Internatonal PR Networks - Masterclass

Anyone lucky enough to be at Edelman’s London office last Tuesday night would have heard some of the foremost contributors to international PR pulling apart the traditional processes around running an international PR network. More interestingly they then tried to reassemble them fit for the social media age.

Roger White, for 12 years the Communications Director at PwC, the global accountancy firm and David Brain, in charge of Edelman’s activities in Europe, both delved deeply into the argument for and against global direction compare to local decision making, particularly exploring the models which support these different approaches.

Crucially, social media is speeding the process of information and the necessity to react. Traditionally, global campaigns have not allowed local practitioners much freedom. Both contributors recognised the need to devolve decisions to the local level whilst maintaining a corporate-wide uniformity.

One recurring characteristic focussed on the influence of US-centric global brands. Scaling campaigns to fit a market is not that simple and countries with populations larger and smaller than 4-5 million require a different selection of techniques. David Brain illustrated this through the comparatively differing ways to engage within countries like New Zealand, opposed to the US. Within the smaller countries it is important to know your stuff but more importantly (than with larger countries) there is an imperative to know the stakeholders...’it’s not so much what you know but who you know’.

Many organisations have come unstuck when a successful US campaign (to a market of 300 million people) is rolled-out to much smaller markets. The strategy and techniques don’t just reduce and this is when it is most important to have good local PR counsel able to decode the requirement, advise and adapt for the local market.

There is also the issue of transferability. Some campaigns just don’t travel. For example take the Co Compare the Market / Go Compare the Meerkat...brilliant for the UK but would it work in the US – probably not. As opposed to the Singapore Airline’s Singapore Girl which has been used successfully globally for over 20 years.

If you are involved in international PR networks there seemed to be two quite distinct activities and associated skills. For those charged with running an international campaign an understanding of strategy and techniques on a global level, combined with the skill to instruct and adapt on a local level. The other side of the coin is if you are running the local campaign, instructed by global. Then the skill is to take and modify expectations on the basis of your understanding of the local market.

(Failing to) Bridge the divide

There are some gaps which will never be bridged – I am pretty sure there will never be a bridge from Russia to Alaska across the often sub-zero Bering Straight. There is also the divide between the ways that traditional and online media are measured. From talking to people in the industry at events like Measurement Camp it seems to be an issue on which a serious discussion and research need to be focussed.
At this point it seems illogical to cut to what I think might be the conclusion to this post ...that these media types are essentially so different that no metric can transcend and we might as well just get used to it and carry on life. If that’s your position then to be aware of the issue is probably enough. But I strongly believe that PR and marketing needs cross-media metrics, able to transcend the multitude of media channels. How can budgets be effectively divided, resources allocated and jobs given out if there is no comparative value associated with each type of media?
In the world of traditional media measurement audience data often underpins the gauging of impact. This is all nicely audited and is accepted as a dependable yardstick. But when you flip into the digital world those sort of figures don’t exist – in relative terms it’s the twilight-zone.
There are many more familiar with online metrics and I acknowledge its an area I should know more about but my view is new media is just so varied that any sort of sample audit can’t accurately encapsulate the real picture.
In the world of social media measurement there are loads of question marks and none bigger than cross media metrics - can you find an answer?

Are you interested in the CIPR?

Anyone who is a member of the CIPR can not have failed to have been impressed by their St James's Square HQ. I have often used the members rooms as my London office with its wifi and coffee machine; it has always been pleasant surroundings and occasionally a real lifesaver.

So it must be a disappointment to many that they are moving in April to Russell Square. Personally, it will mean a longer walk from Charring Cross, but the issue I am sure more people are concerned about is what are the members rooms going to be like?

Well for anyone who can't wait until April the CIPR International Group is hosting its AGM at the St Stephen's Club, London on the 30th March with Colin Farrington, Director General and Kevin Taylor the CIPR President who among other things will try to enlighten us on their new premises. To book a place go to this link http://tinyurl.com/coqsl3 or contact me directly and I will reserve you a place.

Measuring the decline in sports sponsorship

Yesterday afternoon the Aviva yacht sailed past the office here on the South Coast of England and while I don’t necessarily want to give extra publicity to one of my clients rivals it did get me thinking about RBS's recent announcement on its sponsorship deals. This Wednesday’s RBS said it plans to drastically cut back its sports sponsorship commitments, something which won't be good for the sports and is bound to have negative implications for the UK's PR industry.

Sports sponsorship is an invaluable supplement to many sports peoples existence and with the clock counting down to London 2012 Olympics it looks likely that last Summer’s medal haul will not be easily re-enacted. With the current economic contraction playing out there is little public appetite to make up for RBS (and others?) scaling back of support.

