KDPaine's PR Measurement Blog

This is really scary for accountable communicators in the UK

Thanks to my friend Dave Fleet for alerting us to this this disturbing development in the UK. There was an discussion I missed at the AMEC conference about the implications of some of the moves of the NLA, the UK's Newspaper Licencing Bureau  which holds all the measurement companies in the UK hostage via copyright restrictions. But this development is  takes us all hostage.
What makes me crazy is that even if this goes thru, it's not the journalists that make the money, it's the NLA.
What I'm most concerned about it that this will no doubt increase the cost of measurement substantially, in an era when budget s are tight, and we need metrics more than ever.  

More great discussion about Social Media ROI

Make sure you read all the comments:
Defining Social Media ROI once and for all, and understanding the action-reactive-return narrative « The BrandBuilder Blog.

Get up to speed on social media measurement in a hurry.. listen in to this

New Bulldog Reporter Conference Reveals How PR Can Monitor Brand and Buzz on Blogs, Twitter, Facebook and Beyond.

Listen up folks, this is the new reality

I think it's no secret that I generally think Shel Israel makes alot of sense.. even if he occasionally disagrees with me. He's now put our entire profession into perspective.

YES WE CAN Measure Conversations

In his wonderful blog Global Neighbourhoods, Shel Israel has aruged that there is value to a conversation that can't be emasured.
I disagree, of course. Because in 23 years in the business, I've never met a communications program I can't measure.
The value of a good conversation isn't that it leads to greater market share, or a huge sale, but that it enhances relationships, which lowers the costs of doing business. When Robert Putnam did his research on the value of Social Capital, he was in fact making a strong argument to measure relationships. Because what he found was that the greater the level of social capital between people, the healthier and more productive and more efficient people became.
Other research  also showed (Download Fussell Tangible Benefits of Social Capital)that the more conversations i.e. the more social capital -- the more efficient organizations become, and oh, by the way, they also see lower legal bills, lower recruitment costs, lower turnover rates and higher customer satisfaction.
The way to measure the value of conversations is to first measure the degree to which people trust you, and the degree to which your stakeholders are satisfied and committed to your relationships. Find out just how valuable people think those relationships are. Then start a conversation and measure how much MORE valuable people think the relationship after you've been talking with them awhile. I'm guessing you'll find that conversations are enormously valuable, not just from a warm and fuzzy standpoint, but from a highly tangible perspective.
And yes, in the interest of transparency KDPaine & Partners does conduct relationship research.

Great question: would you rather have no conversation or negative chatter?

Earned Media: Is No Chatter Worse Than Negative Chatter? - Advertising Age - DigitalNext.

You're never wrong, you're just early..

For the past two years, I've been telling my clients, and anyone else who would listen, that the times they are a changing, particularly in the world of product PR. Looks like NYTimes agrees with me.

Great post on evaluating Twitter

MediaPost Publications Twittering Away Time And Money 06/30/2009.

Time for us to put up or shut up

I've been at dozens of measurement conferences this year and handed out thousands of stickers that say "YES WE CAN MEASURE PR" and "YES WE CAN MEASURE SOCIAL MEDIA"  and most people seem to agree with that statement. Now's our chance to prove it. Everyone out there that is doing good research, measurement or evaluation in the field of social media or public relations should submit his/her program for the Jack Felton Golden Ruler Award.
Lets prove to the world that we can in deed tie PR to tangible results

Can Nokia's reputation be saved?

When I first heard about the Wall Street Journal story essentially blaming Nokia & Siemens for the Iranian dictatorship's ability to track and arrest protestors via cell phones, I was all for signing the petition demanding a  Boycott of  Nokia, Siemens for Selling to Iran.
Then I read spokesperson Ben Roome's blog post which provided a rationale explanation of the issue. But from a reputation measurement perspective, it got me wondering. As long as the WSJ stands by its story, and as long as that story is being tweeted and retweeted amongh the thousands of folks following #iranelection on Twitter, what chance does the company have of actually controlling the public's perception of the company's role in the brutal crackdown in Iran? And, does a company have an obligation to be more proactive in a crisis of this sort?  I know that Nokia Siemens is following standard crisis communications theory by putting their story out there, listening (and publishing) the comments and criticisms, and I really can't fault them.
But I'm wondering if, in this era of instant communications and continuous news reporting, classic crisis communications no longer works. Do you have to do somethingn above and beyond the norm, something proactive, not reactive, that will tell the world that you do indeed stand for the basic human rights of freedom of speech and liberty for all?
I guess if I were them, I'd be tracking my social media presence against sales of phones, to see whether the call for a boycott has legs, But I'd be working on a blan B if it does.

