In order to make the business case for your media relations efforts, you need to be able to accurately measure the effectiveness of your campaign. Heidi Mock, senior director of analytics at Time Warner Cable and featured speaker at PR News' Media Relations Conference in Washington, D.C. on Dec. 11, shares some thoughts on the key metrics to follow.
Output vs. Outcomes: Inventory all of the ways in which you are messaging versus all of the reactions to those messages using the PESO (paid, earned, shared, owned) model. After this baseline of measurement has been established, look for trends and opportunities that will help you shape your strategy and initiate behavior changes toward your messages.
Prominence of Your Company within the Coverage: Prominence scores are assigned to each news article based on an algorithm which evaluates data gathered from the news article including the number of mentions, placement of the mentions (headline, first paragraph, etc.), size of the article and exclusivity. This information can be presented as a comparison of your company against one or more of your competitors, or as a trend over time for your company.
Total Impact by Company: The media impact score reflects the importance of each outlet. A tier-one national outlet will have a higher factor than a local daily newspaper…multiplied by the prominence score.
Activity vs. Coverage: Capturing PR efforts including, but not limited to, releases, pitches, interviews and inquires can show how the volume of work contributed to the news coverage—or it can explain trends over time, declines in coverage and killed stories. This is an important metric to show how your team is keeping your company out of negative coverage.
Tracking the right data is an evolution that comes from starting with an output and working toward behavioral change. The right data will become evident when you are able to compare results historically or as a trend over time. With tracking in place, you will be able to evaluate the successes or weaknesses of your programs, campaigns and messages. Then apply that information to your planning or decision-making process.
To learn more about media pitching and spreading your brand's message, join PR News for the Media Relations Conference in Washington, D.C. on Dec. 11. Experienced professionals from the Washington Post, Time Warner Cable, Zumba Fitness, The Carlyle Group, Ogilvy Public Relations and more will share tactics and strategies for better media relations.
Follow Heidi Mock: @HeidiMock1
Follow Richard Brownell: @RickBrownell