).

While one would hope these transactions have unlocked hidden value for their respective shareholders, it is not clear (yet) how the new organizations will better serve their customers.  Here is one personal example of how consolidation is acting against customer needs.  At MWW Group we have a proprietary measurement platform called Upshot.  For one client we set up a measurement system on Upshot with an XML feed from Bacon’s.  After a period of time we elected to migrate the system to Cymfony.  For consistency we decided to set up the system with a primary feed from Bacon’s.  We were informed by Cymfony that we could not use a Bacon’s feed because Bacon’s, er Cision,  refused to work with Cymfony because it competes with their measurement play, Delahaye.  So, Bacon’s lost a customer in this case.  It seemed misguided and petty to me at the time.  It still does.

Had a different experience?  Is industry consolidation working for or against you?