Thoughts on the Berlin Protocol

Barry Leggetter, AMEC's Executive Director and the force behind last week's Berlin Measurement Summit, very correctly asked me for specifics of "The Berlin Protocol" that I proposed in my post last week.
So here's a start.

 

• 1.       We agree to use no research methodology that isn’t based on solid research and facts
• 2.       We agree to a standard principle that the best measurements are business outcomes not exposure, AVE or OTS
• 3.       We all agree to avoid to not use multipliers and other non-proven false statistics
• 4.       We agree that transparency is key to credibility in  our industry, and so we agree to reveal, if asked, our methodologies and our intercoder reliability scores and eschew “black boxes” and mystery algorithms
• 5.       We do not promote or offer or endorse AVEs, and if they are used, they must discount negative stories, stories that do not contain key messages, and stories that do not mention the brand in the headline or top 20% of the story. (i.e. stories you’d actually be willing to pay for)

Further thoughts? Additions? ?

My favorite newmeasurement tool

I got a chance to check out  this new analysis tool out from NEWBASE called Infonitor at the AMEC Measurement Summit last week, it's pretty impressive.

Why 31% of Marketers and most PR people will probably lose their jobs

There's more and more research, like this new report on Marketing Measurement
that essentially says that CEOs expect ROI and serious business metrics, while most marketers haven't even budgeted for basic measurement.
Like the recently released AMEC Benchpoint study reveals, there's a gap the size of the Grand Canyon between what your average PR or Mktg person measures, and what the CEO expects/wants.
So is it any wonder that marketing and pr budgets are getting slashed and more and more of our friends are looking for jobs?

Assessing the assessors at AMEC's Summit on Measurment

 After spending 3 days in Berlin talking about measurement, I’m ready to try gardening for the rest of my life. Or maybe politics, at least with gardening and politics things actually change. Don’t get me wrong, I was as delighted as the next person by the fact that 8% more people measure today than they did 5 years ago. But it was the lack of movement in HOW people measured that really got to me. In essence, despite the advances in Dashboard, survey research, and social networking analysis, most PR people are measuring in 2009 with tools that I rejected in 1987 when I started Delahaye, my first measurement company.

When David Rockland asked the 150 or so people how many people used AVE (Ad Value Equivalents) almost everyone raised his/her hand. And while a large number of them also admitted not being exactly proud of doing so, the universal assessment was that “they had no choice.”  They had to deliver what the client wants. And, I asked, if the client wanted heroin or nuclear weaponry or child porn would they also deliver. Sadly, the consensus was yes. The proliferation of AVEs is driven by market demand.
Rockland went on to spend another hour or so discussing a metric that IMHO has no place in today’s measurement discussion. But obviously I was a minority (except, of course on Twitter, where there was a general consensus of WTF – why was so much time being devoted to this topic. )But that’s because people on Twitter tend to be aficionados of social media where AVE isn’t even an option.

I obviously have a radically different outlook than most of my profession. But somehow, I’ve managed to grow two companies, hang on to over 4000 twitter followers, generate  over 2000 subscribers to our newsletters, and happily service 100s of clients that don’t seem to mind me sticking to my principles. So I for one will continue to eschew AVE and welcome any and all fellow supporters into my club.

In fact, the idealist in me wish for a “Berlin Protocol” in which we all agreed to not just promote measurement, but to promote the “right” way of measuring based on outcomes not outputs and based on true science not “assessment by voodoo economics.” 

As a side note, it does make my life easier. As you might imagine, I am frequently asked to judge PR award programs, and my stance makes it for far  easier judging.  I routinely toss  out any entry that even comes within the discussion of AVEs, so as a result I have far fewer entries to judge.

But I digress. At the Amec there were numerous fascinating and elucidating presentations on all aspects of PR measurement and beautifully summed up by Nanette Bresson.   But when it came down to the nitty gritty, in essence, the vast majority of vendors in the room, were still counting hits (How Idiots Track Success) and AVEs.  They were all basing decisions on data that was either patently false or never existed. Don Wright and David Michaelson discussed their  seminal research that proved conclusively that multipliers had no basis in reality, but that doesn’t mean anyone in that room in Berlin has plans to abandon them anytime soon.

So here’s a question and a proposition. First the question: If I drop out of sight for a year, tend my garden, speak no more, and let the industry get on with its day to day issues, and assuming I returned to return to the business in June of 2010, would anything have changed?  

And here’s the proposition: Lets all agree to never again deliver an AVE number, or any other number we don’t believe in. Do you really think our business would collapse? Would clients really leave measurement in droves? . Or would they be forced to actually look at true business outcomes. And if we don’t do this, don’t we lose the business to management consultants anyway?

Watching the Green Revolution from the home of the Velvet one.

