KDPaine's PR Measurement Blog

Automated Vs. Human Analysis | The Social Analyst

Author: Michael Woldhuis

via www.online1984.com

This is a great indepth post on the plusses and minuses of automated vs human analysis

It might be harsh, but it just might work

via badpitch.blogspot.com

I've loved Kevin Dugan's Bad Pitch Blog ever since I first stumbled upon it five years ago, and have submitted numerous entries to it over the years.
Now Gawker has picked up on the theme and taken it up a notch with its PR Dummies Blog.

Interesting that at the same time, there is a debate going on in a LinkedIn Group about whether purchased lists sold by some of the industries leading  brand names are just spam.

Now we all know good PR practitioners, but there's a long chain of command from the savvy people at the top of an agency to the person who is being told to write and send out these bad pitches. But at some point, we need to stop blaming the newbie and start looking in the mirror at the practices that cause PR to be the subject of such ridicule.

I'm not sure this is a "perfect storm" moment that will lead to a "PR Spring"  but it just might be a "tipping point" to get us to change the paradigm and improve our practices. (I"m actually trying to see if I put enough PR cliches in a single posting, Gawker will pick it up 

I couldn't have said it better, predicting elections by counting words is complete bunk

So glad to know I'm not the only one who rolls her eyes when she sees all of the annoucements of how automated sentiment analysis is going to predict the 2012 Election outcome. Huffington Post is just as skeptical 

 

Interesting analysis of Social Media Measurement Tools and Needs

2011 has been a year of extraordinary growth in our practice at Semphonic. But no part of that practice has grown as dramatically as Social Media Measurement. There's tremendous interest right now in Social Media but it's an area - perhaps even more than mobile - where companies are still struggling to formulate a coherent strategy. That hasn't necessarily stopped or even slowed the pace of investment and maybe that's not unreasonable. If you wait until everyone figures out how to do this stuff, you may find that your competitors enjoy insurmountable advantages.

via semphonic.blogs.com

This is too focused on technology for my taste, but Gary makes some excellent points about overlapping platforms

Talking Sense About Marketing Metrics

Without metrics, marketers cannot manage investments or show the value of marketing. However, without careful selection of metrics, diligent analysis and a clear overarching vision, measurement can become the biggest barrier to successful long-term marketing programs.

via blogs.imediaconnection.com

Eric does a great job summarizing the pitfalls of what most people are measuring

Klout's future gives me the creeps.

As ususal there's even more discussion of influence flying around the social sphere these days, some of which started with David Pakman's gushing endorsement of his newest investment.

Pakman states "Klout’s algorithms score the actual influence of people as they share on the social web. They attempt to measure your influence by observing interactions on the social web. As we all work to build and manage our online identity and profile, Klout helps measure our reach and topics of influence." 

The problem with his premise is that it mistakenly equates  social activity with influence.  Nathan Gilliat brilliantly dismisses that argument.

Pakman's premise is that it assumes that people who are active on Twitter and Facebook somehow DESERVE to be treated better by restaurants airlines etc. I don't disagree that social media helps give consumers more power and makes brands more accountable, but lets not forget that all Klout measures is activity, mostly on Twitter. So if I am on bereivement leave or vacation, and my Klout score drops because my I'm away from electronic devices, I no longer deserve good service or a good meal? That sounds like a new version of the caste system, but one based on one's access to social media.
This isn't measurement, it is discrimination.

The uncivil society that Pakman proposes is one in which someone with a smart robot can game their way to a high klout score and then leverage that score to muscle their way onto planes, doctor's offices and restaurants. Can't wait to see what the 99% does with that.

Mathew, Do You Know What Trust IS?

I have no doubt that Mathew Ingram is a solid businss reporter, but his piece today about Klout being a measure of trust and reputation is an indicator of just how little he knows about trust and reputation AND, what a bad job the public relations industry  has done in educating the media on the topic. His basic premise is

"This reputation-based economy requires some kind of measurement system, and possibly many competing systems, just as the traditional media market needs Nielsen and comScore....

Someone is going to do it, though, because the social Web needs it to function properly. As users, the most we can hope for is that the process is relatively obvious and that we get some benefit from allowing ourselves to be tracked."

Never mind that Nielsen and comScore never measured reputation or trust, but rather estimated the "reach" of an advertising mesage, the fundamental misunderstanding here is what consistutes reputation.

Mathew, for your information, repuation and trust have nothing to do with Klout/Kred or Peerindex. Trust and reputation exist in the minds of your customers, your employees, your stakeholders and your marketplace. These concepts are measured by how people perceive your accumulated actions towards them and their community  -- be that community a physical one, or a professional or personal one. Get that. It's PERCEPTIONS, not whether there is an electronic indicator that someone has "followed you" or "liked" you. Half of those follows and likes are electronically generated bots. The rest of them are fleeting moments of "oh, I agree with this" or "this is interesting" -- neither of those actions have anything to do with trust or reputation. 

I find it hard to believe that anyone that is writing for Bloomberg/Business week isn't unaware that the measurement of reputation and trust is something that corporations have been doing for years and that measures of trust have been around for years. Whether its via bespoke surveys or Edelman's Trust barometer or a survey like the Reputation Institute's reputation score, there are a lot more reliable ways available to measure reputation than the electronic equivalent of a wink. 

What I think you mean, and please correct me if you're wrong, is that people need a social media equivalent of a GRP or "Impressions"  which, back in the last century, served as an indicator of how many potential "eyeballs" saw an ad.  I would argue that you are suggesting you are calling for the media equivalent of an hour glass to measure a lightwave. 

Today's environment is far more dependent on the personal networks and REAL definitions of trust than simple reach. Organizations like Procter & Gamble & Coca Cola have already realized this, and are working on results-based metrics, not made up "influence" scores.

 

How Penn State measures success in a crisis

Page 2 of 2 HARRISBURG, Pa. January 4, 2012 (AP)

via abcnews.go.com

Interesting metrics: the lack of alumni requesting refunds and the lack of Penn State in top search terms. If I were on the board, I'd want to know how we were doing in comparison of other major university scandals.