Get PR up the pecking order!

In a study of major advertisers, 74% reported their 2023 budgets were under pressure, as reported by CampaignLive. If that’s true of advertising spend, then it’s certainly true of PR budget too.

As the economic climate bites, companies are rationalising their brand-building activities, focusing on short-term revenue generation. For in-house PR teams, this might mean sliding further down the pecking order of budget allocation, while for agencies it is certain to result in delayed decision-making about client projects and tougher negotiations about cost.

Demonstrating your worth at a time of shrinking resources can help you prove to management or clients that it would be short-sighted to skimp on PR. Compared to advertising, for example, PR has much higher utility. It is much lower cost, yet it can still be surprisingly effective at helping achieve those short-term revenue goals that everyone is focused on.

In a Metricomm study of UK supermarkets, we found that media coverage was equally as successful in driving interest in Google shopping as TV advertising for the same brands. Similarly, we can provide robust evidence that PR has an impact on purchase consideration, including Google search, website visits and sales. In fact, media coverage is a far more powerful element in the customer journey than most senior leaders realise.

To demonstrate the extent of PR effectiveness, there is no point starting with volume of coverage. Metricomm’s AI-based analysis has demonstrated that analysis must be based on the size of audience that engages with media coverage in order to provide proof of impact on business results at very high levels of confidence. If you know the size of audience and how to measure their response to PR, it is possible to show statistically that the relationship between media coverage and commercial outcomes cannot be down to chance alone.

If this is a conversation you would like to have with your manager, or your clients, we can provide sample analysis to help you make your case for getting PR higher up the pecking order. Email us on hello@metricomm.com to learn more.