The Pandora's Box In Measuring The Value Of PR
By Tom Foremski - July 30, 2009
This is a great time to be in PR. That's what Jason Mandell from Launchsquad said in a recent guest post on SVW, and that's also the view of Emilio Robles, over at Ogilvy blog Tech PR Nibbles.
I agree. I also think it's a great time to be in media. But PR hasn't yet had to deal with the gut wrenching changes that media has had to deal with as business models change. My friends in PR tell me they can see the changes therefore they will be able to deal with it all and prosper.
I'm not so sure. Changes are underway in PR and they are not pretty. For example, the opportunities offered by social media are not well recognized by clients. There is a perception that social media is free yet it's more expensive than traditional PR.
I like to remind people that disruptive technologies disrupt. We are dealing with disruptive media (PR) technologies. If you are in the path of a disruptive technology you will likely slam into that train-wreck up ahead -- even if you can see it. That's why I just nod when people tell me that they can what's ahead and can change fast enough that it won't be a problem.
Social Media Metrics = PR ROI = More $$
One key theme that's part of the changes in the PR world is the desire to measure the effectiveness of PR. There is belief that it's possible to use a variety of tools to measure PR and thus create an ROI. And that once you do this and compare that ROI number to other marketing spends PR will show itself to be the best value around and therefore more business will be generated.
Emilio Robles writes: Tech PR Nibbles* » Now is a great time to be in PR
Unlike traditional media, social media metrics provide a fantastic opportunity to highlight PR ROI, if done correctly. Linking back a PR-specific program to traffic, or eyeballs or community conversations can be easier (and cheaper) than the more traditional qual and quant analyses of print and broadcast media. There are powerful online tools that allow you to do this and even automate the reporting.
All in all, now is a great time to be in PR.
Open carefully...
But be careful what you wish for this is a Pandora's box. With social media metrics you have to agree on what those numbers should be. What is an acceptable number of YouTube views for that "viral" video you made? What is the value of those 10 re-tweets? How many pageviews is great?
The bigger problem is that those numbers are going to become more difficult to reach because the noise level in the mediasphere is so much greater than ever before and it's going to get louder. PR firms hoping to charge clients based on their metrics will get into trouble because those metrics will begin showing a decline -- no matter how good the work -- because of all the new media being created and the pressure on people's attention.
Figuring out where PR spending is wasted
It's similar to traditional media. Advertisers always knew they were wasting half of their spending but didn't know where. Now, with online ad metrics, advertisers know exactly what isn't working and they can pull those ads.
Traditional media has suffered greatly in the online world because of advertising metrics. The half of the ad money that was being "wasted" was subsidizing journalism and other news services.
Similarly, PR metrics will show clients where their money is being wasted. And that's going to hurt. But it's too late to close Pandora's box and PR firms will have to play by these new rules.
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Comments (4)
Whomever is thinking that traditional measures will do is living in fantasy land - at least in B2B PR. Might work for consumer but no way does it translate to business readers. That's about influence which has almost nothing to do with eyeballs.
Posted: July 30, 2009 11:16 AM
Great topic.
There's no question that as PR campaigns increasingly address the virtual world and social media, the measurement of these campaigns needs to change.
But we don't see this as a Pandora's box. Just like traditional PR measurement, the key lies in establishing the right (what matters) benchmarks so you can track how a campaign moves the proverbial needle.
Yes, it's going to take some time to figure how to value "10 tweets" but time will sort this out.
More importantly, PR needs to take a holistic approach to programming. In other words, the metrics need to ultimately funnel up into the company's business objectives and how these objectives are measured.
Such an approach requires a different mindset and different tools.
Here's one quick example.
We're experimenting with a technology that integrates with Google Analytics for tracking our social media campaigns. In short, this tool enables us to track view throughs as well as click throughs. Furthermore, the prospect is tracked to his/her closing action; i.e., a buy, request for information or exit.
The data is crunched with the overall marketing numbers so we can see what's working, what's not working and the associated cost (compared with other marketing vehicles).
Personally, I like playing "by the new rules" because it places greater value on the execution phase which plays to our strength.
Posted: July 30, 2009 11:52 AM
Hi Tom - great post, I think you hit the nail on the head. My fear is that this Pandora's Box runs deeper than just ROI issues and that folks are not ready to face this. If PR can't offer value across the whole organization, at every level, we will simply be media (new and traditional) relations people and publicists. It's time to figure out what's next or we are all doomed.
Posted: July 31, 2009 1:51 PM
Tom – your point about “disruptive” technologies stuck with me after reading this. Anyone in the PR industry who simply assumes they’ll change fast enough or that metrics won’t pose major challenges probably isn’t paranoid enough.
And even if a client agrees with you on the value of, say, a re-tweet, that “value” is still removed from bottom line ROI. Values for page views, video views, etc. are all derivative unless they’re mapped to actual business metrics.
Focusing on outcomes that clients understand and pay for (i.e. leads, sales) is more valuable than just focusing on outputs (eyeballs). In some of our early client work in this area, we’re finding that “earned media” can be more effective than “paid media” in driving outcomes such as conversions, so the greater measurability of outcomes can actually be a good thing for PR. That’s a positive sign, especially since those results are before any campaigns – whether social media, traditional media or both – have been optimized for targeting influencers and driving conversions among specific audiences.
I think this will ultimately be better for the audiences our clients want to reach since campaigns will be less focused on blanketing people with information and more on facilitating some kind of useful interaction. Same trend has been happening in advertising for a while – that’s nothing new.
Every discipline’s wasted spend will gradually be exposed (just wait until TV ads become performance-based) but in a world of information overload and endless media content, real influence matters that much more. I'd assert that PR has as good or better an opportunity to own the business of influence…IF we get ahead of understanding metrics and mapping PR to bottom line outcomes.
Joseph Kingsbury, Text 100
(more on our view here)
http://text100.com/hypertext/2009/08/when-it-comes-to-pr-measurement-and-roi-are-you-paranoid-enough/
Posted: August 3, 2009 4:09 PM