5 Ways to Measure the Value of PR
For a long time, the PR world has engaged in a spirited debate on how to effectively measure the value of PR. Because the digital landscape has revolutionized so much within the last decade, the way we measure our PR efforts should align with the future of digital media.
Measuring the value of your PR efforts allows you to identify what’s working, what’s not, and enables you to take actionable steps to improve any loopholes in your PR strategy.
In this article, I’ll dive in and discuss how to measure the value of PR.
How to measure the value of PR
To measure the results of your PR efforts, you’ll identify the metrics that matter, and this data will help you make informed decisions about future PR goals and tactics.
Let’s dive into some tangible metrics that will help show the value of your PR efforts!
1. Engagement with journalists
Measuring open rates after pitching journalists is one indicator of how well your message is resonating. When a journalist opens the pitch, that’s a good sign. It means you have caught their eye. While they may not have a story to fit your brand in at that moment, many journalists treat their inbox like Google–searching for sources when a need arises.
If you aren’t getting a good open rate, that usually means it is time to try a new angle, subject line, and even shortening your pitch.
At TaleSplash, we have seen success through well-crafted pitches and subject lines, sent to carefully curated contacts that are a fit for our clients.
Getting noticed by journalists is challenging, but with the right approach, you'll increase your chances of securing coverage for your next story.
2. Business impact from press coverage
With the right PR strategy, media coverage of products and services can help generate sales, partnerships, and new business opportunities. Your go-to-market strategy should include public relations to build awareness and legitimacy among your target audiences.
At TaleSplash, we have seen press coverage help our clients attract customers, investors, partners, and talent by establishing credibility and trust for their brand and expertise.
While tracking this impact isn’t a perfect science, you can try some of the following ways:
Ask how customers how they heard about you
Check to see if any of your press hits rank highly in a Google search
Use UTM codes in press releases and social content that promotes the media coverage
You can layer this anecdotal feedback and data in with the referral traffic that’s generated from press hits that contain backlinks, which we’ll discuss more in the next section, to get a more comprehensive view of your performance.
3. Backlinks from domains in your niche
If media coverage includes a link to your website, it’s considered a backlink, which is very valuable for SEO because it helps your website build trust.
Backlinks can be measured by Domain Authority (DA), and they’re a predictor of a website’s likelihood to rank on Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs), measured on a scale of 1 to 100. A higher DA score indicates a greater likelihood of a website appearing on SERPs.
Backlinks from websites with high-authority domains that link to your website, tell Google that your website is “trusted,” which can help your website rank higher on SERPs Backlinks from low-domain authority domains tell Google that your website might be spammy, which results in lower SERPs.
Tools such as SEMRUSH, Moz, and Ahref can be used to calculate the DA of a website.
4. Competitive analysis data
"The time your game is most vulnerable is when you're ahead. Never let up," -- Rod Laver, Adidas.
Going beyond simply measuring the performance of your PR efforts, a competitive analysis allows you to benchmark the impact of your PR strategies compared to other brands in your category. This also provides an opportunity to identify what’s working well for other brands.
At TaleSplash, we often run a competitive analysis of media coverage to gain insights on the topics within an industry that journalists are covering. Keeping a close eye on the broader landscape can help identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and potential threats within a group of similar brands.
Share of voice can also be measured as part of brand tracking research or with tools like BrandMentions and Sprout Social, which allow you to measure your target audience’s online sentiment.
5. Social media engagement of media coverage
Sharing media coverage on social media channels is nearly as important as the coverage itself. Engagement can be quantified through metrics such as likes, shares, comments and mentions.
Social media engagement boosts the value of earned media because it functions like word-of-mouth recommendations from trusted contacts. It signifies to audiences, ‘Hey, this is what I think about X, Y, Z product or service because I’ve tried it, and here are my thoughts on why you should try it too (or not).’
In conclusion, measuring the value of PR is a multifaceted endeavor. The list is not exhaustive, but exploring the five key indicators above can provide a holistic view of the impact of public relations efforts on your business.
Want to learn more? Book some time with us.