Insights for Leaders Navigating
Visibility, Credibility, and Growth.
From media strategy to reputation management, we explore the trends shaping public perception and share the approaches that drive measurable results for growing brands.
Forbes.com posted an interesting article the other day titled, “How NOT to do public relations: An interview with Peter Shankman.” Peter is a former PR practitioner and founder of Help A Reporter Out (HARO), an online service connecting journalists with PR people.
In the Q&A, Peter and contributor Jennifer Leggio discuss the relationship between PR practitioners and the media. Notes Peter, “There will always be problems between PR people and journalists, no matter how much we try and repair the rift. Look, fundamentally, the two are simply designed to oppose. On one hand, you have journalists, who have the job of finding actual news – a good story, a trend, something interesting. That’s not easy to do, and they’re being asked every day to do more with less. On the flip side, you have PR people, who are beholden to the request of the clients – A very simple, yet incredibly complex request: ‘Get us press.’”
Managing this balance is exactly what’s so great about being in PR, and at Communiqué PR we pride ourselves on our relationships with both our clients and journalists.
Here’s what we focus on in order to maintain that balance:
- The role of PR is to provide strategic counsel to our clients – first and foremost, our responsibility is to them – even though they might not always want to hear what we have to say. This counsel is based on research and prior experience, and we’re the experts – it’s our job.
- We are also responsible to the journalists whom we are pitching on behalf of our clients. It is imperative that we do our homework to understand their coverage areas so that when we send them a compelling pitch it’s about something they write about.
- As an independent third party, it is essential for us to offer objectivity and vision. Sometimes our clients are too close to an issue to understand why a strategy will be unsuccessful.
- Both the PR practitioner’s and the client’s credibility are at stake if the pitch isn’t newsworthy. After all, it will be much harder to get the journalist’s attention next time.
- Remember, PR is an ongoing process that requires you to continually evaluate your strategy to address changing needs/environments. It’s okay to revisit goals and make a mid-course correction in order to allow for the best possible outcome.
Remember the old saying; it’s a marathon not a sprint. This is true in PR as well, as we work to create new relationships and solidifying existing ones.
I recently read the book “How to Measure Anything,” by Douglas W. Hubbard. As the title infers, the book makes the bold assertion that anything can be measured.
In the context of public relations, measurement is significant. On the Communiqué PR blog, we have addressed topics such as Measuring the Value of PR, Measuring ROI in Social Media, Measuring Media Relations Takes a Multifaceted Approach and Determining Your Share of Voice. Measurement is important because it informs decisions.
But before incorporating measurement into your PR approach, it’s essential to note two things about measurement. First, measurement doesn’t have to be 100-percent accurate; rather, it’s a quantitatively expressed reduction in uncertainty. You may not know how many people actually read what you’ve written on your Twitter account, but you can determine how many people are followers, how many are sharing your tweets and how many send you direct messages. This information reduces any uncertainty you may have about the number of people who may be reading your content.
Second, if you’re trying to measure something, there should be some expected outcome from measuring it. You shouldn’t measure something for the sake of measurement. For example, if you want to measure how effective a particular strategy is, you probably want to do so to know if you should continue with that given strategy.
Prior to measuring something, asking yourself the following five questions will help you determine exactly what you are talking about and why you care about it.
1. What is the decision this measurement is supposed to support?
2. What is the definition of the thing being measured in terms of observable consequences? For example, if you want to talk about “engagement” in social media, what specifically does it mean? Does it mean interactions per person per month? Does it mean “likes,” “shares” or “comments” on Facebook? And what decisions depend on that measurement of engagement?
3. How, exactly, does this thing matter to the decision being asked? Using the example noted above, why does engagement matter to your specific social media efforts? Will the measurement information you glean change the outcome of a particular strategy?
4. How much do you know about it now (i.e., what is your current level of uncertainty)?
5. What is the value of additional information?
The first three questions define the need for measurement. As Hubbard notes, “If a measurement matters at all, it is because it must have some conceivable effect on decisions and behavior. If we can’t identify a decision that could be affected by a proposed measure and how it could change those decisions, then the measurement simply has no value.”
In public relations, we like to talk about “readership.” But to measure readership (such as the readership of a company blog or newsletter), we really need to define what we mean by “readership” in the first place. Does this entail the number of people subscribed? Is this the number of people who click on a link? Does clicking on a link mean they read something? And why specifically are we trying to understand how many readers something has? What decision will be based on us obtaining this measurement? These questions and others should help inform your business decisions.
Question no. 4 is essential to helping you understand what you currently do know about something. As Hubbard notes, “The lack of having an exact number is not the same as knowing nothing.” Rather, he suggests that your answer have a 90-percent confidence level that the correct answer is within a particular range.
For example, if someone asked how many inches long a business card is, you wouldn’t necessarily provide its exact dimensions. You’d note that it was greater than two inches, but less than five inches. So you have a 90-percent confidence level that the exact length of the card is between those two numbers. The goal is not to have a “right” answer, but rather remove uncertainty. If you aren’t sure of something, widen your range.
