Author: Marianne Morgan, Director of Research and Analytics at Citypress and Chair of AMEC’s European Chapter.

I recently completed a course in executive coaching. The premise is simple – by listening carefully and asking powerful questions you can enable individuals to think about their problems with a new perspective. This new awareness will help them find their own solutions and give them the tools to solve future problems more easily.

Research suggests that this is a much more effective way of problem solving than simply being given the answer by a boss, a line manager or a peer. After all, who likes to be told what to do? And, as the saying goes, there is more than one way to skin a cat. Ultimately, we are all different and only you truly know what the right choice for you will be.

This same premise also applies to PR measurement. So often, I encounter people (clients and peers) who want to know the ‘best’ way to measure their communications effectiveness. The answer is always the same – it depends on your objectives, your budget, your target audience and your tactics.

It may be true but it’s an unsatisfactory answer for most.

However, if we really listen to what sits behind the question, I wonder if we would be able to empower more comms professionals to solve their own measurement challenges.

The clients and colleagues who deliver the best measurement are the ones who have taken time to think about what they want their PR to achieve – whether that is awareness, a perception change or an influx of sales leads – and how to measure that single, most-important thing effectively.

They are also the ones who have listened to their businesses and understood what metrics will resonate. There are still many businesses and consultancies that use AVEs. I doubt it is because they think it’s a really robust metric (it isn’t!) but it clearly offers something or it wouldn’t be requested so often. Sometimes, it is the comfort of having a monetary value assigned to PR, sometimes it is habit – it enables easy year-on-year comparisons – and sometimes it is simply because no one has had a better idea. There are ways and means of solving all these problems – different monetary metrics, implementing a transition period or training – but the right solution can only be found if we understand the real problem.

So, next time you are asked about best-practice measurement, take a moment to really listen to what that business needs. Ask powerful questions and you may just see some powerful change.

ENDS