Measuring the effect of PR is tough enough, but before we can measure it, we need to understand precisely what we can and should expect PR to accomplish — as well as what the C-suite in its infinite wisdom often does expect, whether realistic or not. As we'll see, these expectations for PR's proper effect can range widely from organization to organization. We asked measurement leaders to outline and evaluate these varied expectations and assess the feasibility of measuring them.

Mark Weiner, North American CEO for PRIME Research, says that because "value" varies from company to company, communications professionals need to find out exactly what their top executives want from PR through "a more formal alignment process."  After conducting thousands of executive interviews over the years, Weiner concludes that executives generally favor one of two forms of valuation: First, the type that applies to every area of the company, such as "quality completion of objectives"; and second, the type that applies only to PR, such as "delivery of key messages to target media."

Overall, Weiner says valuation system should reflect the degree to which the results are meaningful, measurable and reasonable. "Clip volume" is reasonable, but not meaningful, whereas "sales" are meaningful but difficult to track back to PR efforts, he adds.

At Bank of America, senior executives value, among other measures of success, "the level of preparedness and our ability to manage the headline risk on a given issue at a given time," says Jim Pierpoint, senior vice president and head of media relations, global consumer and small business banking for Bank of America in Charlotte, NC.

The bank, he adds, uses proprietary process tools that engage their businesses and evaluate the media environment. Elaborating, Pierpoint notes that "this headline-risk tool gives our senior executives an instant read on where risks and opportunities may lie in terms of the media. It also has become a platform for managing communications tactics, and is an integration point for our external and internal communications. Furthermore, our headline risk assessment is fully integrated with our respective lines of business, from early on in the product development stage."

Plano-TX-based Cadbury Schweppes Americas Beverages' brand teams have their own proprietary means of measuring "good PR," explains director of corporate communications Greg Artkop. For example, Cadbury conducts research and ties it into a major integrated marketing promotion and has determined that PR was the most effective disciplines in terms of 'reach vs. spend' and increased consumer-purchasing intent. Currently "the company has decided to go with a more holistic approach to measure success," Artkop says. "For example, recently we announced we would give everyone in America a Dr. Pepper if Guns n' Roses released Chinese Democracy — an album that has been in the works for 17 years. We secured an estimated 150 million impressions, hit every key message in every story and exceeded all of our coverage goals."

Pursuing the Holy Grail: ROI and the Bottom Line

Clearly the holy grail of PR measurement is return on investment in dollar terms: "I spent $10 million and produced $200 million in sales—an unarguably strong ROI," Weiner relates. "But obviously, PR doesn't book the sales, and there are many steps between a favorable article in USA Today and a sales spike for your hot new lawnmower. As noted, connecting those dots can be both complex and costly.

Sometimes, however, simply digging superficially can tell you all you need to know about ROI. Weiner tells of a U.S. household appliance manufacturer that applied business-management strategy Six Sigma methodology to its corporate communications, coupled with a rigorous public relations measurement program. "The brand's PR executive wanted to assess the value of sponsoring an annual fishing tournament," he relates. For starters, the executive discovered that the event generated very little media coverage, which prompted him to probe further. He discovered, Weiner says, that the net profit for the brand's on-board marine refrigerators was less than the cost of the sponsorship. The event was discontinued. The savings gave the PR executive a 700-percent budget increase for the brand.

On the other hand, often more sophisticated measurement is necessary. JetBlue uses propriety tools that hard-link media placement with "conversion to browse/booked travel," explains Jenny Dervin, corporate communications director of JetBlue Airways. While Dervin could not disclose the proprietary "numbers" with regard to what this tool generates, she points to a direct link to ROI and the company's bottom line.

Weiner also relates a classic measurement case that touches the hearts of all PR professionals: "Several years ago, Miller Brewing Company wanted to measure the impact of PR compared with other forms of marketing," he says. "Its findings were typical: Every dollar spent on TV advertising resulted in $1.10 in sales; trade advertising delivered a return of about $2.20 for every dollar spent; and PR delivered $8.00 for every dollar invested. In addition, four percent of all incremental sales were attributed to PR, which represented tens of millions of dollars."