Back to the readership question: You could guess that it’s between 1 and 5,000 readers. If a readership of 5,000 seems like an extreme stretch for the item in question, you at least know you have an upper limit, and it will help you try to narrow down the range. On the lower end of the range, you could measure click-throughs to determine that approximately 2,500 people open the email. So you would be 90-percent certain that readership includes a range of 2,500-5,000 readers. If you feel that not all of the 2,500 click-throughs actually read the email, you could broaden your range slightly to account for that difference, making it a range of 2,000 to 5,000.
Finally, question no.5 should help you determine if there truly is value in obtaining additional information. For example, if you measure your company’s blog or newsletter readership, discover it’s extremely low, but don’t do anything about it, the measurement is then an exercise in futility. If no value is to be added, then don’t proceed with the measurement. Alternately, you could determine that readership is higher than expected, which will support a decision to continue producing the content.
As you can see, measurement involves a high degree of strategic thinking before even attempting to measure something. Once you’ve determined specifically what you’re after and how it will be useful for your business and communications objectives, Hubbard has a great five-step process (he calls this the “Applied Information Economics” method) to help you approach improving assessment. Giving extra thought to measurement will help you provide more meaningful information to help shape business decisions, and in turn provide more valuable service to your clients.
Joni Kirk
Ever since the Seattle Sonics left for Oklahoma City four seasons ago, the community has held hope that someday we might have another NBA team. As it turns out, we might actually be close to having a team in town as soon as next fall. The city of Seattle’s mayor’s office has quietly been in discussion with Christopher Hansen, a San Francisco-based hedge fund manager (and Seattle native) to help finance a new arena to attract an NBA team. According to news reports, discussions have been going on for almost a year.
A year?! What’s interesting to me is that this is the first time the general public has heard about this. There haven’t been any news conferences or press releases talking about the what ifs but instead the powers that be have been diligently working in the background to try and make this happen before setting any expectations. Instead of spending their time answering questions they don’t have answers to, they focused on putting a deal together to alleviate some of the message spin. The mayor’s office has done an outstanding job of managing the messaging on this for almost a year now, and for this they deserve some kudos.
Nothing would steam Seattle’s milk more than the prospect of publicly financed stadiums and subsidized pro-sports teams, so it can’t be easy to manage expectations and messaging for such a high profile, high-risk initiative.
As PR practitioners it’s our job to think about the before, during, and after; to position the message just so; and to deftly manage the feedback. Imagine the counterproductive buzz that would have pushed these sensitive NBA talks off course had word gotten out sooner. Not good. Instead, questions are answered before they’re asked, strategic partners feel valued and the message has momentum.
Well played.
Did you catch Chrysler’s commercial featuring Clint Eastwood during last Sunday’s Super Bowl? More than 100 million people tuned in to watch the commercials. What makes this Clint Eastwood spot significant over the other commercials is the amount of buzz and media coverage it has received since its airing.
In case you missed it, the ad features Clint Eastwood giving a half-time pep talk to America, saying, “This country can’t be knocked out with one punch. We get right back up again and, when we do, the world is gonna hear the roar of our engines. Yeah, it’s halftime America, and the second half is about to begin.”
Let’s assume for a minute there was no political agenda – after all, I’ve read pretty persuasive arguments from all corners of the political spectrum – and that the ad was just an ad. Let’s also assume that the ensuing political controversy was unexpected by Chrysler – executives said there was no political message intended – it was just an ad. Now, think about the enviable position Chrysler has found itself in.
The ad is thought provoking and timely. Context and timing are two crucial elements that must be considered in any marketing communications program and Chrysler nailed it. Timing a message appropriately is a key factor, and in this case, is tied to the American public’s state of mind.
While media coverage has primarily focused on the potential political nature of the message, there’s no denying the press coverage has worked to put Chrysler at the forefront of people’s attention. After all, successful public relations campaigns are one of the most strategic tools a company can employ to communicate with their customers and potential customers.
Chrysler and its ad agency, Wieden & Kennedy, made a great ad, there’s no debating that. Since the commercial aired, the company has stated that it wasn’t a political message at all, but a message to Americans in general. Chrysler wasn’t calling for political change nor were they thanking the current administration for the tax-fund bailout. Regardless, it still worked.
Context and timing.
It started with Sponsored Stories early last year and now, Facebook continues to encourage user activity and promoted content with the recently announced new Timeline apps. These Timeline apps allow users to broadcast their daily activities, such as “cooking,” “hiking,” and “knitting,” moving beyond the traditional “like,” “read,” “watch” and “listen” buttons. These actions are chronicled through the use of specific applications connected to Facebook; you may have already seen many posts on your news feed from connected apps such as Spotify and The Washington Post, for example.
In January, Facebook announced the expansion and enhancement of action-based interactions and added 60 more Timeline apps, with many more to be added as the new feature grows in poularity. This advancement creates a new way for users to interact with apps, content and brands. Think of actions as creating a virtual, public diary chronicling everything you do throughout the day and “expressing who you are; a runner, foodie, traveler, music fan, movie buff and more” (Facebook.com).
