Put an to End Meaningless PR Metrics

Ever wonder what PR metrics really mean?

Gone are the days when the success of PR is measured only by outputs: number of articles published about our company; number of people who were reached by the publications, TV programs and radio shows we appeared in; etc. The problem with these metrics is, we’re never really sure exactly how many people we’ve reached and, more importantly, what effect such exposure has had on consumer behavior.

Even Advertising Value Equivalency or AVE (the cost of editorial coverage if you were to pay for it as advertising space) is far from an accurate measure of exactly what results our PR efforts bring. The only thing you find out with this metric is, you probably spent way less for that exposure through PR than if you had paid for it in advertising.

Pretty impressive, but the next question is, so what?

The integration of social media with traditional media in PR has made measurement much easier. We can now trace exactly how many people clicked on a particular link and, upon getting to our landing page, how many took the action we wanted — whether it’s signing up for an email list or placing an order.

Yet social media measurements aren’t perfect, either. We still can’t capture “more favorable attitudes” or “increased awareness” towards our product or service, for example. That’s because knowledge, awareness, and attitudes don’t always translate into behaviors we can observe and measure objectively.

Given that there is yet no perfect way to measure the impact and effectiveness of PR, we can’t lose sight of the fact that we can at least make PR measurement more meaningful.

That is, we can measure and track those metrics that help us get to know our prospects and customers better, determine what works and what doesn’t, and have a reliable basis to make future PR, marketing and business decisions.

Our Approach to Measuring PR

In my own experience with clients at Cross Border Communication, the key is first understanding the business outcomes you need to produce. Pick that outcome apart into its underlying components.

This exercise can turn something as intangible as “building awareness” into a concrete objective with observable benchmarks, such as increase in social discussions, improvement of search engine ranking, number of downloads of a white paper, proliferation in the use of our hash tag, etc.

Therefore, metrics are meaningful because they support our PR/marketing and business goals. It becomes clear why we’re measuring something, and what the metrics mean in relation to the results or outcomes (vs outputs) we want to accomplish.

Developing some discipline around measuring the metrics that describe our benchmarks and tracking the data over time can give us powerful insights and market intelligence we can use to improve future campaigns. Company executives can also better understand and appreciate the results PR has generated.

How Do You Measure PR?

What have you been doing to measure the effectiveness and success of you company’s PR? How do you feel about the metrics you currently track?

I’d love to hear about your experience in the comments below. You can also send me a message via Twitter, or post a comment on our Facebook page.

photo credit: aussiegall

Building Long-Term PR Relationships in a Digital World

When we first started working with Dongbu HiTek in 2001, it was a start-up semiconductor manufacturer based in Korea wanting to enter the North American market. Though its parent company was worth $11 billion, Dongbu was going to enter a competitive market mostly buying from strong competitors in Taiwan and China. It was virtually unknown in the semiconductor industry and had no relationships with key media and analyst influencers in the US.

In 10 years we have provided the gamut of technology PR and marketing communications services for Dongbu – writing, media relations, trade show and event management, marketing collateral development, and much more.  We have also done PR projects for them in Europe and Asia.
Although we now work with clients on online strategies, a decade ago there was no Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. No one was blogging, getting inbound links or using SEO to get found. We built relationships with Dongbu’s key influencers the old-fashioned way – one person at a time.

In an increasingly digital world, don’t underestimate the power of building long-term and personal relationships. The lessons below still apply today.

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How to Leverage Company Activities To Get PR

One of our newest clients, Rapid Electric Vehicles (REV) delivers completely electric fleet vehicles that serve as the first-ever mobile storage system for the electricity grid, in addition to powering on-site equipment for fleet crews.

They have a unique technology, blue-chip customers, a clearly articulated vision and an extremely quotable CEO. At first glance, it seems like they compete in a space that is crowded… until one digs deeper to find their truly compelling story.

The founder and CEO, Jay Giraud, travels and speaks extensively as a passionate advocate for clean technology in Canada and the US. In a single month, we have observed Jay:

• present at the Canadian Financing Forum, be named in Vancouver’s Clean Tech “Ready to Rocket” award list
• speak as a panelist at the California Vehicle to Grid Consortium
• present on “Smart Grids, Smarter Cars” at the Niagara Development Forum on Innovation & New Concepts in Ontario
• participate in a local tech industry reception, and
• most recently, attend a micro-grid military unveiling in Oahu.

So, how does one get media excited about a company, in order to maximize a busy CEO’s activities?

Here’s what we did:

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PR Packs a Multi-Million Dollar Punch

From time to time, we’ll be sharing with you some PR case studies. These case studies will help to identify the key elements to a successful PR campaign. Our hope is they will help you use PR to achieve your business goals. Today’s case study is from my Director of Client Services at Cross Border Communications, Jackie Peterson.

Since jumping into the PR game a few years ago, I have learned plenty about media and delivering messages effectively. I feel fortunate to have met people running businesses from all walks of life in many different realms.

The best part of PR is meeting the entrepreneurs. They are equal parts creative, passionate and life-loving, with a dash of wild and a pinch of crazy.

In other words, we get along swimmingly.

Helping them achieve their vision is most rewarding. Probably one of the most illustrative examples of the power of PR happened in 2010, when I worked with a company looking to raise money for a private fund.

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Unexpected Exposure

I felt a little shock and a lot of awe when I received the news that PR in Your Pajamas was included in PR Web’s 25 Essential Public Relations Blogs You Should Be Reading.

Shock, because I’ve always considered this blog to be in the fledgling stage. I started it just over a year and a half ago and while I always strive to deliver quality information about PR and social media, I haven’t exactly been diligent about it. It was only in the last few months that I’ve been able to publish a new post at least every week.

I also felt awe, because the other bloggers on the list are PR and social media stars: Brian Solis, Peter Shankman of HARO, Danny Brown, and Jason Falls of Social Media Explorer, among others.

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You Never Know Who’s Listening

The amazing thing with doing public relations is, you never know who’s out there listening, watching or reading about you.

This might be a scary thing, but most of the time, it’s a GOOD thing.

The more consistently you put yourself out there, the more unexpected praise, recognition and opportunities come your way.

The ripple effect of PR has only gotten more intense with social networking. Journalists as well as other content publishers and influence peddlers are online. They may be “on to you” without you being aware of it.

I experienced this myself recently when I was included in Forbes.com’s 20 Women for Entrepreneurs to Follow on Twitter.

I hadn’t been interacting with the writer on Twitter.

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PR Case Study: Getting Over Stage Fright

I was recently contacted by Janet Esposito, author of the new book Getting Over Stage Fright who said:

“I wanted to share with you the great news of my first article for my book. It is a full page spread with a huge image of my book and my photo, along with a long text. It appeared in the feature section of the Litchfield County Times. Thanks so much Elena, for helping to inspire me to go after local media as a first step. I will continue to contact other newspapers and will look forward to more exposure!”

I loved the title of her book as it is what many business owners go through in their own PR efforts – Stage Fright!

We’re often afraid to get started in doing our own PR because of fear of rejection, overwhelm with how to start in the first place and general apprehension of doing something new.

In the meantime, we keep looking over at the competition who IS getting media coverage and wondering when it will be our turn to shine in the spotlight. Read more