What constitutes ROI?
Many professional communicators are starting to talk about ROI or Return On Investment in regards to measuring their communications activities.
I came across a blog posting at Intelligent Measurement that questions the value of assigning an advertising equivalency to news coverage.
Advertising equivalency is essentially putting a dollar value to media coverage. Its value is generally calculated by comparing the size of the article to paid advertising of the relatively the same size and placement. Or in the case of broadcast, the length and time of the mention in comparison to an advertising spot.
The blog posting, The problem with ROI, would like to see more of an emphasis on brand and reputation issues.
Fair enough.
But it’s important to remember that when it comes to good analysis there is no silver bullet. There is no one technique that will communicate what exactly is going on or how your communications efforts are being perceived.
Some organizations have tried to correlate stock prices or sales to news coverage, and, similar to advertising equivalency, this practice has it detractors. Can you correlate stock prices or sales to news coverage? The answer is: Sometimes yes and sometimes no.
That may sound like a cop-out, but in reality it’s the most truthful answer and exemplifies why you need more than tools when it comes to media analysis. You need knowledgeable people who understand the issues to tell you what’s going on.
Good media analysis is about providing insight, and telling a story that accurately communicates to your organization what is going on and how information is being perceived. It’s about being able to read the tea leaves, and it’s important to use all means that are valuable to you to do so.
