When promoting your business, it is very rare you only ever carry out one type of marketing activity at a time. You often have several activities running simultaneously, such as a website that promotes the business, social media posts, customer engagement and newsletters. With all these messages running at once how can you really determine which is having the biggest impact for your business?
Was your spike in website traffic because of your social media campaign or newspaper coverage? Are you paying for marketing that you don’t need? How can you really be sure each campaign is giving you maximum results?
PR and marketing should always feature a mixture of techniques which complement one another. Measuring the success of that campaign can use lots of different techniques and it important that you understand how to measure and evaluate each project to make sure you get maximum impact.
We run down the top 5 ways to measure if your PR campaign is working effectively.
Let your data do the talking
Data driven analytics will help you to see how your PR and marketing is working. Who is visiting your site, how your media and social platforms tie in and most importantly where you get the most engagement.
Make sure that you instigate Google Analytics on your website and take the time to monitor your data. Look for spikes in activity. In the period when an article went live have you seen a spike in activity on the website from internet searches?
If you have links in an article, are they driving traffic to your website?
Don’t forget to keep an eye on how back links in media coverage are boosting your SEO ratings as well. News websites have some of the best Domain Authorities delivering high ranking back links to your website and helping your business improve its Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). Keep an eye on how your data improves and what is driving that success.
Customer surveys
Customer surveys are a great way to gather information for your business. Ask customers to let you know where they heard about you from, have they seen particular coverage, does the coverage help to keep them informed?
Just remember that individuals often see your messaging in several locations so just because they say they are buying today because of a social post it doesn’t mean they weren’t also influenced by the media coverage. Studies show individuals need to see your message 7 times before choosing to buy. So, if you ask them to name their last interaction you aren’t getting the full picture.
Ask customers all the places they have seen your business rather than why they chose to buy today. This will give you a much more in depth picture of what is working for your business.
Share of voice
Share of voice simply means looking at all the news about your industry and analysing how much features your company. Are you getting a greater share of coverage compared to your competitors?
Next time you get coverage, have a look to see if your coverage is larger or smaller than that of a competitor, do you regularly get featured more than your competitors or are their messages dominating the media? If you are struggling to be heard above your competitors, it might be time to improve your position in the market and grow your share of voice.
Content of PR gained
When measuring the success of a PR campaign one of the most important things you should look at is not just who and where your message has been published but what that message actually looks like.
Don’t simply count the number of pieces of coverage. Look at what is actually said. Is the tone positive, does it include all your key messaging, does the headline emphasise what you were looking for?
Too often people see coverage and simply count the number of headlines. However, quality messaging and content is far more valuable than multiple pieces that don’t deliver your intended call to action or show your business in the best light. For more advice look at Why Content is Just as Important as Headlines in Measuring PR Success.
Engagement after sharing PR
When you gain PR coverage that should only be the start of your journey. To maximise impact from that coverage make sure you share it as much as possible. Post it on social media and in your customer newsletters, share with staff and upload to your website and blogs.
Track your engagement on social media posts about media coverage. My clients often report that their highest ranking social media posts are those that share recent media coverage. When measuring success don’t forget to add in this reach and impact as well.
PR isn’t about just the people who see your news article, hear you on the radio or see the television coverage it is about its wider impact in growing the business as well.
PR’s success lies in getting as many people as possible talking about your brand and understanding what you do. As they see your other sales campaigns this understanding of the brand will then help to convert your sales.
This means that PR shouldn’t be measured purely in sales figures but also in how it adds to your other marketing activities.
It is there to raise brand awareness so that when your products or services are needed you are seen as the trusted, successful brand to choose in your area and industry.
If you are wondering whether your business could benefit from PR then why not book a free, no obligation chat to see if Creative Word PR can help.
Offering flexible, affordable advice you can trust we take the faff out of PR to demystify the industry and show you how to get your business to stand out.
Get in touch today by calling 07725 195642 or email cheryl@creativewordpr.co.uk
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