What makes your public relations work valuable? This question lies at the heart of the ongoing measurement challenge in the PR industry. According to Mark Weiner, CEO Prime Research North America, ‘proving value’ can be very subjective and requires an understanding of ‘the value drivers of the organization and its executives’.
Weiner states that in measuring PR value, there is a need to ‘assess and align’ the client’s definitions of what is ‘measurable, meaningful and reasonable’. So what happens when the client wants to judge PR performance on the dollar value of the media coverage that has been achieved? The use of Advertising Value Equivalents (AVEs) was condemned formally by the PRIA in 1999. Yet 10 years on, the practice is still fairly common, often due to pressure from clients who are looking for some form of quantitative measure by which to judge the success of the PR work they have commissioned.
The problem with AVEs is that they treat every piece of media coverage as valuable, without considering ‘content and tone’, according to Professor Jim Macnamara of UTS. Not only criticised by the PRIA, AVEs are also discouraged by the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR- UK), the Institute for Public Relations (IPR – US), the Advertising Federation of Australia and the Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA).
Macnamara highlights eight fundamental flaws of AVEs, summarising them as ‘invalid and irrelevant as a measure of editorial publicity’ for two main reasons. First, the differences between advertising and publicity make them almost impossible to compare. Second, that AVEs only measure cost, not value, pointing out that advertising value is never measured simply by the ad spend. In another paper, Weiner adds to this list of flaws, discussing how there is a significant difference between a person having the ‘opportunity to see’ an article and actually reading it. In very basic terms, AVEs lack meaning.
Both Weiner and Macnamara argue that the professional reputation of the PR industry is at stake with the continued use of AVEs as they are a misleading representation of the value of PR. So what can be done? While AVEs may be easy to measure, highlighting their lack of meaning to the client, using Macnamra’s list of flaws, may be a first step. But PR professionals also need to be able to present alternative measures to clients to assist them in defining what ‘value’ means to them. All the papers discussed here have alternative solutions which can bolster the credibility and professional standing of the public relations industry.
Note: This piece was originally drafted by me for the PRIA(SA) e-newsletter in 2009.
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