Eric Hoffer, in The True Believer, writes that among the committed ideologues, fact is less relevant than belief. We see this played out in pedestrian quarters, not just the halls of power, when we see PR people who won’t measure their programs — they like the lack of accountability, the sense of playing the artist. They’re convinced of their own intrinsic judgment to point of refusing to brook dissent.

It’s also true that if we use research merely to prove that what we’re doing or recommending is right, we are indeed missing the point! A brief example. For some time, I’ve held that a main purpose of employee communication is convincing your workforce to expend discretionary effort toward achieving organizational goals. I’m revisiting that belief in the wake of some discussions to the contrary. I’m willing to change my mind if there’s data that will illuminate me.

But then, I’m kind of a dweeb for this stuff.

AVE is not an advertising value equivalent in any shape or form. If PRs want some simple output measures, then they can certainly list the media in which coverage was achieved and that media’s reach in terms of people (although that doesn’t tell you if the same people were reached multiple times or if they were different people – and which of those is “right” depends on what your objectives are).

All of that would be great if PR folk undertook research into those they wish to communicate with and which media they consume (which in my experience, few do).

The only justification for focusing on spend, is to compare the effectiveness of different approaches. So given a certain budget, where am I best to spend it to achieve my defined objectives. Then you can compare the cost of creating and placing advertising, with the cost of creating and placing media articles – but you would do this in terms of what both achieved.

PR may well produce more column inches for the money spent than buying the equivalent volume as advertising. Whether the nature of that coverage achieves the required outcome is what is important as you say.

Simply providing the “beancounters” with a measure rather than engaging them, along with those responsible for other communications, in the nature of influence is not a healpful approach.

BTW, “awareness” is also rather fluffy as an outcome measure – why do you want someone to be aware? What did this charity really want beyond people knowing of its existence? That should be the real driver of activity, not the lazy post-rationalisation that often seems to occur.

“According to Montreal’s Influence Communication, the media coverage (television, Internet, radio, and newspaper) generated by his space visit reached a media audience of 878.8 million people in 71 countries. Computed with no weighting or factoring, the AVE was valued at more than $592 million.”

There are a couple of questions unanswered in your figures.

First, the “audience of 878.8 million people” is merely the circulation of print publications and the estimated online potential audience, as well as the TV and radio ratings for outlets during the period, not viewers/listeners/ readers. Without additional data, this figure has no context. Online articles may only be visible for a few minutes, but the advertising totals don’t take that into account.

Second, are the AVE figures actual cost data, or book rates? Have the costs of producing the coverage been removed from the total AVE? These two adjustments are the most frequently left out of the calculations, but they are critical. The book rate for an ad may be $2,000, but the actual might be much less, even a quarter of the book rate. We don’t know. The staff at Cirque may have done all the PR work themselves, or they may have had the help of an agency. These costs must be accounted for.

Finally, what is the cost of an ad on the front page of the Globe and Mail, Wall Street Journal, New York Times — and are the articles truly equivalent to ads?

I’m delighted you close with the admonition that AVEs don’t tell us anything about outcomes — there are far too many PR pros who believe that the media attention IS an outcome.

Sean Williams
@CommAMMO
(Member, Institute for PR Measurement Commission)

With tongue firmly in cheek, here are two suggestions:
An admission of guilt: tweaculpa
What the heck was I thinking?: twhoops

Seriously though, I too am with Erin: call a spade a spade.

The best I can come up with following Joe’s rules is an apologtweet. (Admittedly, not that great)