It’s fascinating to watch the developments unfold in Iran, while I’m in Prague learning about their “Velvet Revolution” --   If you haven’t been following the bloody aftermath of the recent Iranian election which many believe to have been stolen,  just  search for #iranelection on Twitter and you won’t get any more work done for the rest of the week. It is a fascinating 1^st person account from dozens of people on the street, talking about events literally as they are happening. It started with proofs that the election was stolen, went on to accuse CNN and American Media in general of gross negligence in its coverage. Ultimately the Tweets on the streets started posting photos of the violence, the Twitterverse responded with a number of innovative ways of showing its support, The most compelling were the shots of Iranian women, bloddied but unbowed taking to the streets in the cause of freedom.

It’s being called the Green revolution and as we speak hundreds of my Tweeps have changed their avatars to green in support of the protests. There are several key twitters, specifically @change_for_iran and @persiankiwi who have been live blogging the events,  and while I’ve never met either one of them, I’m praying like crazy that they are safe.   

As I’m running around Prague I started thinking hard about what it all means and what’s the difference between the Czech “Velvet” revolution and todays’ “Green Revolution” in Iran.  Obvioulsly when the Velvet revolution happened, while there was no alternative or social media to report it, the truth was that the soviet regime had essentially run  out of steam, and didn’t have the muscle to fight the protesters. According to a student I sat next to on the plane, who's parents were in the thick of it, those in the know, and in authority, realized what the future held,  saw the writing on the wall and switched sides. Thus the whole thing happened with nary a shot fired. There was no Twitter, no Facebook, no such thing as “blocking” Internet access because it was before the Internet, Google, Hulu and any of the other tools we’ve gotten used to.

Fast forward 20 years later, Prague is a vibrant city, with free Wi-Fi virtually everywhere, a startingly diverse cultural life, a healthy divergence of political opinions, that retains its Bohemian reputation but has added democracy and freedom to its repertoire. This for a country and a city that has been occupied, terrorized, subjugated, and otherwise robbed of its freedoms more times than you can count. Yet here it is today, with better arts and culture, more tourists, a better reputation, and one might argue a healthier democracy and a freer society than American has enjoyed in the last 8 years.

Which brings me back to Iran. Obviously Achmadinajad is nowhere near as close to the end of his powers as Gorbachev was in 1989. But Gorbachev didn’t have Twitter and the rest of social media to deal with. Despite the Iranian government’s numerous attempts to block various social networks Including Twitter, the amazing crowd sourcing abilities of the millions of people who are on line  providing proxy servers, alternative means of distribution, and a continuous stream of photos, videos and proof that the election was rigged.

All of which reminds me of a conversation that I had with Shel Israel a couple of years ago. Shel and I are both idealistic hippy reporters from the 70s, so it wasn’t a big stretch for us to come to the conclusion over dinner in Chicago one night that social media might actually lead to world peace. Okay, you can attribute whatever percentage of that idealistic notion to the wine we may or may not have consumed. But we’ve now had some serious proof, in Moldova, Colombia and now Iran that revolutions really can be, if not started, at least fomented via social media.

I pray that my friends and Tweeps in Iran survive this night and the ensuing weeks, and that their revolution is both “Green” and “Velvet”  and that change happens in Iran with a minimum of bloodshed. But I also pray that every other authoritarian ruler out there, that thinks that they can somehow keep down the human spirit in an age of social media takes heed of these happenings.

As I chanted in the 70s “The people, united, will never be divided”  I now add, the people, united by Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and all other forms of social media, will never be divided. Ultimately, we are all human at heart, some more human than others, but when we have the ability to connect with each other and remind ourselves that the vast majority of us want the same things as Elvis Costello would have said – peace, love and understanding .

Wandering thru Prague one sees constant evidence that over time, even the strongest of bastions will decay, whether it be a Castle, a church, a tower, or a command and control authoritarian government. The good news is that if Prague is any indication, we’ll may chose to patch elements back together, but ultimately, humanity does survive. 

persiankiwi (persiankiwi) on Twitter.

Stop with the excuses, ROI isn't that hard, just read this

Paul Dunay has captured perfectly why so many of us are running out of patience with the wringing of hands about ROI of Social Media discussion.

Great summary of AMEC Summit

For those who couldn't attend the AMEC Measurement Summit - TNannett Bresson has written a wonderful synopsis

Great explanation as to why HITS still stand for How Idiots Track Success

Confusion, lawsuits, denial of reality and resistance to change are all roiling the audience measurement marketing these days. Read all abouot it:  Nielsen Glitch Focuses Attention On New Online Measurement System, Impact Unknown

Interesting stats on Twitter Usage

Sysomos has released this research data on Twitter World.