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Before you ‘measure’ the effectiveness of your PR, you need to ensure that the outcomes you generate from this process will result in relevant insights and recommendations for your client. This is the most important aspect of analysing PR value. With this in mind, the following five points should help guide you towards the right way to assess the impact of your PR activities:
Measurement is about much more than the number of articles placed. Once published, content takes on a life of its own, being shared, circulated and syndicated across multiple outlets, including social media and other digital platforms. Keeping tabs on the lifecycle of an article or blog post not only helps identify key influential targets, but also assists in developing a better understanding of where customers go for information. It also identifies new opportunities for engagement.
Every company has different communications challenges. Some focus on increasing public awareness, while others try to reinvent themselves or shape audience perception. Some are keen to determine how their industry is viewed and defined. Each distinct objective requires different sets of data, so the more you take your business’s particular and unique needs into consideration, the more valuable your findings will be in guiding their efforts.
Automated tools can significantly streamline your coverage-tracking processes and help you become more responsive to changes in direction. With the extra time available, you can focus a greater amount of energy on analysing the data and discovering insights related to customer perception, engagement, amplification and reach.
Your credibility is on the line every time you send out a report, so make sure that the content and substance contained within each one are both relevant and accurate. Having a conversation up-front about business needs and the environment in which the client is operating will go a long way towards building foundations and subsequently trust. From this position, you can provide even more value.
Observations garnered from careful analysis can help you move from merely providing data to uncovering competitive intelligence, identifying trends and anticipating issues. Such valuable and strategic insights can lead to better recommendations about who to target, how to improve campaign effectiveness and any changes needed for the future.