According to TechCrunch, each app will have anywhere between two to ten verbs, which will then show up in Ticker (a feature of the Timeline profile). At the end of each month, all personal activities will be summed up on your timeline in the format of a visual graph. An article on Fast Company outlines the idea behind actions and Timeline apps:
Let’s say you listen to a particular song on Spotify. That action, “listened to a song,” gets passed back to Facebook (assuming you’ve given Spotify approval to do so). The action gets listed in your friends’ Tickers, where all their friends’ actions inside Facebook (like when they Like a page or comment on a picture) gets displayed in real-time. The action also gets listed on your Timeline as a permanent part of your history. (Though you can choose not to have that listed, or limit the people to whom it gets displayed.)
VentureBeat describes actions as “the holy grail of semantic data,” defining relation types between people, objects, content, places, businesses and more. Carl Sjogreen of the Facebook product team states,
Ideally, any app you find meaningful will be able to connect to Facebook in a way that’s more meaningful than just clicking a ‘like’ button or automating shares from that app on your wall – and that all your stories will be told, not through a universe of apps, but universally on Facebook and with a structured context.
These new Timeline apps create an opportunity for businesses and organizations to further understand relationships between consumers and products consumed. According to an article on Forbes.com, actions and Timeline apps allow for more targeted marketing, which means businesses will need to begin harnessing beyond “likes” in order for people to demonstrate their loyalty and connection to a brand. Furthermore, the article states that for marketers, this means “new ways to target, reach and engage consumers.” Forbes.com also noted that studies show incorporating social information and connecting ads to friends’ actions on Facebook make people twice as likely to click an ad and the intent to purchase increases fourfold.
This means that people will spend more time on Facebook than they already do. Using these apps and allowing them to structurally organize your actions onto Facebook means news feeds and profiles will see a lot more traffic. Users will be more connected to Facebook as it will chronicle and track everyday actions, subsequently encouraging and allowing friends to participate in the same activities, purchases, and more. With this increased interaction on Facebook, comes more ad inventory, increased options for social ads and improved ad targeting.
Privacy is the main concern over the new Facebook Timeline apps and their actions. Many users have fear around the publicity of location apps such as RunKeeper, which uses a GPS function to map the route of your run, walk, hike, etc. Furthermore, it will take some time before Timeline apps will create a big impact on Facebook and outside developers. In order for the action features to truly launch, everyone must be on Facebook’s Timeline format, which is predicted to be mandatory very soon.
We recommend looking into Facebook Timeline apps and mapping out how it all might drive consumer awareness, participation and overall success for your business or organization. Make the transition from Facebook Pages to a Facebook Timeline so you are ready to utilize actions in the near future and stay ahead of the curve.
Katherine Turney
Last week, Susan G. Komen’s decision to cut breast-screening grants to Planned Parenthood dominated the headlines across countless media outlets and conversations in the world of social media. The story was first reported by the Associated Press on Tuesday, Jan. 31, highlighting that Komen would cease funding under new eligibility rules that precludes grants to groups under government investigation.
Within 24 hours, the groundswell of backlash from politicians, celebrities, activists, advocates and general supporters quickly became a PR nightmare for the breast cancer organization. In a survey conducted by a Washington-based public relations firm, 75 percent of the people posting about the decision on social media shared negative comments about Susan G. Komen, and more than 20 percent said they would not give money to Komen because of the move.
In previous blog posts, we have discussed the importance of analyzing how a change in a company’s policy or service will be perceived by all stakeholders, and developing the appropriate messaging that provides transparency around these changes. In addition, we have also discussed the importance of developing a crisis communication plan to help you react faster and make more effective decisions when in the midst of a crisis. It is the actions a company or individual take within the first 24 hours that sets the tone for how the media and general public will react.
While thousands of supporters on both sides voiced their opinions, Planned Parenthood and Susan G. Komen utilized their social media channels to communicate their position on the decision. Planned Parenthood used their social media channels to galvanize supporters in not only raising awareness, but also created a call to action for supporters to donate funds. By Wednesday evening, the organization had received more than $650,000 in donations, which nearly matched what Komen had pledged the previous year.
In an effort to correct the negative perception of Komen’s decision, the foundation issued a number of Tweets responding to the public scrutiny, and also created a YouTube video featuring its CEO Susan G. Brinker. While both approaches are acceptable means for disseminating the organization’s key messages, they were remiss in their decision to remove negative comments posted to its Facebook page, which does not help in rebuilding trust among its constituents.
Komen’s recent PR blunder is yet another reminder of how powerful social media can be. Not only does it have the power to connect with target audiences, increase brand recognition, and convey key messages, it can also be a driving force in creating change. By Friday, Feb. 3, Susan G. Komen announced the reversal of their decision to cut breast-screening grants to Planned Parenthood, and said they would continue to fund existing grants and preserve the eligibility for Planned Parenthood to apply for future grants.