The Blog About KDPaine's New Book "Measuring Public Relationships"

Don Bartholomew Makes Some Good Points About Measuring Relationships

Over at Proving the Value of Public Relations, Don Bartholomew makes some excellent points on the topic of "Reining In The Hype About Relationship Measurement."

He won't be the last to voice these or similar objections. Relationship measurement is a bit unproven as yet; it needs a lot more research and study, and the subject will undoubtably get deeper and more interesting as that happens. And it doesn't directly measure PR's impact on business outcomes, which is what most people want to or wish they could measure.

Don's objections will be proved more or less serious as time goes by and more research and practical relationship measurement efforts are undertaken.

In the meantime, note that relationship measurement, in the form of the Grunig and Hon survey technique, does have immediate practical value, as demonstrated by Forrest Anderson's effective use of it to solve a client's problems. --Bill Paarlberg

Relationship Measurement Case Study from Forrest Anderson

If you have found "Measuring Public Relationships" interesting, then you will be interested in this new research that explicitly investigated relationship components. Forrest Anderson and Paul Raab have completed a communications audit that used the Grunig questionnaire to pinpoint relationship problems for their client. You can read the whole story at The Measurement Standard newsletter, or at The Measurement Standard Blog Edition, where an interesting comment or two have been added.

This research approach is exactly what Katie Delahaye Paine's new book "Measuring Public Relationships" (which this blog is all about) promotes. In fact, we will no doubt try to include the Anderson and Raab work in the book's second edition. -- Bill Paarlberg