"ROI is an increasingly mandatory requirement for sustainability in all management practices," says Jim Macnamara, general manager, research, CARMA International (Asia Pacific) of Washington, D.C. in his article "Return on Investment (ROI) of PR and Corporate Communications."

He says it is narrow and unproductive to view the ROI of PR and corporate communications only in terms of direct monetary return, particularly since public sector organizations and most associations do not have share value or sales objectives.  In addition, many marketing and corporate communications activities have specific campaign objectives that are not directly linked to sales or share value.  Because "PR and corporate communications campaigns are often long-term and integrated with other forms of communication," he notes, "ultimate financial impacts are difficult or impossible to specifically attribute to any one form of communication."

Creating Your Communications Dashboard

The communications dashboard has emerged as one of the most prevalent methods for monitoring and reflecting the quality of PR coverage among sophisticated (and better-funded) communications departments. A dashboard is simply a technique for simplifying data reporting by displaying a small number of important summary measures together in one location, explains Katie Paine.

A PR dashboard, she says, includes only those measures most critical for assessing the progress or health of a program or company.  Originally, Paine points out, dashboards were seen mostly in corporate boardrooms with metrics on them such as "sales wins relative to goal," "revenue per employee," or "administrative costs per member per month."

Dashboards, she explains, forced managers to set parameters to define excellent progress and the warning signs vs. "real" problems. Soon, dashboards made their way out of the C-suite — down the organization to sales, marketing and, eventually, marketing communications.

According to Vocus' Strance, a typical measurement dashboard is used to look at number of clips, circulation and ad value. Now it has expanded to include indicators such as mindshare and competitive analysis — to show not only your success but where you stand in relation to others. A typical dashboard has also changed to include more ROI indicators to show you the amount of effort as compared to the return, to help you fine tune your strategy.

Nail says Cymfony's dashboard is highly customizable, with the ability to display eight different metrics and cross them with a number of different characteristics of articles. "We pull in new content continuously and, depending on the content sources, may be updated as often as every 15 minutes, but at least daily," he says. "Our dashboard has a 'My Views' tab that we customize with the key performance indicators that are most important to the clients, so they can get a quick report on coverage. Another tab allows them to create a report pulling the KPI charts, create other charts/graphs, and pull individual clips that are important. For clients for whom we write reports, our analysts use the dashboard as a starting place."

When it comes to quantitative criteria, Clements adds, it is based on impressions — how many people get to see it. Most important is the key message transference and which key messages have appeared most frequently. Also, the quality of the article — and the elements that make up the quality of the article — are used for measurement. This includes tone and impact scores.

For PR pros, dashboards are used to access data on a daily basis: "We call it a 'pulse check' and use it to generate specific reports and interpret the data based on client needs," Clements says. "From the dashboard you can create various types of customized reports. Reporting capability is built into the dashboard."

Is Your Scorecard Balanced?

Some companies use what's call a "balanced scorecard" to assess their communications' effectiveness. This approach, Mark Weiner explains, is a decades-old strategic planning and management system that is used extensively in business, industry, government and non-profit organizations worldwide to align business activities to the vision and strategy of the organization, improve external and internal communications and monitor organization performance against strategic goals.

The new balanced scorecard, Weiner adds, has evolved from its early use as a simple performance measurement framework to a full strategic planning and management system. The "new" balanced scorecard transforms an organization's strategic plan from a passive document into "marching orders" for the organization on a daily basis. It provides a framework that not only provides performance measurements but also helps planners identify what should be done and measured. It enables executives to truly execute their strategies.

According to Silvana Moschini, founder and CEO of international PR firm INTUIC, in her article "Think You Can't Effectively Measure PR? Think Again" in the Daily 'Dog, PR pros who use the balanced scorecard method will not only be able to keep track of campaign goals and activities, but will also have a powerful presentation tool to showcase success to management and clients.