Obviously I am not commenting on Aviva’s sponsorship commitments – I am not aware of any changes with them, but I do feel there is an issue surrounding the measuring of success for sponsorship. A crucial element of any sponsorship campaign is measuring the media generated, with a view to generating some form of ROI.

While media output is not directly linked to attitudinal outcomes (or buyer behaviour) it is a powerful proxy - but just how powerful?. My concern is that, as companies revise sponsorship budgets, so they will dispense with output measures. We can argue over how accurate the link is between output and outcomes and undoubtedly this is one of the most controversial aspects of PR measurement.

From my work as one of the awards judges for the CIPR over the last couple of years I have been struck by how ingrained opinions are on media outputs and crucially the percieved closeness of its connection to outcomes. Campaign results are often outlined as a series of media hits with little attempt to address consumer out-take, let alone outcome.

Online however is mixing it all up and conventional off-line metrics don't transfer well online. I am bound to say that this does not mean it can't be done but the dynamic of the medium is necessitating a more dynamic solution.

Social media measurement and evaluation - after the event

I just read an interesting post by Jason Falls about a new product from Scout Labs providing online media monitoring and measurement. I was talking with someone at yesterdays Measurement Camp about these types of service and it seems to be a shame it is not possible to offer an after the event service, as it is my understanding that one needs to set something up before coverage appears (please correct me if I am wrong).

I have a client who has just finished a campaign which seems to have got 150+ online media clips and it would be very interesting to present in tamden some sort of social media specific measurement. This connects with another posting I want to do on yesterdays Measurement Camp, which I will try and do later.

Markets, the State and academia

I am involved in the International Group of the CIPR (as Treasurer) and last night it hosted the Maggie Nally Lecture at the Palace of Westminster with Sir Howard Davies, now with the LSE and formally running the FSA, the CBI and being Deputy Governor of the Bank of England - the ideal person from whom to gain a perspective of the current state of the economy.

He did that, but he also offered a rare insight into the flaws of free market economics and the contrast between the Anglo-Saxon Laissez-faire approach and that taken by the ‘more broad minded near continentals’. In particular he spoke about the French attitude where there is growing feeling that the markets must operate with greater oversight, or to use Sir Howard’s expression ‘return of the state’.

Sir Howard spoke about how the Treasury only seriously considers scientifically based research, avoiding any consideration for the less tangible influences like the ethics of wealth and the associated philosophies under pinning them. Some could argue over the merits of a more Gallic approach and as I am so ignorant on this area I would say nothing more than the Treasury’s approach has obviously failed and there is a need for a discussion on issues like the meaning of wealth, how we reward it and the destructive forces which run hand-in-hand with speculation.

London’s financial services boom of the last ten years has largely been built on speculation and Sir Howard indicated that the new raft of market regulation will vastly limit the ‘creativity’ bankers and financiers have. This will limit asset pricing, limiting the relative size of this sector and ultimately London and UK fortunes. In effect these new regulations will not allow London’s financial services boom to happen again.

This might seem a bit off-topic but I think there is a public relations/measurement element to this. Sir Howard talked about the need for ‘translators’ to make the findings from academia of use to the greater public. In many ways the job of these translators is similar to PR in being the conduit between the organisational message and the public consumption. Whilst we are lucky to have some of the greatest researchers in this country it was seen as regrettable that they were not able to convey their finding in a more accessible way, ie the need for these third-party translators.

Measurement Camp ups the pace

Yesterday was the first of this years Measurement Camp monthly meetings, hosted this time by Econsultancy (Thanks Michelle and Aliya!). The 40 or so participants cover a vast cross-section of marketing specialisms, from PR, advertising, online and offline, direct and social media content producers. The breadth of interest and experience has to be unique, all to ponder the single issue of media measurement.

Some of the out-take I got was the overwhelming feeling that people needed to apply measurement to a massive selection of media outputs. Not only across the large number of social media platforms, but with the aim of generating a customised selection of results specific to their circumstances.

The instruments available make it possible to present many many different results sets. Clients don't want to be faced with 100 different metrics, and that is where Measurement Camp comes into its own. The format of the meetings are to take a real or imaginary media campaign and over a period of 2 hours present the best ways we can think of to measure it. The photo above shows our group presenting our finding to the rest.

Getting back to the out-takes; its clear that there will never be a single all-encompassing measure...a metric to to measure all social media; forget it. Through meaningful discussions and education on behalf of the agency, researchers and clients the hope is there should develop a confidence to pick on a couple of the metrics most appropriate. It will also help if examples of best-practice can be promoted as part of this education.

My final thought is on secrecy. There can be no use in agencies adopting a 'smoke and mirrors' approach to methodology. If it is not clear and transparent there can be no justification. I strongly believe that any efforts to cloak methodology will hinder the widespread adoption effective media measurement harming the evaluation agencies, confusing the clients as well as the media agencies.